Islamabad: Recognising the weakness in its Kashmir narrative, Pakistan has tried every trick in the book to overcome its glaring shortcomings.
With the country reeling under widespread internal unrest — from home-grown terrorism in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and an armed secessionist movement in Balochistan to an unprecedented public discontent in Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK), including Pakistan-occupied Gilgit-Baltistan (PoGB) — one would have expected Islamabad to focus on putting its own house in order, a report has stated.
Against this backdrop, reports that Pakistan is set to launch a diplomatic campaign to internationalise the Kashmir issue in the UK and Europe may have come as a surprise to the uninitiated, retired Indian Army Officer Nilesh Kunwar wrote in ‘Eurasia Review’.
Slamming Pakistani Army chief Asim Munir, Kunwar said that the absence of domestic criticism of the military establishment has emboldened the army chief to engage in reckless rhetoric, while his remarks on Kashmir expose the skewed mindset.
“Since no one in Pakistan dares to question the country’s ‘failed’ Field Marshal, he probably thinks that silence is an endorsement of his astute thinking. Perhaps this is why he indulges in immature rhetoric so often and his irresponsible utterance that ‘What India labels as terrorism is, in fact, a legitimate and lawful struggle for freedom, recognised by international law’ exposes his skewed mindset,” the Indian Army veteran said.
“It would however, be naive to believe that a cunning fox like Field Marshal Munir genuinely expects that the proposed diplomatic outreach would yield positive results for Pakistan. And his talk of fighting 10 more wars for Kashmir unambiguously indicates that just like all his predecessors, the Field Marshal knows very well that his much-touted diplomatic offensive on Kashmir will, like all the previous attempts, end with a whimper, not a bang but it will enthrall the masses,” he added.
According to Kunwar, the obvious question is why Pakistan keeps raking up the Kashmir issue despite knowing it would ultimately end up “eating crow”.
He said the answer is simple: “Having precipitated a crisis of gargantuan domestic proportions and started a war with Afghanistan, Field Marshal Munir needs to divert public attention and so he has fallen back on his favourite stratagem- raising the Kashmir bogey.”
“Last year he had boasted that ‘Three wars have already been fought for Kashmir, and if 10 more are needed, we will fight them’ but failed to deliver on his promise as is his wont. This year he’s trying his luck by re-launching the diplomatic Kashmir offensive despite its uninterrupted record of failure,” Kunwar highlighted.
(IANS)
