Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi hit the nail on the head on Wednesday – during a virtual summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) – when he said that confronting terrorism and extremism must continue to be a priority, ‘but terrorism-related allegations must not be used as a political tool to malign and victimise any country or religion’. The minister also rightly called on all countries to hold accountable all states indulging in terrorism against people, especially when they illegally occupy other territories. It is no surprise that many countries, in the years since 9/11 especially, have openly and deliberately added religious connotations to acts of terrorism, giving rise to an unprecedented wave of Islamophobia across the world.
Now that the world faces another type of existential crisis, one which makes no distinction between religions and politics, at least, hopefully world leaders will understand that some of the more recurring problems that always kept their countries divided are better left buried in the past. There’s little point in arguing about things like social and religious differences or who did what to whom two hundred years ago, after all, when everybody is worried about protecting their populations from everyday death and disease. Sadly, though, some governments just refuse to play along, even if it means everybody loses out in the end.
The only thing holding back progress between Pakistan and India, and indeed much of South Asia, is simply the Indian government’s blind hatred of not just everything related to Pakistan but also Muslins living inside India. Every Pakistani government from Nawaz Sharif’s second time in office to Imran Khan has reached out to India to settle all outstanding issues. General Musharraf came to closest to finally getting India on the road to peace — and it was said that settlement of the Sir Creek issue was only a signature away when the lawyers’ movement upset everything in 2007 – yet India has always stepped back. And Delhi does this, of course, for purely political reasons related to the domestic voting culture. All the while, it keeps accusing Pakistan of terrorism and using the religion card without fail; even after Pakistan has fought its own war against terrorism and helped bring an end to the menace in Afghanistan by brokering peace.
