
In the wake of recent visit of Saudi Crown Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz
Pakistan's policy position on Syria keeps coming up for public debate,
as much for the initial obfuscation on the part of government on the
outcome of visit as for the spanner thrown in the works by a news agency
report. In fact it was the report which set off the debate by claiming
that Pakistan agreed to sell anti-aircraft and anti-tank missiles to the
Kingdom for onward supply to anti-government Syrian rebel forces. And
this, the report suggested, was in furtherance of the Pak-Saudi
agreement inked by the two sides during the visit to help set up a
'transitional government' in Syria. To the public mind, and rightly so,
such a policy shift at a time when most of the challenges to our
national security stemming from the growing menace of sectarianism are
already on our hands, would add to our woes. All that the government had
been saying up till then about the Syrian civil war that Pakistan is
greatly concerned over gross violation of human rights and would like
the two sides in the civil war to hammer out a peaceful solution. Never
ever there was any suggestion made by Islamabad in support of a
'transitional government' in Damascus, which simply stated means the
ouster of the Assad regime. That the Kingdom's number two had come, on
the heels of a high-profile long-awaited visit by the Saudi foreign
minister, at the time their erstwhile guest Nawaz Sharif is in power in
Pakistan - perceptibly there was this rich concoction that tended to
strengthen the impression that Pakistan was going to join the Syrian
opposition. In fact there are even rumours of volunteers being enlisted.
So there are now the PM Advisor Sartaj Aziz and Foreign Office
spokesperson on job to inform the nation of the truth in the matter.
There is nothing new in the Pak-Saudi joint statement, he told the
National Assembly, adding 'it was in keeping with the declared position
on Syria...the UN-backed Action Group in its Geneva meeting on June 30,
2012 had proposed setting up transitional government including members
of government and opposition with executive powers'. And as for the much
talked about sale-purchase of arms the Prince Salman travelled on to
New Delhi from Islamabad and there too he signed 'defence pact aimed to
help defence personnel of the two sides to work closely and learn from
each other's experiences'. As for the arms sold to Saudi Arabia making
way to Syria the Foreign Office spokesman insists it is not possible
given that defence deals invariably carry end-users certificate which
ensures that our arms are not resold or provided to a third country. So
far so good; but one would have beef with the spokesperson when she
rejects public criticism saying ill-informed people are liable to
misunderstand the outcome of the Saudi visit, and added that "Bottom
line is that foreign policy represents your national interests'. She is
right but only to the extent of generality of her remark.
A large majority in Pakistan looks at the Syrian imbroglio in
its wider context, both for its regional complexity and its negative
impact on the unity of Muslim world. Given that civil war in Syria is
increasingly becoming a direct clash between the Iran-supported Assad
regime and Saudi-backed opposition it tends to suck in volunteers from
the Shia-Sunni divide. Already, as poignantly pointed out by Prince
Karim Aga Khan in his speech to a joint sitting of Canadian parliament,
the tensions between the two denominations "have increased massively in
scope and intensity recently and have been exacerbated by external
interventions". "In Pakistan, Malaysia, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Bahrain,
Yemen, Somalia and Afghanistan it is becoming a disaster". He aptly
compared the Shia-Sunni divide with the situation in Ireland with
Catholics and Protestants pitted against each other, and warned against
being oblivious to this reality. Not that we think Pakistan is being led
to the battlefields blindfold, but do detect the shift in our foreign
policy on civil war in Syria. That Geneva-I backed the idea of
transitional government and therefore this understanding with Saudi
Arabia - two years on we find the argument a little hollow. And we want a
transitional government in Syria because it would serve our 'national
interests' - we need to redefine as to what constitutes a national
interest. Only at the risk of being dubbed as grossly obstinate and
irrelevant one would refuse to admit that to our blood-soaked sectarian
showdown is as much a national creation as the 'kindness' of our foreign
friends. No wonder then when Foreign Office justifies shift in policy
on Syria in line with national interests the people look around and
wonder.
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