Self-determination

JUST a day after Prime Minister Yousuf Reza Gilani repeated his government’s position that the Kashmir issue was distracting the Pakistan military from the War on Terror because it was the cause of the Pakistan-India tension that kept so much of the military on the eastern frontier, the relevant United Nations subcommittee passed a resolution, which supported self-determination, on a Pakistani proposal. It will be placed before the UN General Assembly for approval next month. The resolution condemned military intervention, occupation and aggression. Passed with the support of about 50 Asian, Latin American and African states, it also called for an end to discrimination, exploitation and oppression. The resolution also called upon the Human Rights Council to take note of violations of human rights, especially in those areas where the struggle for self-determination was being waged against military occupation by a foreign force. There is probably no one who does not realise that the resolution is closely linked to both the Kashmir and Palestinian liberation struggles, with Pakistan being interested deeply in both of them.
However, the wording of the resolution shows more that it is India that is being referred to rather than Israel, though the resolution is also applicable to it. The resolution is also a timely reminder to the Pakistan government of the attention it must pay to both liberation struggles, but especially the first, at a time when the government, in its eagerness to placate foreign pro-Indian opinion, was trying in vain to cozy up to India. It is because of that, that Mr Gilani’s statement on Saturday to the US National Security Adviser was timely. It cannot be pressed too much upon our foreign interlocutors that it is incumbent upon them to bring pressure upon India to resolve the Kashmir issue, which not only might bring the two South Asian neighbours to nuclear war, but also prevents Pakistan from participating in the War on Terror as much as it can. Mr Gilani’s speaking of dialogue loses much of its force, not because of its logic, which is impeccable, but because India simply refuses to come to the negotiating table on one pretext after the other, the latest being the Mumbai attacks, now almost a year old.