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Chidanand Rajghatta
WASHINGTON, SEPT 21: What's the capital of Pakistan? Islamabad, you'd think? Not if you were watching the heightened Pakistani political activity here in distant Washington DC. After a disastrous diplomatic downturn in wake of the Kargil misadventure, Pakistan has mounted a massive offensive to neutralise and win back US and international sentiment that has swung sharply towards India.
There has been such a flurry of activity here involving Pakistan's political elite that the state department has been driven to distraction. From Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's brother and confidante Shahbaz Sharif, to former president Zia Ul Haq's son Ejaz-ul Haq, Islamabad has been deploying its full political weight to extricate itself from the international doghouse where it landed after the Kargil bloomer.
Fundamental to Islamabad's gambit of turning the diplomatic tables is to posit the Kargil fiasco as a consequence of what it says is a festering Kashmir problem. With this in mind, Pakistan is spending time andresources to mobilize Congressional support on the `K-agenda.'
Partly as a result, an old letter seeking a special envoy for Kashmir that was signed by a few stray lawmakers several weeks ago has been dusted off, reinvigorated, and recirculated to the extent that it has now gathered a sizeable 70 signatures on the Hill. Congressional sources say the letter will be handed over to President Bill Clinton at an appropriate time to create the maximum impact.
The Pakistani community in the US too has been rallied for the cause. According to lobbying industry sources, an organization of Pakistani physicians called APPNA has been shepherded into a political forum called PakPac (Pakistan's Political Action Committee) to intensify lobbying efforts on the Hill. The sources said the action group had hired Patton Boggs, a lobbying firm that already handles the official Pakistani government account. Lanny Davis, a former White House counsel, works for Patton Boggs, and he is said to be the key interlocutor forPakistani affairs.
Sources said the Pakistani professional community had also hired an organization called DCS Group and former Congressman Jim Bates to be executive director of its new lobbying office. `The whole idea seems to be to put Kashmir on the frontburner,' one Congressional staffer who is monitoring the situation said.
The Indians are also galvanized by the flurry of activity in the Pakistani camp against the backdrop of the UN General Assembly session. Letters have been sent to members of the 100-plus strong India Caucus seeking their support in the face of the Pakistani offensive.
However, efforts of Indian diplomats to meet Detroit Congressman David Bonior, who is leading the Pakistani effort, has come to nought. Indian diplomats say Bonior has declined to meet so they could present New Delhi's case despite several attempts to establish contact.
Even Pakistan's domestic politics is being played out here. Aside sarkari luminaries like Shahbaz Sharif and chairman of Pakistan's senateforeign relations committee Ahmed Zaki doing the US tour of duty, opposition figures like former prime minister Benazir Bhutto and Tehrik-I-Insaaf (Justice Party) chief former cricketer Imran Khan have also been doing the rounds here seeking the ouster of the man who has believed to have fallen out of favour with the Clinton administration.
In fact, so much is Pakistan's domestic politics Washington-centric that its former army chief Mirza Beg claimed last week that the US had already decided that Prime Miniter Nawaz Sharif has to go. As if in response, Sharif's brother Shahbaz was entertained by top Clinton administration officials, including a dinner meeting at Deputy Secretary Strobe Talbott's house, news that was prominently amplified by the Sharif camp to prove they still enjoyed Washington's confidence.
Indeed, several observers feel that Pakistan's long standing reputation as a US client state, which it had diluted to some extent over the past decade of democratic rule, is being refurbished.
OnWednesday, the Clinton administration took the extraordinary route of addressing Islamabad's domestic politics by warning the Pakistani army against any coup attempt on Sharif. At the same time, a US official told Reuters that Sharif too should allow democratic expressions of dissent.
`After so many years of existence, it is pathetic that we are still treated like a lackey,' one Pakistani community activist lamented.
There have been other perfunctory admonitions from the Clinton administration that continues to diminish Islamabad, he said. If Pakistani papers are to be believed, in recent days US officials have warned Islamabad against having any truck with terrorists like Osama bin Laden and terrorist groups like Harkat-ul Ansar.
There's more trouble in the offing for Islamabad on the morrow when Amnesty International is set to release what it says is a major new report on the practice of `honour killings' in Pakistan.
According to the report, details of which will be released tomorrow, womenin Pakistan are killed for illicit affairs real or imaginary; for seeking divorce; and sometimes for being raped. The deaths come at the hands of family members, usually men, who feel they have been disgraced by the women's behavior.
Pakistani activists fear that the report will be another stick for the administration and lawmakers to beat Islamabad with. Washington's Afghan policy is said to have turned dramatically on the strength of secretary of state Madeleine Albright's horror at the treatment of women by the Taliban. As a prelude to what could be, Amnesty has declared that `It is mobilising supporters around the world to put immediate pressure on the government of Pakistan to stop these murders.'
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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