HYDERABAD: Govt asked to resist external pressure: Foreign policy
Bureau Report
HYDERABAD, Feb 2: Foreign affairs experts and scholars have recommended that Pakistan should not succumb to extraneous pressures, which could be detrimental to its supreme national interest.
They also advised that without compromising on principles Pakistan should seek to resolve contentious issues through dialogue and negotiations rather than through conflict and confrontation thus enabling diversion of funds from security to development.
They were reading papers at a seminar on "New directions of Pakistan's foreign policy: Geopolitics, security and development" organised by the Department of International Relations and Area Study Centre of the University of Sindh at Allama I. I. Kazi Campus on Thursday.
They said that Pakistan should not place all its eggs in one basket but should explore other geopolitical options with a view to balancing its foreign policy.
The country should lay greater emphasis on non-traditional aspects of security and work on a regional security regime with common human security objectives, they stressed.
They said that based on the guidelines of Quaid-i-Azam Pakistan's foreign policy should be made moderate, progressive, enlightened and proactive rather than reactive and in consonance with the core Islamic values of peace, tolerance and fair play.
Institute of Regional Studies Islamabad President Major General (Rtd) Jamshed Ayaz Khan said that Pakistan was endeavouring to remodel itself to the Quaid-i-Azam’s moderate, progressive, democratic and dynamic country where Islamic values should prevail.
He said that new directions in the age-old confrontational policy with India were visible because composite dialogue process was making slow but steady progress forcing India to come around to discussing Kashmir in a serious manner.
Mr Khan said that Afghan policy was changed after 9/11 and the present day realities in Afghanistan and globalisation were compelling Pakistan to fine tune its policy in the tribal areas.
He said that Pak-Afghan relations had come under stress and needed priority attention. Pakistan needed peace to put its house in order, shun extremism and embrace moderation, enlightenment, gender equality and values of human decency and dignity, he said.
He said that Pakistan at its birth inherited a very difficult and somewhat impossible security situation vis-à-vis its powerful neighbour India who showed no sign of reconciliation.
Sindh University Vice-Chancellor Dr Mazharul Haq Siddiqui said in his presidential remarks that the role of directions in shaping the policy was always foundational and paramount.
The foreign policy formulation had to keep in view that most important factor of national power and reliable quality of human resource, he said.
Dr Rodney W. Jones, president of Policy Architect International USA, said reading his paper on "Future of US-Pakistan relations" that Pakistan and the United States needed to keep their relationship productive and mutually beneficial.
Former ambassador Dr Ross Masood Hussain said that foreign policy of any country constituted an endless dialogue between the powers of continuity and the power of change.
Within this deterministic matrix every nation had to determine its objectives in the light of its actual powers and potential available for the pursuit of its objectives, he added.
Dr Rasool Bux Rais, a professor of Lahore University of Management Sciences, said in his paper on "Pakistan's new partnership with United States", that Pakistan today operated in a very difficult international climate, expending foreign policy energies on proving its sincerity and steadfastness as a frontline member of coalition against terrorism.
