South Asian Regional/International Affairs:  

( An eight minute read). 

N. P. Upadhyaya ( Aryal)

Kathmandu: If the Pakistani Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari “surprised many a intelligent brains” in the US including that of his host-the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, for defending Imran Khan’s Moscow visit in a bold manner and that too while being in the US soil itself, then concurrently of his visit to China-the bête noir of the USA must have puzzled the previous host-the US concluding as to how the US should deal with the new Pakistani government led by Shehbaz Sharif whose tilt for China is clearly visible?

To recall, the Pak FM immediately left for China upon his return from the US.

This is how the matter stands for leaving the US to ponder over as to what to do next with a government having “distinct” inclination towards China?

The Ousted PM Khan accuses the US to have engineered his ousters through the men close to the US in Pakistan.
The US has time again denied the Khan’s accusations.

Khan’s accusations are wrong is what the US says since the day one of the allegations.

While being in the US, Bilawal Bhutto apart from defending Imran Khan, he also took to task the Indian regime which has kept the entire “occupied” Kashmir as an open air jail since decades and decades.

In a way, Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto jolted the Indian establishment when he in New York May 11, 2022, raised the issue of the India’ Illegally Occupied Kashmir issue.

Going one step further and in a brave move, the Pak foreign minister wrote a straight letter to the UN highlighting the Kashmir issue in detail.

Perhaps no foreign minister from Pakistan in its seven decades of history so far had accomplished such an act thus BB must be admired by the entire South Asian population for having brought the issue of Kashmir to the forefront for a variety of political reasons or else the UNSC, in many more ways than one, has shelved, it appears, the “burning” issue.

Yes! Shah Md. Qureshi too have had wrote some letters to the UN body.

Needless to say, the Kashmir concern is a flash point in South Asia which may bring in the two South Asian nuclear regional forces face to face any time if and when the two nation’s conflict takes new dimension.

To put it bluntly, Indian Occupied Kashmir not only is an overly stretched nuisance in between India and Pakistan but the issue in itself is a grave threat to South Asian regional security-the threat US deliberately ignores.

Recently, Secretary Antony Blinken has talked of working together with Pakistan for regional security which, let’s hope, may include the issue of Kashmir apart from Afghani security.

Most puzzling is the fact is why the US prefers to ignore the Kashmir issue as a destabilizing factor in the entire South Asian region?

Is it due to the fact that the US takes expansionist Indian regime as a “strategic partner” in the scheme of Quad of which India is a member?

India’s, for the knowledge of the US, hatred against the Indian Muslims too is an issue that the US ignores transparently.

The champion of democracy is the US for the outside world. But Alas!

For the consumption of the US, Nepali observers claim that India can never be trusted and the US, better late than never, realize that India is a regime controlled by fascist Hindu fanatics which has a observant distinct tilt for the Russian federation-the heir apparent of the former Soviet Union.

During the Cold war era, India have had signed a two decades long security pact with the then USSR which facilitated the way for the emergence of Bangladesh by fracturing Pakistan.

Very freshly, India refrained in Tokyo from condemning Russia for the Ukrainian invasion even if President Biden expected India to take the US line.

Modi met President Biden on May 24, in Tokyo during the Quad Summit.

To recall, the Indian PM Modi and US President Biden met in the sidelines of the Tokyo hosted Quad Summit.

President Trump while meeting PM Imran Khan had said, “should India and Pakistan so desire, I am ready to mediate” to sort out the overly prolonged Kashmir issue.

However, with India’s abrupt “No”, the Trumpian desire to mediate was shelved for an indefinite period.

PM Khan had approached Trump for a meaningful mediation.

But recently, when FM Bilawal Bhutto lambasted at the UN Security Council in New York for having “miserably failed” in materializing its own promised resolutions made in the past for a “plebiscite” in Kashmir, let’s hope that the UN body may have come out from deep “snooze”.

Bilawal speaking to journalists, said, as per the TFI Post reportage dated May 21, 2022 when asked on Pakistan’s ties with India, he says, “As far as the question of our relationship with India is concerned, it is particularly complicated by their recent actions in Kashmir – firstly the August 5, 2019 decision to abrogate Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir as well as the recent decision by the delimitation commission on Jammu and Kashmir.”

This means that Bilawal will not settle for less than sorting out the “complicated” Kashmir issue for the betterment of the bilateral ties.

The TFI post further reports that FM Bilawal told point blank that India and India alone has complicated this ( Kashmir) matter” and alleged that they are an “assault” on the United Nations, on the UN Security Council resolutions and the Geneva Convention.

“Such actions make it very difficult for us to hold a dialogue.

” Bilawal put his bottom line straight for the perusal of Indian regime.

Most importantly, at the United Nations, Pakistan has reiterated to continue to expose India’s state terrorism and its oppression against the people of the Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir.

Exercising his right of reply in reaction to Indian delegate’s comments on Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari’s address to the UN Security Council ministerial-level meeting on food security, Pakistan’s delegate Imran Khan rejected India’s claim that Jammu and Kashmir is its integral part.

He said Jammu and Kashmir is not and has never been a part of India and any official UN map can verify that it is a disputed territory.

The Pakistani delegate said India has accepted the UN Security Council resolutions on Jammu and Kashmir, but these remain to be implemented.

He said India’s refusal to implement the UN resolutions for over seven decades constitutes a flagrant violation of the UN Charter and international law. ( Several media sources including Radio Pakistan).

The Letter to the UN on Delimitation: Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari wrote a letter to the President and Secretary-General of the United Nations Security Council drawing attention to the illegal demarcation of Indian-occupied Jammu and Kashmir, which seeks to reduce the Muslim population in the region.

Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari addressed a letter to the President of the United Nations Security Council and the United Nations Secretary-General, reports APP dated may 11, 2022, urging them to take immediate cognizance of India’s ploy of reducing Muslims’ representation in Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK) through unlawful “delimitation” exercise.

According to the statement, the foreign minister urged the UN Security Council to remind India that Jammu and Kashmir remains an internationally recognized dispute and that it should refrain from bringing about any illegal demographic changes in the occupied territory.

Bilawal called for prevailing upon India to let the people of IOK determine their own future through a free and fair plebiscite under the relevant UN Security Council resolutions.

Bilawal’s main thrust was to draw the attention of the UN Security Council which, according to Bilawal, so far has miserably failed in materializing its own committed pronouncements made some seven decades ago.

Be it known to all that “Pakistan continues to internationally highlight the alarming situation in the IOJK in the wake of India’s illegal and unilateral actions on August 5 2019”.

According to the statement, as per Geo-news dated May 11, 2022, Pakistani foreign minister Bilawal underscored that these illegal measures constitute a flagrant violation of international law, including the UN Charter, and said the relevant Security Council resolutions on the Jammu and Kashmir dispute were ipso facto illegal and null and void.
Nepali observers take Bilawal’s outbursts against the Indian regime in New York to have been the first ever strongest statement made by any foreign minister from the US soil in the past.

FM Bilawal highlighted India’s gross, systematic and widespread human rights violations in IOJK.

He also drew particular attention to the ongoing Indian efforts, according to Geo-news, to further marginalize, disempower, and divide the beleaguered Kashmiri population.

He noted that this was a shameless assault on the identity, fundamental rights of the people, and culture of IOJK, and was designed to pave the way for installing yet another puppet government in IOJK that is pliant to BJP-RSS combine, and panders to its “Hindutva” ideology.

Weaving all the threads together, what appears to the analysts in Nepal that the emergence of Bilawal Bhutto as new foreign minister of Pakistan will mean much to the arrogant Indian regime in the days to come?

In the eyes of India, Bilawal may be a Baby Bhutto but he is no longer a baby.

Given Pakistan’s “iron-brother ties” with China and given Pakistan’s desire to inch closer to the Russian federation-both the countries being a threat as perceived by the US, what remains to be seen as to how the US administration “resets” its recently deteriorated ties with Pakistan.

To add insult to injury, Foreign Minister Bilawal, by the time of this story is being written, has already retuned to Pakistan.

This is his maiden trip to China.

China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Bilawal have already held bilateral talks in the Chinese city of Guangzhou and come out with a long joint statement.

What is more than interesting is that FM Bilawal was in China together with his deputy foreign minister Hina Rabbani Khar.

To recall, Bilawal Bhutto in his recent interviews to the media after his talks with US Secretary of State Blinken, Bilawal ruled out that Pakistan’s growing relationship with the US would hurt its ties with Beijing.

Well, this is Bilawal’s version. However, how Antony Blinken will take Bilawal’s “one-on-one talks with China’s powerful FM Wang Yi will perhaps determine the real course of US Pakistan ties.

Add to this, sooner than later, Bilawal may land in Moscow at the invitation of Sergei Lavrov.

In the opinions of political pundits monitoring South Asian regional politics, the US may have a tough time to “reset” its deteriorated ties with Pakistan.

Let’s wait and see how the US reacts and how regional politics unfolds after Bilawal’s fresh visit to China.

Having said all these, what too must be noted here is that Bilawal made some soothing comments also on India.
Look what he says that “he is hopeful that a day will come when his country will be able to engage with India diplomatically as well as economically.

He said that “Aaaj nhin to kal”, a day will have to come soon. That day we will unlock our full economic potential, and all will share the fruit of prosperity,” Bilawal added.

He was however confidently optimistic that in his life time, the conflict with India will come to an end. Utilize the vast potentials that we both, India and Pakistan, possess in abundance.

That’s all.

# Next issue: The Elephant in the Room-Kashmir- Hina Rabbani Khar.

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