AMERICA’s decision to pull most of is troops out of Saudi Arabia and all but close the big Prince Sultan air base there looks like a withdrawal but is actually a first step in an ambitious US plan to “remake” the Middle East.

The decision makers in Washington seem to think that the US-led victory in Iraq has provided them an opportunity to encourage political and economic reforms in a region where the failure of the authoritarian governments to adapt to the ways of the modern world and provide a decent life to their peoples has helped make the region a breeding ground for anti-Americanism and terrorism.

The US strategy appears to be two-pronged : the first goal is to change the “behaviour” of hostile regimes like Syria and Iran. Both belong to the ‘rejectionist group’ opposing any concessions to Israel to buy peace in the region. Stern warnings have already been issued to Syria to be followed by adequate diplomatic and economic pressure. Iran may be the next on the list as the neo-conservatives in Washington believe that Tehran’s theocratic regime is attempting to build nuclear weapons, an anathema under the Bush doctrine.

While the U.S is pressing its regional “enemies” for a change in behaviour, it is also taking a sceptical look at its friends and allies, Saudi Arabia being on top of the list.

For almost half a century, Washington has had an unwritten understanding with Riyadh whose central point was oil in exchange for protection: you give us oil and we shall provide you protection. The Saudi oil kept the American industry rolling and the royal family flourished under the US security umbrella.This understanding worked perfectly well until September 11, 2001 when the terrorists wreaked havoc in New York and Washington.

Fifteen of the nineteen hijackers came from the staunchest US ally in the region, Saudi Arabia. While the ruling family remained friendly to the US, the Saudi people were becoming resentful and increasingly anti-American. Despite the country’s oil wealth, per capita income has fallen in Saudi Arabia from $8,600 in 1981 to $6,800 in 2001.

These developments were mainly responsible for the historic statement of Secretary of State Colin Powell, four months ago, which indicated a major shift in the US policy in the region. In a major speech on December 12 at Heritage Foundation, a Washington’s think-tank, Powell openly criticized Arab rulers for keeping their people in poverty and oppression. He rejected the hitherto followed policy of ignoring political repression in oil-rich Arab countries in exchange for reliable supplies of cheap crude oil. “I no longer think it is affordable and sustainable,” said the US Secretary of State.

The decision to pull US forces out of Saudi Arabia is the first part of an attempt to change the current dynamics. The principal reason behind the decision, arrived at by “mutual consent”, was that the continuing presence of US forces in the country had started threatening the security of the House of Saud by giving its opponents and Islamic extremists a legitimate ground for inciting passions against the ruling family. Osama bin Laden, who himself belonged to a rich business family of Saudi Arabia, had given the presence of “infidels” in the Arabian Peninsula, as one of the reasons for his jihad against the US and its allies in the region. It is not unlikely that after the pull-out of US forces the vacuum will be filled by some Islamic country, most probably Pakistan.

The strategy in the short term appears to be to bolster the House of Saud against Islamic militants and rivals. In the longer term, the Bush administration hopes to persuade the Saudi rulers to introduce important reforms which may help the conservative society adapt and adjust to the needs of modernity. Washington also wants Riyadh to ensure that Saudi nationals stop funding extremist Islamic groups that actively promote fanatacism and terrorism.

The decision makers in Washington, however, need to know that the introduction of political and economic reforms, though urgently needed in the Arab world — in fact, in the Islamic world at large — is not going to prove a talisman for them. A very important reason for the increasing anti-Americanism in the Islamic world is that their blind support to Israel has been encouraging Tel Aviv to persist in refusing to arrive at a just and equitable settlement of the Palestinian issue.

On April 30, President George Bush unveiled the much-awaited international “roadmap” for peace in the Middle East. The plan, formulated by the United States, European Union, United Nations and Russia, envisions a Palestinian state by 2005. It also calls for a rollback of Israeli settlements, which is going to be the real sticking point.

A “viable” Palestinian state, as promised by the plan, is not possible without a rollback of settlements and territorial adjustments by the Israelis. It may be recalled that at an Arab League summit last year, the Arab countries agreed to have normal relations with Israel in exchange for a land-for-peace swap that produces a viable Palestinian state and removes Israeli forces from all territories occupied since 1967.

It is no more than wishful thinking that the hawkish government of Ariel Sharon will ever agree to the Arab League formula without real arm-twisting by the US — something that is unthinkable as long as Israel has an influential and powerful lobby in Washington.

Soon after the September 11 tragedy, President Bush asked: “Why do they hate us?”. This was not a rhetorical query. He and the American people really wanted to know the reason behind the rage vented through the homicidal attacks. President Bush suggested that the reason was the very greatness of America — its wealth and power. But his critics claimed that the real problem lay in the tendency of the United States to support repressive regimes, especially in the Middle East, and not to put sufficient pressure on Israel to come to a just and equitable settlement with the Palestinians.

How the hawks amongst the neo-conservatives control the Bush administration’s Middle East policy was made amply clear by the recent remarks of the former Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives and an influential member of the Pentagon’s Defence Policy Board, Newt Gingrich. Speaking at the neo-conservative think tank, American Enterprise Institute, he charged that the Bush administration was split between two “world views”: the State Department world-view as “one of process, politeness and accommodation” and the president’s world view of “facts, values and outcomes”. Gingrich criticized the supposed pro-Arab bias of the Near East Bureau of the State Department.

According to the latest issue of the Economist (April 26-May 2), former British cabinet minister Lord Jopling told the House of Lords on March 18 that the neo-conservatives “now have a stranglehold on the Pentagon and seem, as well, to have a compliant armlock on the president himself”. Most of the neo-conservatives are Jewish.

A member of the French parliament is reported by the Economist to have quoted Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin saying the hawks in the US administration are in the hands of the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon. If this assessment is correct, any optimism about the prospects of the recently announced roadmap becomes misplaced.

The writer is a former ambassador.

THE really evil crimes are committed not in anger, but after careful planning in an atmosphere free from the qualms of conscience generally by the influential and wealthy. The detection of the well-connected criminal is extremely difficult and successful prosecution a near impossibility.

An ill-equipped, corrupt and mostly incompetent police force is no match for such criminals. With the establishment of the Citizens Police Liaison Committee and as a result of the untiring effort and guidance provided by the men heading it, the effectiveness and credibility of the CPLC was established. Karachi was fortunate to have men of the calibre of Mr. Nazim Haji and Mr. Jamil Yusuf. What then is most surprising is that every effort is being made to dismantle the CPLC.

Dr Ishratul Ibad, amongst his first acts as governor, decided to remove Jamil Yusuf as head of the CPLC. Why? No reason has been offered for this arbitrary act of the governor and the one which defies explanation. Mr. Jamil Yusuf was doing admirable work. He was volunteering his time, money and effort to combat serious crime. He managed to develop a little confidence in a much abused and feared police force.

His credibility was established by his performance. Many well-to-do citizens unable to cope with the upsurge in Karachi’s crime simply emigrated while others relocated their businesses to safer places. The brave stayed back to be counted. The governor along with other colleagues sojourned in safe and pleasant London.

The governor is appointed by the president and is to “hold office during the pleasure of the president”, though the political reality is that Dr. Ibad is the nominee of the MQM and part of the price demanded (and received) by it for supporting the chosen government of General Pervez Musharraf.

Without a courageous and brave man like Jamil Yusuf heading the CPLC, few people would have confidence in even reporting crimes. It is a commonly held perception that reporting a crime to the police compounds the suffering of the victims. Jamil Yusuf was the people’s man standing by victims in times of their greatest ordeals. He was a thorn in the side of the powerful and organized crime lobby. Criminals whose tentacles reach the holders of high offices could not tolerate a God-fearing honest man, immune from political pressure, bribes, intimidation or threats. Jamil Yusuf’s removal is a great victory for criminals. Criminals like Shaikh Muhammad Amjad who abducted and murdered Shakir Latif, a promising young barrister. Shaikh Amjad was a veritable pillar of society, who lived in an expensive neighbourhood, was admitted to the membership of Karachi’s select clubs and consorted with the well heeled and establishment figures. He abducted and murdered Shakir but coolly demanded ransom for his release. With the close cooperation of the police, the CPLC managed to apprehend him red-handed. This was not the first time that Amjad had abducted and killed and if it was not for Shakir’s family, the CPLC and the police, it would not have been the last.

However, mere apprehension of a killer does not bring him to justice; the crime against him has to be proved in a court of law on the basis of cogent evidence. Sloppy investigation or incompetent handling of the case by prosecution lawyers often results in an acquittal. And if the criminal is well connected his chances of conviction dramatically decrease because he is able to buy up or intimidate witnesses.

With the help of the CPLC and Mr Muhammad Ilyas Khan, the special public prosecutor, it was ensured that the case would be properly conducted. From the arrest to conviction of Amjad and having exhausted the appellate process took about a year and a half, which is a remarkable achievement in Pakistan. The High Court in its judgment noted the work of the CPLC then headed by Jamil Yusuf as “very commendable”, which is a rare tribute.

Karachi’s citizens wanted Jamil Yusuf to stay as the CPLC chief, as is evident from numerous newspaper letters and statements condemning his removal. The only person who has spoken out in support of Jamil Yusuf’s sacking is MQM’s Mr Kunwar Khalid Younus. (Dawn, April 13). Must party politics intrude into everything?

Mr Younus contends that for institutions to develop there must be constant change of leadership. But what he conveniently overlooks is that there is no maximum tenure for those who are not paid a salary, and who selflessly serve. In any case, if Mr Younus does not say anything about the fact that the MQM has seen no change in its top leadership for a period far longer than Jamil Yusuf heading the CPLC.

The fact remains that not a single person who is not a party member of the MQM has supported this act of the governor. Can the taxpayers not decide who is to head the CPLC? After all, the CPLC is also a check on the government influencing police investigations and containing political interference in the running of the police. Is this anathema to the governor or the government of Sindh?

General Pervez Musharraf coined the popular term ‘Pakistan First’, but he now appears to be more interested in saving those who do his bidding. If he continues to look away from the anti-people acts of his proteges in the province what comes first is becoming all too clear.

AS I walked into my bank some time ago I was greeted with posters and written slogans announcing a Courtesy Week. I found the entire staff, including the manager, tense because of the restraints they had to impose on themselves during the seven days.

It was the last day, and as the cashier, an old acquaintance, gave me my money, he said petulantly, “Thank God this will be over tomorrow and we can come back to normal.” I am sorry I couldn’t go to the bank the next day to witness the staff’s relief and see them without the fixed smiles on their faces.

Special weeks are great favourites with us. Whenever we have an ideal or objective that we know we are not inclined to attain, we at once hold a week to highlight it, whether it is tree-planting or punctuality on the railway or cleanliness in our cities. This last was observed with great eclat in Rawalpindi last year when the Australian High Commissioner, broom in hand, helped to remove the dirt from a particularly nauseating locality in pursuance of the “Clean up the world” campaign. I hope he didn’t make the mistake of visiting the place again to see it come back to normal.

I wish someone had suggested to General Ziaul Haq to have a Democracy Week in Pakistan every year. I say this because we mistakenly take him to be a military dictator, when his son Ejazul Haq insists that he was a democrat at heart, only he didn’t get the opportunity to implement his ideas. (I suppose the awam can be blamed for this too). In that case, he would have loved the Democracy Week, and all his admirers in politics (some of whom are till around in high places) and the now defunct NPT paper would have waxed eloquent about the blessings of democracy, secure in the knowledge that it was nowhere in sight.

In his address to the nation to inaugurate the week, the general would have told us how he had been enamoured of democracy ever since he had read about it in Greek history in Delhi’s St. Stephen’s College and how he was determined to introduce it in Pakistan within ninety years, ninety days being too short to prepare for it. Till then the nation could do with his brand of Islam which was only a second name for democracy.

I remember how several years ago the then chief of the TNFJ, the Shia political party, had proposed the holding of a National Integration Week. I was sure the idea would meet with instant approval from all quarters since no one was really interested in national integration. I don’t recall now why it found no takers. We didn’t have the ASSP in those days to oppose it, but may be the other religious parties too didn’t want to be caught following a Shia initiative.

I don’t know whether you will agree with me, but I think the number of special weeks being observed in Pakistan is pitifully small. It doesn’t even amount to one a month, which is a matter of shame for a nuclear country. We must do something about it. If the government gives the lead, the nation, which is bound to it through the Legal Framework Order, is sure to respond with fervour.

Leaving some time for the two Eids and Muharram (and of course the month of fasting) we must fully occupy the rest of the year and have at least 40 special weeks. We have an endless variety of aims, targets and ideals that we have no intention of ever fulfilling, and they must all be made the subject of special weeks, so that during a seven-day period we are totally engrossed with them, turn by turn.

For example, there are honesty, tolerance, hard work, good manners, respect for tradition, knowledge, truth, helpfulness, charity, unselfishness — there is no end to the good things that we are never serious about and which qualify on that account for intense concentration for seven days. A by-product of this exercise would be that by observing special weeks we shall get rid of the weight of these desirable attributes on our conscience for the rest of the year. Imagine the benefit to the national psyche!

There are qualities that may require more than one week annually. A mere seven days might not be sufficient to express our loyalty to them, without of course harbouring any intention to adopt them in our daily lives. Tolerance, for example. The observance could be broken up and we could have a week each for religious tolerance, political tolerance, social tolerance, sports tolerance and other rare forms of tolerance which all seem to be dying for want of use.

But we must beware of an anti-corruption week. I would not advocate that for anything, for fear that if a special week is observed for it the corrupt might make it an excuse for trying to gain their whole year’s target of ill-gotten earnings in those seven days. That would surely break the people’s back, or whatever is left of it, by the government’s endeavours to improve the economy.

This has already happened in one sector. I remember that during the Traffic Week in Islamabad some time ago, men of the Traffic Police made hay even though the sun was not shining because of the rains. The week made no difference to the public, except to those road-users who had to pay through the nose for alleged traffic violations, but there was a strong demand from the traffic police itself to have at least one such week every three months. They said this was a must if they were to continue to keep their children in classy English schools.

I have no space to mention other subjects, but let me say that special weeks are great morale-boosters. Bureaucrats love them because they help to show how hard they are working, while newspapers welcome them because they invariably lead to special supplements full of extra advertisements. Thus, apart from the reasons cited by me in the beginning, they spread happiness all around.

“THEY don’t negotiate like we do,” explained Governor Bill Richardson of New Mexico, former US ambassador to the United Nations and one of the North Korean regime’s few channels of communication with the United States, after meeting with Pyongyang’s representative in January.

“They believe that to get something, they have to step up the rhetoric, be more belligerent.” They have certainly stepped up the rhetoric now. At a meeting between North Korean and US diplomats in Beijing last week, North Korean delegate Ri Gun told US Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly that Pyongyang already has nuclear weapons, and has almost finished reprocessing 8,000 spent fuel rods from its reactor at Yongbyon, which would give it enough fissile material for half a dozen more.

Not only does North Korea have nuclear weapons, but it is prepared to test them or pass them on to other countries, or maybe even to terrorists, if Washington does not end the crisis on Pyongyang’s terms. “We can’t dismantle them,” Ri told Kelly. “It’s up to you whether we do a physical demonstration or transfer them.” President George W. Bush immediately accused North Korea of “blackmail” — but what can he do about it?

Iraq was easy, because its army had never been rebuilt after the catastrophic defeat of 1991, because Kuwait was willing to let the US use its territory as a launching pad for the invasion, and above all because Iraq had no ‘weapons of mass destruction’. The accusations about Iraqi WMD were needed to provide a legal pretext for the attack and persuade the US public that it was necessary, but Mr Bush must have known they probably didn’t exist — or at least, that was what his own intelligence services were telling him, particularly regarding any Iraqi nuclear capacity.

North Korea, by contrast, has the world’s third-biggest army, and consists mostly of mountains, not flat desert. There are US bases in South Korea, but it is most unlikely that South Korean President Roh Moo Hyun would let the US launch a war from there that could devastate the whole Korean peninsula. And North Korea is now openly saying it has nuclear weapons, and what does the US plan to do about it?

What is the United States going to do about it? The first thing it must do is to figure out what is going on under the bouffant hairdo of North Korea’s diminutive ‘Dear Leader’, Kim Jong Il. Why did he have his diplomats to tell Kelly last October that North Korea had a nuclear weapons programme, and now that it has actual nukes? There is little doubt that Kim was cheating on the 1994 ‘Agreed Framework’ deal that ended the last crisis over North Korean nuclear weapons. He shut down the plutonium-fuelled reactor at Yongbyon at that time in return for free shipments of oil and a promise by the US, South Korea and Japan to build two new pressurised-water reactors that do not produce much in the way of weapons-grade material. He even admitted inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency to check that the Yongbyon reactor stayed shut. But he did simultaneously start up a secret uranium enrichment programme (which does not need a reactor to produce fissile material).

By 1998 Washington’s suspicions were growing, but President Clinton’s administration did not panic because nobody thought the programme was anywhere near to success. The panic began fifteen months ago, when President Bush included North Korea in his ‘axis of evil’ hit-list — and it was a panic in Pyongyang, not in Washington.

Kim Jong Il thought he had a deal with the US (even though he was cheating on it, and the US wasn’t moving very fast on building the promised reactors either). Suddenly, reading the intelligence reports and news briefs over breakfast one morning, he discovers that the world’s greatest power has decided to destroy his regime. Of course he panics.

We know from ex-White House speech-writer David Frum’s tell-all account that North Korea got included in the ‘axis of evil’ almost by accident: there were two Muslim countries, Iraq and Iran, on the list already, and they just needed a non-Muslim country for ‘balance’. But in Pyongyang it felt like a death sentence — and when it became clear last autumn that the US was going to execute the sentence on Iraq, North Korea went into overdrive. It deliberately revealed its secret uranium-enrichment programme to Washington.

Since then it has expelled the IAEA inspectors, withdrawn from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, started up the Yongbyon reactor again, and now claims to have actual nuclear weapons. — Copyright

FOR those of us who have always considered good-neighbourly relations between India and Pakistan a prerequisite for sustained subcontinental progress, it is much too soon to start jumping for joy. The recent thaw between New Delhi and Islamabad cannot be presumed to foreshadow a historical breakthrough that would lead both sides to eschew in the long term the confrontationism that has blighted ties for the past 55 years.

The considerably improved atmosphere nevertheless warrants a sigh of relief. Zafarullah Khan Jamali’s enthusiastic response to Atal Behari Vajpayee’s overture on the resumption of a dialogue has facilitated gestures that unequivocally deserve to be welcomed. The resumption of normal diplomatic relations and air services will bring to an end a ridiculous hiatus that witnessed heightened tensions and led international observers to describe South Asia as the most dangerous place on earth. Sporting links, cultural contacts and preferential trade could follow.

India and Pakistan are not on the verge of becoming the best of friends, although it must be hoped that they will do so one day. It would be safe to conclude, however, that they are also not on the brink of hostilities, as they appeared to be on more than one occasion during the previous 18 months.

This could suddenly change, of course. On both sides of the border there are forces that thrive on bellicosity between the two nations. An outrage engineered by any one of them could in one vile stroke negate all sensible achievements and set barking once more the dogs of war.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. The Indian authorities would be making a vital concession to realism were they to acknowledge that not every violence-prone extremist group takes its orders from the ISI or any other component of the ruling structure in Pakistan. Most of these groups draw sustenance from the fact that their acts of terror entail political repercussions. In order to deny them that satisfaction, it is essential that moves towards rapprochement be intensified rather than suspended whenever terrorism rears its ugly head.

It is also important for New Delhi to recognize that at least some of what is described as separatist violence in Jammu and Kashmir is an indigenous response to military repression, and that the authorities in Pakistan do not — and perhaps cannot — control the agenda of every extremist faction. Besides, infiltration across the Line of Control can be conclusively dealt with only within the context of a comprehensive settlement of the Kashmir issue.

Significantly, the Indian government appears to have stopped insisting on an end to cross-border terrorism as an essential prerequisite for negotiations. Although related rhetoric has not ceased, this is nonetheless a healthy concession to reality.

The sharp deterioration in Indo-Pakistan relations that brought the two nations to the brink of war occurred in the context of the first phase of what the United States describes as its war on terror. Miffed by Washington’s cool response to India’s hasty offer of its soil as a launching pad for the assault on Afghanistan, New Delhi apparently clung on to the hope that in its mood of uncompromising hostility towards all things Islamic, the US would, with a bit of instigation, “sort out” Pakistan.

The doctrine of pre-emption renewed its determination: if the US could move militarily against Iraq on the basis of the threat it allegedly posed, surely it would be at least equally justifiable for India to regard Pakistan in a similar light. In their eagerness to draw parallels, the ideologues of the Bharatiya Janata Party evidently overlooked the fact that the US is rarely inclined to share (except with Israel) the imperialist rights it arrogates by virtue of being the sole global superpower.

New Delhi and Islamabad formally opposed the aggression against Iraq, and it has been suggested that the fate of Baghdad has served to concentrate minds in both capitals. That may indeed be the case, but it does not satisfactorily explain the recent outbreak of bonhomie. The two sides have been trying to hose down speculation that the changed mood is a response to pressure from Washington. But in the light of Colin Powell’s recent conversations with his Indian and Pakistani counterparts and State Department tough guy Richard Armitage’s visit to the region this week, it is hard to regard the disavowals at face value.

It does not follow, of course, that one must be suspicious of peace moves in the subcontinent simply because they happen to coincide with US foreign policy objectives. It must be hoped, however, that last week’s gestures are grounded in sincerity. While Pakistan has more or less consistently been lobbying for a dialogue, India had hitherto proved to be a reluctant interlocutor. Its dramatically changed approach will turn out to be worthwhile only if it springs from a change of heart, not if it’s merely a calculated response to persistent prodding from an overweening superpower.

India’s cool response to Jamali’s invitation to Vajpayee should not be viewed with dismay, because it makes good sense for high-profile summits to be preceded by negotiations at a lower level, as Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri acknowledged earlier this week. Kasuri’s willingness to put business above deeper and darker matters should also prove to be a fruitful tack. It is also worth recognizing that after the Lahore/Kargil and Agra fiascos, India is understandably wary. It is probably no coincidence that the top-level contacts thus far have involved Vajpayee and Jamali, rather than the man disarmingly identified by the latter as his boss.

Pakistan’s prime minister appears to have a penchant for speaking in non sequiturs — either that or his riddles and proverbs don’t translate too well into English. But it seems unfair for him to have attracted flak on account of a frank — and, frankly, incontrovertible — admission about who wears the pants in the PM-presidential (and, by extension, the civilian-military) relationship.

It has been every Pakistani army chief’s wish to institutionalize a military role in political affairs. Last year’s Legal Framework Order was General Pervez Musharraf’s contribution to this long-standing drive. Sharply at variance in several ways with his purported aim of introducing “true” democracy, the LFO could also be interpreted as an attempt surreptitiously to institute what is effectively a presidential form of government.

Equally alarming were the provisions whereby the ersatz 2002 referendum is elevated to a valid electoral procedure, and the obvious anomaly involved in a military chief serving simultaneously as the head of state is conveniently glossed over.

Musharraf, in his occasional Ziaul Haq mode, apparently thought he could get away with it by manipulating the veritable alphabet soup of PMLs and various other parties in the fray. He may have come close to doing so. After last year’s flawed elections, the parliamentary benches are once more creaking under the weight of a broadly familiar range of maulanas, makhdooms, chaudhrys and sardars. Yet some of them are willing to make a noise about the brazen attempt to incorporate the LFO in the Constitution without so much as a token vote.

Musharraf did not like the sound of that noise. Not only because it meant postponing indefinitely his address to a joint session of parliament, but also because those accustomed to military discipline and clear-cut lines of command generally find it hard to come to terms with certain aspects of democracy.

The uncompromising stance initially adopted by Musharraf and his allies over the non-negotiability of the LFO has given way to a more considered stance incorporating a degree of flexibility. The amorphous opposition has responded in kind. Amid reports of differences of opinion both within the ruling coalition and among its rivals, it is difficult to predict what lies ahead. Both sides speak with multiple voices. They also have a tendency to contradict themselves. And it is certainly not unknown for the contradictions to be contradicted, too.

Negotiations and reasonable compromises are the only way out of the LFO-generated constitutional crisis, and an all-parties committee (without Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain at its helm) seems like a sensible means, under the circumstances, of thrashing out differences and identifying points of concurrence. But don’t expect everything to be sorted out by next week. Ultimately, a great deal depends on how much Musharraf is prepared to concede, and whether he is willing to put the national interest above his promises to Washington.

The president’s reluctance to give up his military post suggests he is under no illusions about the source of his power. But he must also realize that the anomaly makes a mockery of Pakistan’s democratic pretensions.

The quest for a solution could prove to be a drawn out affair, and one can only hope it will not interfere unduly with the opportunity for warmer relations with India offered by a vastly improved subcontinental climate. The challenge will be to prove that we can chew gum and shake hands at the same time. For the sake of generations to come, let’s give it a shot.

E-mail: mahirali@journalist.com