Pakistan should take steps to hasten the departure of US troops from its neighborhood. If Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in cooperation with Iran can outmaneuver Bush, Obama and the Pentagon and convince the US to sign the US-Iraq Withdrawal Agreement, Pakistan too, can convince NATO that the presence of their forces in Afghanistan is self defeating.
It shouldn't be too hard. As Ahmed Rashid, in his article, The Way out of Afghanistan , points out, "None of the attempts at rebuilding the Afghan state over the past nine years have really worked. What assurance is there that they will work by 2014?"
Also importantly, Pakistan must expand on its trade base on two levels; regional and international.
Regionally, the country must strengthen friendly relations with nations of southwest Asia region, entering into trading contracts and other "soft" interactions with Turkey, China, Iran, Nepal and Sri Lanka (according to Sri Lanka Customs statistics, the value of total trade between both countries was $345 million in October, representing a 4.5 percent average annual growth from a level of $169 million in 2005).
More broadly, Pakistan must press not for aid, but for market access to western countries. US has recently suspended some $800 million in aid to Pakistan (mostly military). This may be offset by China, our largest trading partner. Pakistan received some $9 billion in infrastructure and mining aid from China last year alone! However, Pakistan must increase trade with other western countries, too. Removing eggs from the US aid basket just to replace them with Chinese eggs could eventually make for trouble!
The point is that the recent policy of limiting trade and aid has given the US immense leverage to call the shots where Pakistan is concerned, because Pakistan has allowed itself to be too dependent upon this one connection. There are lessons to be learnt here: Political independence and sovereignty require economic independence.
So the question then is: Is Pakistan ready to be finally politically independent?
Yasmeen Ali is a Pakistani attorney and university professor who lives in Lahore. She offered this article, which ran originally in her own blog, PakPotpourri2 , to ThisCantBeHappening! , the new Project Censored Award-winning independent online alternative newspaper. She can be reached at yasmeen.a. Email address removed
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