[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]A warning to Afghanistan[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 8th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani warned Afghanistan on October 6 that it should stop all cross-border attacks from its territory into Pakistan and added that “the army had made all arrangements to counter any terrorist attack from across the Afghan border”. The warning is significant as it was delivered on the occasion a joint military exercise with Saudi land forces near Jhelum. Although the exercise was a continuation of old practice, it will be taken as a warning to Pakistan’s two antagonists: Afghanistan and India who have just signed a strategic agreement.

The Foreign Office in Islamabad underlined the possibility that Pakistan may view certain aspects of this agreement with concern. Its spokesperson said the same day that the two countries should “avoid taking steps that may affect regional stability”. Read together with General Kayani’s assertion that Saudi Arabia has always contributed to “regional stability”, it seems that India and Pakistan have already started communicating in a hostile manner. Some analysts in Pakistan have made dire predictions about what they say is the “hidden agenda” behind the India-Afghanistan deal, claiming that it is backed by the US which is now taking its anger out on Pakistan.

Unfortunately, exchanges between Afghanistan and Pakistan have taken on a bitter edge — despite a recent remark by President Hamid Karzai that the latter was Afghanistan’s “twin brother” — after the recent assassination of High Peace Committee president Prof Burhanuddin Rabbani in Kabul. As the Foreign Office took care to concede, the making of an agreement between two members of the Saarc group of states was perfectly legitimate, but Pakistan would study the content of the agreement carefully to see if it was inimical to its interests. As things stand, Pakistan itself is in the process of finalising a far more important trade agreement with India. The region would have benefited as a whole had the three members of Saarc come together and made the India-Afghanistan agreement a tripartite accord with Pakistan giving India a transit route and India allowing investments in Pakistan.

With minds inflamed by purely military thinking, Pakistanis tend to be convinced that India has been finally given the go-ahead by America to establish itself firmly in Afghanistan. And if it trained Afghan military personnel in Afghanistan, that might result in the posting of Indian troops there; and this will challenge Pakistan military directly under the doctrine of ‘strategic depth’. If this kind of thinking is advanced further, Pakistan will obliged to bite off far more than it can chew in the coming months. In India, however, there are words of caution in the post-accord period, advising New Delhi against military escalation against Pakistan in Afghanistan. But the truth is that if Pakistan does nothing — which means abstaining from ruining its economy further — the Indians will soon realise the limits of their penetration in Afghanistan. The Foreign Office must develop a less hostile posture and protect the advance it has made in the direction of increased trade with India. It should not allow the talks to wither on the bough just because the Indians will now train Afghan military personnel. It is not only India and Afghanistan as Saarc members who have moved closer, India has closed ranks with Iran as well despite American persuasion to the contrary.

If the current military thinking persists, India and Pakistan can step up the negative activities that South Asia and the neighbouring regions simply can’t afford. India has an air base and a military hospital in Farkhor in Tajikistan which it can refurbish and use; and Pakistan can encourage the Pashtun warriors of Afghanistan to make India suffer simply because its accord with Kabul will tend to leave the Pashtuns out and benefit a predominantly non-Pashtun officer cadre of the Afghan Army. Making Saudi Arabia an actor in South Asia is not advisable because of the internal Pakistani trend of sectarian violence by non-state actors funded by the Arabs against Iran. The region of South Asia can be stable if its states develop economic synergies instead of military confrontation. If this happens, extra-regional actors will become irrelevant.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Great people not to fly with[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B][B][RIGHT]October 8th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

The main thrust of the case against PIA has been its financial mismanagement. The national airline is widely perceived — correctly as it turns out — to be a white elephant that is hemorrhaging money. But, as a recent investigative series in this paper shows, PIA, and more importantly those who fly it, face far greater dangers. The report reveals that PIA’s aging fleet of aircraft have now become increasingly creaky, with technical issues regularly cropping up, forcing many planes to be grounded. So poorly maintained are many of these planes that the European Union may once again be on the verge of banning the airline’s A-310 planes, something it had done just over a year ago.

Part of the problem is that the system of regulatory oversight is very weak. The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), which should be ensuring the safety of the airline’s planes, often has officials who have previously worked at PIA, so there is at times a conflict of interest. In any case, both work under the same ministry, and that compromises the independence that the CAA should have, if it wants to be an effective regulator. Hence, no surprise that the authority is a tiger with no teeth — after all when was the last time an investigation report into an air crash in the country was made public? For the CAA to do its job, a law must be passed forbidding current and recent employees of airline companies from working for it. Also, all reports into airline mishaps, minor or serious, should be made public on the authority’s website so that there is transparency.

The national airline, for its part, must understand that it exists to serve its passengers, not its employees. It is poorly managed and inefficiently operated, and this is best reflected in it having one of the highest employees-to-plane ratios in the world. Years of political interference, patronage, nepotism and plain old complacency fostered by years of it being a monopoly have led to a situation where it loses billions every year. For it to have any hope of achieving a financial turnaround, mindsets of those who run it need to change. The airline needs to serve its fare-paying customers not ministers or members of parliament. It needs to raise its service standard, and drastically reduce its employee-plane ration. That is the only way to cutting costs, without which its long-term survival could be at stake.

[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Ten years after the invasion of Afghanistan[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B][B][RIGHT]October 9th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

In 2001, Afghanistan was invaded by an international force under a UN Security Council Chapter Seven resolution after al Qaeda, based in Afghanistan and Pakistan, successfully launched a terrorist attack on the United States. Under its charter, Nato invoked a mutual defence clause in sympathy with the US and sent in allied troops under the name of the International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) while America sent in its army under the rubric of ‘Enduring Freedom’. After 10 years, the war remains inconclusive and is being rated a defeat for America. There are no victors.

Then-US President George W Bush, who decided to respond to the al Qaeda attack, thought he could also attend to unfinished business with Iraq’s dictator Saddam Hussein and invaded Iraq, this time without the UN sanction, alienating some of the very allies who were fighting for its cause in Afghanistan. Many say that this ‘distraction’ caused ‘complications’ in the conduct of war in Afghanistan, and attribute to it the final decision to withdraw under President Barack Obama. But there were other complications, and the big one, at least in the eyes of the Americans, was Pakistan.

Pakistan had fought an earlier war as a frontline state against the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union. That war began after 1979 and America chose Pakistan as its major ally in it. A deniable war was fought by ‘non-state actors’ from the Pakistani hinterland and was concluded with a Soviet withdrawal ten years later. As the Afghan war heated up, millions of Afghan refugees poured into the neighbouring states of Iran and Pakistan.

Pakistan was host to the warrior militias of Afghanistan. It handled the weapons the allies sent in for the mujahideen and played favourites with the jihadi outfits, giving the lion’s share to the Hezb-e-Islami of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who was amenable to Pakistan’s other policy directions. As all this was going on, another event supervened, this time across Pakistan’s eastern border. Indian-administered Kashmir experienced an indigenous revolt against Indian occupation in 1989. Pakistan, which since 1980 was used to sending its proxies (across its western border initially), decided to send in ‘non-state actors’. At one point scores of jihadi organisations were training their warriors and infiltrating them into the Valley. But unlike Iran, which quarantined such organisations fighting in Afghanistan, Pakistan allowed them to be a part of the country’s civil society, using them to strengthen the madrassa network it was spawning with the help of Saudi funds. Jihad suited the programme of ‘hard Islam’ being implemented in Pakistan.

If today Pakistan complains of a two-front situation, one should recall that, part of the way through the Afghan war, it was conducting its proxy war on two fronts. Both Iran and Pakistan were hardening their ideology but the latter was allowing its jihadi warriors to be a part of the Islamisation campaign. Then the Soviet Union collapsed after being defeated in Afghanistan. The US came out the victor. Pakistan had to make some very important post-war examination of what it had done. This it did not do and mistakenly thought it, too, had won the war. It tried to send in the Afghan jihadi outfits into Afghanistan as an interim government but this led nowhere. By 1991, the mujahideen plunged into an internecine civil war and this went on for five long years. In 1996 the civil war ended after the Taliban took over and began history’s bloodiest governance under what they called Sharia. Pakistan had suffered ‘reverse indoctrination’ while handling the Islamic warriors. Saudi policies boomeranged as well.

In 2001, an al Qaeda plotter based out of Pakistan ended up destroying the World Trade Centre in New York. Following that Pakistan had little choice but to join the UN-sanctioned invasion of Afghanistan but this went against the grain of its own internal ideological change. The ‘non-state actors’ turned against the Pakistani state, resentment against this stance began to surface in many crucial state institutions, and the army under its chief at that time, Pervez Musharraf, began to be accused of playing a double game.

The Saudi boomerang has been the biggest scourge. Admitted that the ideological virus that caused the Taliban to impose one of history’s worst reigns of terror against the Afghan population, was of Pakistani origin, but the impulse for this hardening of the religious arteries was effected with dollars from Saudi Arabia. During the decade of the 1990s, Pakistan experienced its worst phase of political instability. Following that, it was not given time to recover by the military takeover of 1999 after the military under Musharraf fought its most foolhardy battle of Kargil, which ended in an embarrassing withdrawal and India claiming victory.

The military must have been more than surprised by the events of 9/11, not least because of its repercussions on Afghanistan and on Pakistan. The establishment quickly took out the — rather wilted — olive branch and offered it to India, at the same time rewarding covert warriors who were sent on, kill-missions, across the Line of Control.

One such ‘commando’ called Ilyas Kashmiri later turned against Pakistan along with many of his retired officer colleagues and began to carry out assassinations inside Pakistan. Al Qaeda, along with the Mullah Umar government, relocated to Pakistan and were offered as trophy a fully battle-worthy army composed of Pakistan’s former proxy warriors, in the form of the Taliban. Pakistan progressively lost its writ of the state in the face of this new force. This was the time when a serving army chief, twice, came under attack by the jihadis and when the motorcade of a corps commander came under heavy fire (Lt-Gen Ahsan Saleem Hyat, who survived the attack, went on to become the army’s vice-chief).

If one were to look closely, Pakistan is the only loser. And it shows. Al Qaeda and the Taliban of both Pakistani and Afghan varieties are melded into one terrorist army veritably ruling parts of the country. They have won control of the Tribal Areas and of some settled districts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, can destabilise big cities like Karachi, and kill minority communities they are programmed to destroy by their foreign masters. In the climax to this tragic drama, Pakistan’s latest ‘national consensus, the so-called APC, has chosen the wrong enemy once again.

[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]No armed wings, please[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 10th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Even when a politician in Pakistan says something that seems wholly unobjectionable, it is always best to try and tease out their motives for what they are saying and judge them by their intentions, not their words. PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif’s contention that political parties that have militant wings should be banned is on the surface, something everyone should support. Political parties in the country have used violence far too often as a strategic tool and the results have been less than salutary, as shown by the Supreme Court’s judgement on the Karachi violence. But Mr Sharif’s words reek of opportunism. The PML-N’s student wing, the Muslim Students Federation, has often enforced its authority on campus by resorting to violence. Many prominent figures in the party have also expressed support for militant outfits like the Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan and even maintained links with banned Punjabi groups. If the ban Sharif proposes is to be fairly enforced, then it would have to include his own party.

Just because the PML-N is also morally compromised in this regard, however, does not mean that the problem of political parties maintaining armed wings should be ignored. Rather, it should be acknowledged that every party with a significant following in the country has guns and thugs at its disposal. Since banning all these parties is not feasible, another solution must be sought. Ideally, law-enforcement agencies would be able to crackdown on militant wings within political parties but the police, too, tends to be affiliated to one political party or the other.

To the extent that a solution to this problem is possible, some hope is offered by the Supreme Court suo motu notice on the Karachi violence. By identifying the political parties that were responsible for the killings — which, as it turns out, was nearly all of them — the court has given the police cover to act against militant wings. Ideally, of course, the political parties on their own should purge their ranks of all such elements. The practise of political parties backing up their power with private armies is so well-entrenched that even a powerful Supreme Court may not be able to take them on. But placing our hope in the court is far more realistic than just banning the parties outright.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Bullets and bodies[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 10th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

The story we have heard, so many times, continues. Two more bullet-ridden bodies were found in Balochistan the other day, both belonging to young men who disappeared some weeks ago. The bodies, spotted by passersby in the town of Turbat, are stated to bear marks of torture. Does this shock us? Perhaps not enough. We have become far too accustomed too and hardened to such events. They have occurred frequently, with scores of bodies found over the last few months. International human rights monitoring bodies have associated the incidents with the intelligence agencies and their operations in Balochistan. But in spite of the proof that exists that something terribly wrong is occurring in the region, not enough seems to be happening to remedy it.

In short, our situation now is as bad as any of the Latin American or other dictatorships we have read about at various points in history. Like the people of Chile in the 1970s, the people of Balochistan occupy a kind of nightmare world where nationalists are ‘punished’ in a terrible fashion, apparently by state representatives. Even those who have survived — poets, writers, students, intellectuals — have in some cases, been so gravely physically and emotionally traumatised, that they will bear the scars for life. Those who have been released with their lives intact, have been warned never to speak out about their experiences — or risk yet worse fate, for themselves and their families.

Is this a situation we can live with? The answer quite obviously should be in the negative. Yet, the fact also is that outside Balochistan, concern for the province is far too limited. The government has not done enough either. The degree of anguish that should be present is simply not there. This adds to the problem there; its isolation only makes things worse and in fact aids the elements behind the atrocities. Something needs to be done. Balochistan needs to be saved; its people won back — and we must hope this task has not already been left too late, making success impossible in a province where frustration already runs deep.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Dengue takes its toll — still[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B][B][RIGHT]October 10th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Though dengue first became a threat to public health in 2006, each passing year sees an increase in the number of patients and the death toll it leaves in its wake. This year, Punjab is arguably the worst affected province, with over 14,760 cases and 186 people dead because of the disease. In Lahore, where 168 people have died so far, there are only three functional platelet separators, which is inadequate for the number of patients the province is facing. This year, as usual, saw the Punjab health department scrambling to its feet long after the time for preventive measures had passed. In the vacuum created by the government’s lack of action, charlatans are flourishing, since they at least offer people a hope of cure. The provincial health department has indicated that the epidemic is under control, but this does not mean success of the government because cooler weathers generally reduce the diseases’s incidence. In the same vein, Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif’s statement that a plan to counter dengue in the winter has been created must be taken with a pinch of salt. Dengue is a disease which strikes mostly between June and November, with cooler temperatures causing the strain to become dormant.

The chief minister is now addressing dengue seminars and inaugurating Facebook pages and hotlines for the disease — all very well, but not a substitute for basic administrative competence. The sincerity of the government’s efforts to fight against dengue is also suspect, with reports of fake dengue fumigations surfacing. Meanwhile, the PPP has taken the opportunity to malign the incompetent governance of the PML-N in Punjab, but instead of political bickering, both the federal and provincial governments should be working to bring the epidemic under control. In the absence of a clearly chalked-out plan, the best citizens can do is protect themselves by wearing long, loose clothing, making sure there aren’t any standing pools of water around their houses and workplaces and using mosquito repellants.

[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]A gamble with the economy[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B][B][RIGHT]October 11th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Central bankers are typically the most risk averse amongst policymakers. So when they take a gamble as big as a 1.5 per cent cut in the benchmark interest rate in the country, it is worth paying attention to the reasons as to why they did so. On Saturday October 8, the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) issued a press release stating that it had decided to reduce the discount rate — the interest rate at which it lends money to commercial banks — to 12 per cent from 13.5 per cent, citing lower inflation.

There is no question that the move has a potential upside: the cut by the SBP is likely to have a cascading effect across the financial system, reducing borrowing costs throughout the economy, thus making it easier for businesses to grow. No sane Pakistani would be opposed to lower rates if they help accelerate economic growth and we hope this measure by the SBP has its desired effect. But given the allegations that the move was politically motivated, it is worth questioning the wisdom of reducing interest rates by 150 basis points in one go.

For starters, it had emerged that the analysis within the central bank was not unanimous in supporting quite so dramatic a rate cut. Indeed, there is considerable debate amongst the economists at the SBP as to whether a cut in interest rates would hurt or help the economy. While economic growth should be the primary concern of any government, it is not the job of the central bank to allow the administration to take short-cuts, particularly at the expense of potentially fuelling inflation. This is precisely why central banks are given more independence than any other part of the government’s economic management team.

Some experts believe that a reduction in rates may well cause inflation to rise from its already high levels and cause an acceleration in the depreciation of the rupee. This is highly dangerous at any time, but particularly dangerous when the government is expecting to make large payments on its external debts over the next few months. A better strategy might have been a more staggered approach in reduction of interest rates, balancing the concerns between inflation and growth. The SBP has decided to take a gamble by doing it all at once. Let us hope for the sake of the Pakistani economy that it works.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Credibility gap[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 11th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Lack of credibility can have very serious consequences. The people of Sindh are discovering just how grave the consequences can be, as they continue to live in the squalor of camps with insufficient facilities and suffer from a lack of food, clean water and sanitation. They must wonder, too, why no one has stepped forward to help. The intricacies of international politics and the inter-relations between the global community are, of course, not easy for villagers to understand. But it is precisely these factors that prevent help from reaching people who are badly in need of assistance.

According to a report in this newspaper, senior UN officials have informed Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar that the paucity of funds coming in is linked to concerns within the international community as to the reliability of data put out by authorities about the damage caused by flooding in Sindh and Balochistan and also about transparency in the use of the funds; other factors such as reluctance to grant visas to aid workers acts as a further impediment. It is hard to understand why our authorities should want to keep such experts away from the affected zone. Surely we would want them to play a part in solving problems.

The results of this lack of trust have been disastrous. According to the UN, only $27 million of the $357 million aid appeal has come in — a tiny fraction of the amount needed. Other agencies such as Oxfam have already described the lack of funding as a calamity. As a nation, we must consider why we have suffered such a fate. The apparent perception that a notion of ‘wolf, wolf’ may be involved in Islamabad’s description of the flood havoc is especially disturbing. As is the case in the fable, we must consider why this view exists. It is also obvious we are becoming more and more isolated. This presents enormous problems for us. The fact also is that the most helpless, the most vulnerable of people are suffering through no fault of their own. Morality demands we find a way to aid them and also to salvage our reputation as a state.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]The HRCP on Karachi[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 11th, 2011
[/RIGHT][/B]
By now, everyone from the Supreme Court to the PML-N has had their say on the causes and solutions to the violence in Karachi but the report issued on October 8 by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), titled “Karachi: unholy alliance for mayhem”, carries even more weight because of the credibility and dedication of the organisation. The HRCP is not afraid of taking names and without letting any of the other parties of the hook, explicitly names MQM for its role in stirring up violence. The HRCP takes a long view of the current situation, attributing it to demographic shifts in the city and claiming that the party is using force to maintain its political monopoly in the city. The report also points out the rise in extortion, usually carried out by gangs with political affiliation and how this leads to turf wars.

Pointing out the root causes of the violence, while requiring the courage to take on armed and dangerous political parties, isn’t enough on its own. Solutions, too, need to be proffered. Among other solutions, the HRCP calls on the police to be depoliticised, for the city to be rid of all weapons whether licensed or unlicensed and an end to encroachments and no-go areas. Most of these solutions, in one form or the other, have been proposed before. The key here is implementation. Unfortunately, a Catch-22 effect is in play. Those who have the power to bring about these changes and allow peace to flourish in Karachi are in fact the very political parties who are responsible for the violence. With the political parties in the city showing no appetite for compromise, there have been increased calls for the army to step in and sort the situation out. The HRCP report wisely cautions against further operations by the Rangers. Previous experience has taught us that police action tends only to lead to a tense, short-term peace after which violence is renewed with even more ferocity. As valuable as the HRCP report is, ultimately peace in Karachi will only be achieved by political parties that decide to put the city ahead of their narrow interests.

[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Shape of things to come?[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 12th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

A gang of thugs comprising of “60 to 70” men have ‘defended’ Islam in Rawalpindi on October 7, by attacking a girls’ school after warning it that it would ‘face the music’ if the girls didn’t ‘dress modestly and wear hijab’. They thrashed the girl students and their female teachers. The following day, most girls’ schools had zero or thin attendance. An official circular was sent around warning all girls’ schools to avoid such incidents by taking ‘preventive measures’. Will the administration pursue the gang who attacked the school? No, according to ‘inside information’ — which means that the state tacitly accepts the ‘ideological’ thrust of the attack.

This is happening against the backdrop of another tacitly accepted ideological punishment inflicted by a pious policeman called Qadri on late governor of Punjab Salmaan Taseer. The lawyers’ community in Pakistan is on the side of the killer and the media has brainwashed the average citizen into thinking that it was the governor who was in the wrong and that the pious policeman should be let off through the legal device of diyat ‘facilitated’ no doubt by the kidnapping of Salmaan Taseer’s son. The challenge is: ask the clerics and the pious lawyers of Rawalpindi whether the gang who attacked the girls’ school were right in doing what they did, and the answer would be yes!

There is perhaps more to come. All girls’ schools may be ordered to make hijab compulsory for their pupils. The real edict behind the attack is what the Taliban have been doing in the tribal areas and what the Taliban did when they were ruling Afghanistan: the place for the girls is at home where after an appropriate period they are to get married and bear children, stereotyped on the model warrior who are now ‘correcting’ the state of Pakistan through suicide bombing. Some years ago when the thugs started attacking the co-educational institutions of Lahore, many pious people thought the ‘golden’ age had arrived and started writing their own threat letters to the institutions. The germ of extremism has grown faster and promises to kill more people than dengue fever ever will.

When the Islamic University of Islamabad was attacked by a suicide-bomber its conservative faculty came out saying there was nothing wrong with the attackers; it was just that the university had been forced to become ‘moderate’ in its stance through the appointment of wrong type of vice-chancellors. The university was founded with Arab dollars and had teachers like Abdullah Azzam and Mullah Krekar, both counted among the founders of al Qaeda in Peshawar. Nextdoor to Rawalpindi, in Islamabad, Lal Masjid became a symbol of piety when in 2007 it started attacking places it thought were responsible for fahashi (indecency) that violated the edicts of Islam. In 2004, it had denounced the Pakistan Army when it confronted the Taliban terrorists in South Waziristan. Today, the Lal Masjid seminary is consensually the best example of Islamic education.

What began in Afghanistan with the destruction of girls’ schools is now happening in Pakistan. In Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and areas surrounding it most girls’ schools have been blown up by the Taliban. Those who advocate this ‘Islamic reform’ are spread far afield including the capital of the country. Dozens of ‘study circles’ have sprung up where learned ladies, on the model of al Huda’s founder, Ms Farhat Hashmi are inculcating a tough brand of Islam, advocating hijab as the first condition. In the wake of an attack on a mosque in Rawalpindi cantonment — which killed many innocent children — it was found that the killers were the sons of teachers who organised such study circles in Islamabad.

The thugs who attacked the girls’ school in Rawalpindi have an agenda that includes other ‘corrections’. The administration would be wrong not to take action and make them answerable to law. If it is legal in Pakistan to have girls’ schools and if there is no legal provision compelling the girls to wear hijab, then these thugs are criminals trying to impose their own will on the citizens. This incident has exposed the state to the challenge of either taking action to reaffirm the writ of the state or shrink from action and allow the writ of the state to be further squeezed.

[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]The prime minister on Balochistan[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B][B][RIGHT]October 13th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

It is hard to know how seriously to take Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani’s speech on Balochistan which he delivered on October 11. Speaking at the induction ceremony of 5,000 recruits from the province into the army, the prime minister declared that he would ensure that the injustices against the Baloch would not be tolerated. The sentiment is certainly a worthy one but is no different to those offered by Gilani and his government on many previous occasions, and moreover, it exists mostly, for now, on paper. The truth is that only the military can dampen separatist ardour in the province because it was the high-handedness of the military that created the insurgency in the first place. As long as the paramilitary is stationed in the province, there will always be a sense of alienation because many Baloch see it as more of an occupying force. Two years ago, the government announced a much-hyped 61-point reforms package. The Balochistan package was unanimously passed by parliament but its implementation has proved to be such a struggle that Raza Rabbani, the Senate committee chairman in charge of doing so, gave up in frustration. From electricity generation projects to allowing exiled Baloch leaders to return, the government has stalled on just about every reform measure. Even relatively simple tasks like building hospitals have been delayed.

Without a doubt, government apathy has added to the popularity of the separatist movement. It may take a long time but efforts have to be made to win over those who are alienated and sympathetic to the cause of the separatists. A start can be made by the state in all earnestness to at least address the issue of the missing persons. Even now, almost every other day, or even more frequently, bodies of Baloch nationalist activists are turning up all over the province. Responding to allegations, the military has said that it is not behind these disappearances — so at the very least, it should help in an investigation into who is actually behind them, so that they can he held accountable. This should be accompanied by fully implementing the Eighteenth Amendment, and allowing the province full financial benefits as those accruing from its vast mineral resources. These are two, but much-needed, initial steps on what will have to be a long journey towards reconciliation.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Endless suffering[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 13th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

One would think that Aasia Bibi, the young Christian woman sentenced to death for blasphemy in a Nankana Sahib village in late 2010, had suffered quite enough. For over a year, she has been kept in a ‘special’ cell at the Sheikhupura jail — separated from her husband and young children who remain in hiding. Her family has denied she committed any wrong, and alleges the charges against her stem from her using a cup to drink water also used by fellow Muslim labourer. Her husband lives in fear of death by extremists and there has been concern that Aasia herself will be murdered in prison — as others accused of blasphemy before her, have also met the same fate.

As if all this was not enough, we now hear Aasia has been subjected to ‘torture’ within jail, by a female warden who claims she found ‘illicit’ items in her cell. Few details are available on this matter, but it seems other staffers did little to stop the violation of jail rules that occurred. The abuse or manhandling of a detainee is, of course, prohibited. The guilty warden has since been suspended — but even this action seems to have come rather late in the day, and perhaps many people will support what the warden did (just like how many support what Mumtaz Qadri has done). Torture, of course, is endemic in our jails; no one should suffer it — but the string of miseries imposed on Aasia Bibi seem never to end. There is a possibility that she is being victimised for being a ‘blasphemy accused’ individual. This, too, has happened before.

We appear to be moving steadily, further and further away from the course of justice. We must ask ourselves in all earnestness what this says about the nature of our society. There is a real need to rediscover the compassion and the humanity we have lost. Until we do so, we cannot claim to count ourselves among the civilised nations of the world. Doing more to end the suffering of Aasia Bibi would, at least, help us look in the right direction and perhaps reach out towards the goal we have lost sight of.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Change at the PCB[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 13th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

For all the controversies surrounding his time as chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), the performance of the national cricket team under Ijaz Butt was not as bad as what many followers of the game would have perceived it to be. Pakistan’s performance on the field during Butt’s tenure included away Test wins against Australia and England; reaching the semi-finals of the 2009 Champions Trophy, the 2010 World Twenty20 championship and the 2011 World Cup; and winning the 2009 World Twenty20 trophy. However, it was the off-the-field antics and Butt’s reaction to events that brought Pakistan cricket to its knees. The 2009 attack on the Sri Lankan team in Lahore; the chairman blasting his hosts and labelling friends-in-need, the English board and its players, match-fixers without an iota of evidence; the bans on some players — and their subsequent overturning — in the aftermath of the disastrous Australian tour; and the infamous spat with Shahid Afridi.

His successor, Zaka Ashraf, is a former president of the Pakistan Sugar Mills Association, and as news came of his appointment, a joke began doing the rounds, that fans hoped that he would, like in the case of the price of sugar, also raise the performance level of the national cricket team. Right now, it would be fair to say that Pakistan cricket is currently in the doldrums. No foreign teams want to visit us, and they can hardly be blamed for that, and the ongoing spot-fixing trial in London is a reminder of just how tainted the sport has become. However, the change does allow for some hope, in that perhaps these issues will be addressed by the new PCB chief. A dearth of international cricket in Pakistan has hit the game hard. While foreign teams may not be coming any time soon, the new chief can — and should — focus on improving the country’s domestic structure, resolving dressing-room issues, and the pending appointment of a new coach. Addressing these is important if the team is to do well on a consistent basis.

[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Power crisis measures[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 14th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Rather than addressing the structural issues plaguing the power sector, the government of Pakistan has once again decided that the best way to manage the gap between demand and supply for electricity is to artificially reduce demand. The government does not seem to have noticed that this strategy — beyond obviously being flawed even in concept — did not work the last time it was tried and seems to have even less efficacy now. Consider some of the measures being proposed: shorter working hours and a two-day weekend. Just last year, these measures were introduced as a means of dealing with the summer peak season of power consumption. By the government’s highly optimistic estimates, these measures can save no more than 500 megawatts of electricity consumption. This is a miniscule proportion of the estimated 9,000 MW shortfall recently witnessed when Pakistan State Oil stopped supplying the power companies with furnace oil. Not only does this policy do nothing to meaningfully address the problem, it acts by reducing economic activity in the country.

The third element of the strategy announced by the Council on Common Interest (CCI) — collecting more than Rs300 billion in outstanding electricity bills — has more promise. Given the fact that the majority of these bills, about Rs155 billion, are owed by the federal and provincial governments themselves, they may want to start off by paying their own dues. Over the longer run, however, the government needs to fundamentally reform the power sector. The special cabinet committee on the energy crisis has reportedly come up with a formula for doing so, which involves ending the unaffordable subsidies, followed by a restructuring and eventual privatisation of the power generation and distribution companies. This should be followed through, because failure to reform may result in lights going out, all over Pakistan, for an uncomfortably long time.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Welcome opening on the Wagah[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B][B][RIGHT]October 14th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Building upon the highly promising trade talks with India in Mumbai late last month, the government of Pakistan has announced that it has agreed “in principle” to grant Most Favoured Nation (MFN) status to India, one of New Delhi’s longest standing demands on trade talks. Given the fact that India has already granted MFN status to Pakistan and that Islamabad is required to reciprocate under its treaty obligations to the World Trade Organisation (WTO), we support this measure by the government and hope that the decision is implemented as soon as possible.

Pakistan’s proposed measure has come after India has shown itself to be flexible in removing the many non-tariff barriers to trade that Pakistani exporters face when supplying goods to India and in particular after it ended its objection to a the European Union granting concessions to 75 Pakistani items of import. At trade talks in Mumbai last month, the Indian government arranged for direct talks between Pakistani businessmen and Indian officials, a process that is expected to help remove some of the non-tariff barriers. While welcome unto itself, we hope that this dialogue results in an ease in the regulatory burden on Pakistani exporters. We hope that New Delhi will come to view the removal of those barriers as contributing to its own economic benefit. The cement industry is a prime example of an area where greater trade might help. Pakistan has a surplus of production capacity and India has a shortage. Yet rather than buying cheaper Pakistani cement, India ends up importing from Africa — paying higher shipping charges — simply because of the regulatory restrictions on importing goods from Pakistan.

India is harming its own economic interests and would be well served by removing many of these barriers. Imagine the political and economic dividends India could reap by allowing Pakistani cement in: lowering the cost of housing construction in its own country and making a constituency within Pakistan that has an economic interest in maintaining good relations with India. For its part, Pakistan’s primary tool of preventing trade is the use of old-fashioned tariffs (Islamabad uses relatively few non-tariff barriers). The move on the part of the government to reduce tariffs on more than 200 goods is an encouraging one. Both sides need to do their part to open up the region to trade and unlock its full economic potential.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]A welcome change[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 14th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Small matters can sometimes lead to big changes. In some ways, the refusal by the Parliamentary Committee on National Security and now the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Defence to attend a briefing at the GHQ on the military operation in tribal areas, seems like a trivial matter. But the issue runs much deeper than that and must be seen against the backdrop of our history, with so many years since 1947 dominated by military rule. This is the past which we need to leave behind, and that can happen only if the notion that parliament is sovereign and is the decision maker in all policies is embedded deeply in the minds of the public. At the moment, confusion on the issue still seems to persist in many places and in many minds.

The view expressed by members of the committees that in democratic countries military men should visit parliament and not the other way round, is a valid one. This refusal signals a growing confidence on the part of elected law-makers and a realisation that real authority should rest with them. This is an extremely welcome development. We have waited far too long for it to come. The roles of various institutions are quite clearly spelled out in the Constitution. It is high time that these were adhered to — both in letter and in spirit.

Today, we stand at a turning point in the course of our democratic development. We need to ensure that we continue along the right road. The GHQ briefing sessions have for now been cancelled. If they are to be held in the future, there appears to be little reason why they cannot be conducted in parliament. Such symbolism is in many ways crucial. It is also important that we get used to the idea that the men in uniform should not be deciding what we do as a nation, but instead playing their role essentially as a force that follows orders from the representatives elected by the people, who must at all times, hold the reins of command in their hands. This process it seems has begun.

[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Khar-Grossman meeting[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 15th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

A parade of US officials have been making their way to Pakistan over the last few months, trying to repair the damage by the Raymond Davis saga and the Osama bin Laden raid, all the while striving to convince us that we need to take swift action against the Haqqani network. The latest visitor was Marc Grossman, the replacement for the late Richard Holbrooke as a special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan. During his day-long trip on October 13, he met with the president, prime minister, foreign minister and the all-important chief of army staff. By all accounts, ties between the countries are slowly inching back toward normalcy, and such high-level meetings can only help move the process along.

But even as the two sides continue to talk, it would be foolish to pretend that relations are back on track. The presence of the Haqqani network on Pakistani soil, and the alleged support they are given will continue to remain a point of contention. The fact is that as the US begins its phased withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Obama administration needs Pakistan to tackle the Afghan Taliban so that they can claim the withdrawal was a sign of victory, not retreat. Pakistan, for its part, is hedging its bets. Wanting influence in a post-withdrawal Afghanistan, it sees no incentive in throwing its lot in with the US. No matter how many meetings are held, this essential fact is unlikely to change. And with the US also prepared to talk with the Afghan Taliban, including the Haqqani network, the status quo will probably remain.

Disagreement about the Haqqani network, however, does not have to mean a complete break in ties. There are still many points at which our interests converge with those of the Americans. Defeating the Pakistani Taliban, for one, should be a priority for both countries. It is also in the interest of the US to ensure that Pakistan does not economically collapse, as that would pave the way to further instability and possibly the toppling of the current government with one that is far more anti-American. Just for that reason alone, aid will continue to pour in and may also be accompanied by further trade. Despite the mistrust on both sides, both countries have too much at stake to simply go their separate ways.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Escape from hell[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 15th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Two boys who had been kidnapped by the Taliban on September 1 from Bajaur Agency, while out on a picnic, have been able to return home after escaping from their captors based in Afghanistan’s Kunar province. However, over two dozen teenagers and men remain hostage with the Taliban, who abducted them because they belong to a local tribe that had raised an anti-Taliban lashkar. They are being held in Afghanistan’s Kunar province, where the Taliban took them after their abduction. In exchange for their return, the militants are demanding the release of all their comrades held in Pakistani jails. Complying with this demand, however, would be tantamount to surrender and would serve to only embolden the kidnappers. Indeed they know no other way to think, or act — and they know no mercy. We do not know in what conditions they are being held or how they are being treated but it would be fair to say that no one this young should have to undergo such a harrowing experience.

But while negotiations with the Taliban are almost certainly inadvisable, something needs to be done on the basis of both humanity and morality to rescue the other kidnapped boys. This is all the more so since the encouragement given to tribesmen in various areas to take on the Taliban contributed to the revenge taken by them, especially since in many cases the state has not come to their aid. The authorities cannot, and should not, remain completely indifferent to the situation or what must be the terrible suffering of the families whose sons or brothers have remained missing for almost six weeks. This is a situation where closer ties with Kabul would have come in handy. Since the missing youngsters are in Kunar, Pakistan needs to use all the help it can, and this should include talking to the governor of the Afghan province. It would be unlikely for the Taliban to keep them in Kunar without the knowledge of the local administration.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Deadly mines[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 15th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Reports of terrible mine accidents, notably in the Balochistan province, have become an almost regular event. Just months ago, 20 miners were killed in an accident deep below the ground; now we hear that five more have perished, this time at a privately-run coal mine in the Mastung area. The tragedy occurred following a blast some 1,500 feet below the ground. The building up of methane gas — a traditional enemy of coal miners — was responsible for the explosion, which caused a part of the mine to cave in. Three of the victims were from the Shangla district in Balochistan, working a long way from home in a desperate effort to earn a living on the meager incomes mine workers receive. The other two who died were from Balochistan — but this of course does not lessen the misery of their families.

The crucial issue here is the same, which is raised again and again: the lack of safety equipment at the mine. While the canary hung in a cage as a means to offer an early warning of gas presence is an image that sticks in the mind, today there are many other modern means to warn miners in time and allow them a chance to escape. Accidents of course can still happen — in the mining industry as in other sectors. But modern equipment and proper maintenance of mines can help avert many of these. Other miners and labour leaders at Mastung say this mine was poorly run with the owner indifferent to possible injury — or worse. We hope action will be taken against him for failing to enforce the relevant laws, though tragically this does not usually happen.

There have been far too many accidents similar to the latest one at Mastung. Scores of lives have been lost. The ILO has commented on conditions at mines — where child labour also continues. It is time to act, to impose controls on the sector, implement laws and by doing so emphasise that the lives of impoverished workers are in no way dispensable simply because they lack power and influence.

[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Raise in power tariffs[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 16th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

For the cowardice and poor judgement of those in power, the weak must suffer. Once again, the government’s inability to enact a well-thought out energy policy is going to result in massively higher prices for the average consumer of electricity, this time by an unprecedented Rs3 per unit, about a 40 per cent increase.

The ostensibly reason for the massive increase in prices is the rise in fuel prices as well as the government’s attempts to reduce its budget deficit by reducing it allocations to power subsidies. We are sympathetic to both arguments but the government is being disingenuous if it expects the citizenry to believe that those two reasons alone account for the entirety of the problem. According to analyses presented to the special committee on the energy crisis, low prices and subsidies account for only about half the picture. The second half — and the one where the government has made almost no progress — is the inefficiency of the state-run power generation companies, whose costs of production are skyrocketing owing not due to higher fuel costs but plummeting efficiency levels. The cabinet committee’s recommendations include proposals to completely restructure these companies, bring in professional management and eventually prepare them from privatisation. Given the government’s inability to manage these companies, we would be in favour of improving the management of these companies, even if it means the government no longer owns them.

The inability to solve the energy crisis has become the single biggest millstone around the neck of an already weak economy. Last year, failure to reduce power subsidies, for instance, cost Rs295 billion to the national exchequer. If the government had stayed within its allocation, it would have been able to meet the budget deficit targets that it promised the International Monetary Fund and the country may not have faced the loss of global credibility it faced as a result of failing to meet that commitment. But that is not the only cost to the government’s inability to manage this self-created problem. The State Bank of Pakistan estimates in its most recent quarterly report on the state of the economy that the country’s gross domestic product would increase by at least two per cent per year if the energy crisis were somehow resolved. That should suggest to our politicians and to our policymakers the gravity of the problem. Two percentage points is the difference between anaemic and brisk economic growth, between rising incomes and falling poverty on the one hand and stagnating incomes and rising poverty on the other. Other than this is also the issue of circular debt. This has reached such unprecedented levels that part of the reason for the chronic power shortages that affected the country in recent weeks were the billions owed by the government to several independent power producers, who, it turns out, were unable to purchase enough furnace oil to generate adequate electricity. If one looks at the installed capacity of all — public and private — power generation plants, it is enough to meet current national demand.

It is true that a solution to the country’s energy problems will result in at least temporary increases in electricity prices. But raising tariffs alone will do little to solve the structural inefficiencies that exist in the energy sector, most notably the government’s horrendously poor management of the power companies’ finances and operations. Why should consumers alone suffer if the government does not have the political courage to take on the employee unions at the state-run power companies in order to restructure them? We have been sympathetic to the challenges faced by any policymaker in managing the Pakistani economy, even more so when the government is democratically elected and needs to cater to the needs of constituencies with vastly differing interests. But a steady power supply — and by extension a robust economy — is not something that deserves to be gambled with for perceived political gain, particularly when there is very little disagreement between experts on how the problem can and should be solved.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Steps towards peace?[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 16th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Piece by piece, Pakistan and India are incrementally working towards better relations. The process was given a jolt by Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar’s visit to New Delhi and since then there has been good news on the economic front. Last month, Amin Fahim, the trade minister, and his Indian counterpart Anand Sharma announced that trade between the two countries would soon reach $6 billion a year, more than double the current amount. India then dropped its objections to the European Union importing goods from Pakistan duty-free. This move was particularly encouraging since the EU will most likely import textiles from Pakistan, which may very well come at the expense of Indian textiles. Now, further moves are afoot that could lead to improved ties in the medium-term. Following up on interior secretary level talks in March, Pakistan and India have now agreed — in principle — to provide multiple-entry visas to businessmen and to make the visa procedure simpler.

Clearly, making visas easier to obtain for businessmen is a welcome move (though it is yet to be formally approved by both the governments). Once this is in place, the countries might want to give a thought to extending the same courtesy to those in the fields of sports, education and arts and entertainment. One possible move could be to persuade the Indian Premier League to re-allow Pakistani cricketers to come to India and take part in the Twenty20 tournament. Increased person-to-person contact will serve to weaken the hawks on both sides of the border.

The visa relaxation, once implemented, could promote greater trade between the two neighbours. Illegal trade that is routed through Dubai and Singapore costs the two countries about $2 billion a year. Pakistan will now also remove further items from the list of goods that India is not allowed to import from here. The hope is that this will eventually lead to tariff-free trade between the two countries. Eventually, closer economic ties will force more political cooperation. As the economic destinies of the two countries become ever more closely intertwined, that will make the thought a political standoff increasingly unpalatable.

[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Friction within the PPP[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 17th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Tensions within Sindh’s leading party PPP that had been escalating over some weeks, chiefly as a consequence of the actions of former provincial home minister Dr Zulfiqar Mirza, have begun to reach a rather dangerous point. Under pressure from pro-Mirza members of the party, the Sindh leadership has reportedly agreed that the local bodies system initiated by the Pervez Musharraf government in 2001 will be abandoned and the previous one before it, dating back to legislation in 1979 will be restored. The 2001 system had recently been revived through a controversial ordinance, moved essentially to mollify the MQM.

The fact that the Mirza camp has succeeded in having this decision overturned at a high-level meeting held in Karachi, signals many things. For starters, it marks a divide within the PPP itself. Attempts by mediators sent by President Asif Ali Zardari to tackle the situation did not really work and one dissenting element needed to be pacified. Further, how will the MQM respond, if the 1979 local bodies law is in fact brought back? Are we to see yet another rift between the coalition partners who have already broken up and rejoined hands multiple times?

The situation is quite obviously a highly unstable one. It is not what Sindh needs. Nor is it good for our democracy as a whole. Too many fractures which occur at one time are difficult to heal. The assurances given by the PPP parliamentary party to dissenters backing Mirza may have some temporary impact in holding things together. But in the longer term, problems are almost certain to arise. Things are beginning to tumble out of control, rather like a house of cards. It is now obvious that Mirza still commands considerable influence within the PPP, even after his resignation as home minister and from his party post. How things will be handled now is difficult to predict. But in Sindh, the party’s base, the omens are not good and it is hard to see how solutions will be chalked out by the trouble-shooters sent in by the top leadership to try and tackle affairs.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Occupying Wall Street[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 17th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

The ‘Occupy Wall Street movement’ began a little over a month ago, with little fanfare and only a couple of dozen protesters. The movement, such as it was, would have fizzled out and been forgotten were it not for one crucial mistake made by the New York Police Department: they turned violent. The police decided to subdue the protesters with pepper spray and roughed them up a bit. Suddenly, what seemed like nothing more than a get-together of a few extreme left marchers turned into a national movement. Now, apart from the huge protest on Wall Street, mirror movements have sprung up in all the major cities of the US and even in countries as far as Tokyo. The lesson here is simple: the best way to make a protest go away is to ignore it. Give it any attention and the protesters will feed off that. We in Pakistan have been through this before. The violence of May 12, only further bolstered support for the lawyers’ movement. Similarly, the movement against Ayub Khan only picked up steam when he started going after Fatima Jinnah, a sainted figure in Pakistani eyes.

Still, it would be premature to call the ‘Occupy Wall Street movement’ a success. Sheer numbers alone do not constitute achievement. For one, it is hard to know what the demands of this diffuse, leaderless movement are, beyond a general disdain for capitalism. The obvious point of comparison here would be the Boston Tea Party movement, which from the opposite end of the political spectrum, turned its protest into electoral success, moving the Republican Party further to the right, and changing the political debate in the US to one where lowering government spending became the overarching priority. The movement now seeks to turn the focus on the fat cats, who have actually benefited from the recession they caused in the first place. It was the bankers who received the bulk of the bailout money and saw their bonuses rise, while unemployment remained above eight per cent. There is no doubt that protesters have tapped into a rich vein of discontent. What remains to be seen is if that can be channeled into legislative achievement.


[B][U][CENTER][SIZE="5"]Polio nightmare[/SIZE][/CENTER][/U][/B]
[B][RIGHT]October 17th, 2011[/RIGHT][/B]

Despite the National Polio Emergency Plan put into action at the start of the year, there is no evidence that Pakistan is making any headway in winning its battle against polio. Instead, new cases emerge at regular intervals, with two new ones recently reported in Fata. Experts involved in the drive against polio believe, the security situation hampers the movement of anti-polio vaccination teams. Refusals by parents in some areas to have their children vaccinated, the mass dislocation of populations and the general mismanagement of campaigns, leads to children missing vaccination during each drive; hence adding to existing issues.

All these factors add up to what is essentially a disastrous situation. The number of polio cases reported by August 31 this year was 77, as compared to 43 by the same time last year. One can only guess what the number will be by the time 2011 ends. The rising number of cases — with a 50 per cent increase reported from Balochistan and other polio invading districts of the province, where it had not been seen for years — suggests drastic measures are needed. Quite obviously, the action plan is not really working. Other strategies need to be planned and means found to prevent more children from being crippled by a sickness that can be prevented simply by administering a few drops of liquid. The awareness about the benefits of vaccination, too, need to be spread further afield — especially in more remote areas. Meetings involving experts from around the world have pretty much continued round the year. But there is an urgent need to assess what has gone wrong — and why every country around the world, including Afghanistan — is doing better than us. It is a shame that today, Pakistan remains one of only four countries in the world where polio remains endemic. The number of cases reported from our nation are also the highest anywhere in the world. We have to find ways to end the resurgence of polio seen over the past few years, and get back to a situation where we have a chance of eradicating a disease that has already taken a toll in our country.