Mohammad Jamil
An indulgent international community’s loathing to see through the shenanigans of the Indian establishment to destabilize Pakistan has indeed a purpose. Baloch dissident leaders Harbiyar Marri and Brahamdagh Bugti are in self-exile and living comfortably in London and Switzerland. Despite concrete evidence of money laundering, hate speeches and RAW’s funding, British police known for its honest and efficiency has not framed charges against MQM head honcho Altaf Hussain. Now Germany’s former ambassador in Bahrain, Kuwait and Syria Dr. Gunter Mulack, while speaking on the topic of ‘Crisis in the Middle East – A German Perspective’ at the Pakistan Institute of International Affairs Karachi, made a bizarre statement unbecoming of a scholar and a diplomat. Mulack stating that the former Indian Navy officer Kulbhushan Yadav, was kidnapped by the Taliban and sold to Pakistani intelligence. India launched a propaganda campaign using its ties with some European countries to cover up its vile acts.
Dr. Mulack also sounded skeptical of the potential of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor when he sarcastically said: “Be aware the Chinese will not bring you paradise on earth.” It is worth mentioning that New Delhi confirmed Kulbushan Yadav as an Indian national, but maintained that he was no longer employed by the navy as he had taken an early retirement. Naturally, no government would accept if its spy was apprehended. Pakistani government had released a video in which he confessed his attempts to destabilize Pakistan by supporting the Baloch separatist insurgency. He admitted working for India’s primary foreign intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), for which he carried out subversive activities in Balochistan and Karachi. He went on to say that he was hired by RAW at the end of 2013, when he was Commander in Indian Navy to direct various activities in Balochistan and Karachi.
India is using some western media outlets, which report without probing facts and analysing evidence presented by Pakistan. National English daily recently reported about the United Kingdom’s opposition to the CPEC, though it agreed to provide $121.6 million in grant to fund construction of Burhan-Havelian Expressway, which falls on the northern route of the corridor in CPEC project. The German diplomat perhaps was taken in by RAW officials’ propaganda claiming that Kulbushan was picked up by the Taliban and sold to the ISI. Kulbushan Yadev was promoted as commander in the Indian Navy in 2003. He had approached passport office in the Indian city of Pune and obtained a passport with a Muslim name and landed in Chabahar. Anyhow, Gunter Mulack’s outpouring against the CPEC was not understandable, as he had no interest in any business or trade activity in Pakistan or China’s cooperation with Pakistan.
However, he was speaking India’s language. India’s frustration over the China-Pak Economic Corridor is understandable, as it will be a game changer not only for Balochistan and Pakistan, but the region at large. Last year, during a press conference, India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said that the Indian government had summoned the Chinese envoy over the $46 billion economic corridor that would run from Gwadar in Pakistan’s west to China’s Kashghar. China’s Foreign Office had rejected India’s reservations on CPEC, and said that “India’s concerns are not right enough and we will carry on trade ties with Pakistan.” Out of desperation, India had stepped its vile acts. On 28th May, armed men wearing uniforms of the security forces killed 19 Pushtun passengers in Mastung to stir ethnic violence. There is not an iota of doubt that the RAW was behind that gory incident.
Pakistan and Germany enjoy cordial relations based on common interest and shared perceptions on major international issues. It was in this backdrop that Pakistani political hierarchy envisioned a qualitative transformation in its relations with Germany for building a broad-based, substantive and long term partnership, encompassing all areas of mutual cooperation. Pakistan values the generous German assistance and constant support for the wider EU market access and securing trade concession such as GSP-Plus for Pakistan. But the case of US meddling in Pakistan’s affairs is different. The US Congress Committee on Foreign Affairs had convened a meeting on February 8, 2012 to discuss the situation in Balochistan. Self-exiled Baloch leaders, American scholars and human rights activists were invited. Congressman Dana Rohrabachar had chaired the meeting. He advocated right of self-determination for the Baloch and championed the cause of independent Balochistan.
Though the US state department had distanced itself from their contemptible audacity by asserting that neither it was involved nor did it participate in their impudent venture. But the US deep interest in Balochistan – crucial province of Pakistan – was neither obscure. An inkling of it could be had from the very outpouring of arrogant Congressmen had fished out from some backyard pond for their hearing on Balochistan. Dana Rohrabachar had said that the US and people of Balochistan are natural allies. Both America’s armchair and active-duty strategists stand swayed perpetually the dream of controlling the crucially-placed Balochistan to project the US power and influence in the region and beyond. Even world maps had been redrawn in American military academics, erasing Pakistan altogether, showing it all fragmented into parts and some merging with Iran’s Sistan-Balohcistan to make up a greater Balochistan under the US tutelage.
But all those dreams have been shattered by the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). However, the province, for its strategic import remains all the time in the vortex of fiercely rivaling international spy agencies for infestation. And not infrequently even big Baloch names get mentioned in world annals for being on their payrolls. The CIA had picked Balochistan as an area of its particular action soon after it had descended on Afghanistan. It got into a hyperactive clandestine mission to soften up Balochistan for the perpetuation of the US geopolitical objectives in the area. Since the US and its allies failed to rein in Taliban who control quite some areas in Afghanistan, the US wishes Pakistan to play a role in reconciliation process by persuading the Taliban to come to the negotiating table. This goes to prove that whenever the US needs Pakistan, it showcases its solidarity with Pakistan.
