Address to
Council of the Socialist International
Casablanca 31 May – 1 June 2002
Mr Prime Minister, Mr President of the `Socialist International, Mr Secretary General, Dear Brothers, Sisters and Comrades
We meet in Casablanca at an extraordinary and dangerous time. The war against international terrorism enters a new phase. Simultaneously the nuclear armed nations of India and Pakistan stand at the brink of war over the disputed area of Jammu and Kashmir.
This is not the way we expected the new millennium to begin but life has its own plan. I address the new realities in this phase of tragedy.
Ladies and Gentleman
Terrorism will not succeed unless we fall into the psychopaths trap. Professor Samuel Huntington of Harvard University has written of a clash between civilisations.
This clash is not inevitable unless we make it so.
The precepts of Islam are part of the Judeo Christian heritage. In the Muslim Holy Book, Abraham is our Father just as Moses and Jesus are our Prophets,
There will only be a clash of civilisation if we allow ignorance and fanaticism to take control, to shape the agenda, to shape the debate.
Osama and his men use commercial airliners as bombs against cities and symbols to provoke the clash of cultures under which they will thrive.
They want the people all over the world to actually believe that this is a war between Islam and the West.
I am not unfamiliar with these people.
As Prime Minister of Pakistan I stood up to many of them. I battled with many of the same extremists, including Osama Bin Laden himself.
During the Afghan Soviet war, my country Pakistan became the breeding ground for their political and religious manipulation. Hiding under the cloak of religion, they preached a lesson that enslaves, not liberates, that teaches children to hate, that keeps people hopeless and desperate, bitter and paranoid.
The Pakistan Peoples Party government had them on the run.
We disarmed their schools. We stopped them from entering the Kashmir struggle. We stopped their friends the Taliban from seizing all Afghanistan. Osama Bin Laden never gave an interview from Afghanistan declaring war against the world during our tenure in office,
Moreover, they were unable to plan a single act of international terror. Each act of international terror took place when my Party was in the Opposition. These included the two attacks on the World Trade Center, the CIA headquarters, the two US embassies in Africa, the Cole ship in Yemen, the Bombay Blasts, the Indian Parliament attack as well as the May 14 attack on women and children in Kashmir.
Distinguished delegates,
The extremists greatest fear is the spread of information, social equality and democracy that are the principle of the International.
And it was in the clusters of information, social equality and democracy that my government gave attention,
We introduced deregulation and decentralisation. We introduced privitisation, We opened up markets, We opened up minds and we opened up opportunity,
Pakistan integrated into the global economy which the fanatics so fear, becoming one of the ten emerging capital markets of the world, attracting billions of dollars of investment.
We brought down the population growth rate. We reduced infant mortality. We recruited an army of women, fifty thousand strong, to deliver health services to the rural poor. We fought domestic violence, established women’s police stations to defend the women of Pakistan, appointed women judges to the superior courts.
It was a transformation that was bringing Pakistan into the modern era as a model to one billion Muslims of what moderate, enlightened Islam could accomplish for its people.
And thus to the fanatics and to the extremists, we became the enemy, the threat and the obstacle. To Islam at the crossroads, a modern Pakistan was one fork in the road, fanaticism and ignorance the other.
Dear delegates,
It was with the eclipse of the PPP government, that the Taliban seized Kabul, imposed their will over Afghanistan, invited Bin Laden in and allowed the recruitment and training in terror.
And since the overthrow of my government, India and Pakistan have thrice come to the brink of a nuclear war.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Kashmir has long been considered by the CIA as the place most likely on earth to trigger a nuclear conflagration.
When Britain granted independence to the Sub Continent, two states were created on religious lines. The princely states were allowed to accede to either India or Pakistan. All but one affiliated with its religious homeland. In the Muslim state of Kashmir, the Hindu ruler acceded to India inciting the first of the three wars between the two countries.
In 1947 a UN ceasefire left Kashmir divided between India and Pakistan. The UN resolution on the dispute was blocked triggering the largest military occupation since the end of world war 11.
Now the smell of war is in the air again. Like helpless actors, the two countries of India and Pakistan are moving inexorably in the direction of a deadly conflict.
Pakistan is now a key ally of the international community. The last situation the international community would like to see develop is the war against terror deflected by the war between India and Pakistan.
But if the militants wanted to deflect attention from the heat of allied forces against Al Qaeda in the tribal areas bordering Pakistan, they succeeded. The fight that began last September triggered by militants flying planes into the Twin Towers, has every possibility of turning into a fight for Srinagar triggered by militants determined to provoke an Indo Pak clash.
A critical error by the international community was the conclusion that a military dictator could defuse tension between India and Pakistan or prevent the tidal wave of extremism now engulfing the region.
The Pakistan Peoples Party welcomes the effort by Britain, the United States and Russia to defuse the crisis through dialogue.
Perhaps the mission will succeed. A similar attempt last December did defuse war in 2001.
Defusing war through dialogue is necessary. More necessary is breaking the recurrent cycle of tension and talk that marks the rise of the Generals in Islamabad.
There are concerns that the cycle of three near nuclear confrontations in three years under General Musharaf could continue unless there is regime change in Islamabad.
Regime change in Islamabad offers the possibility of a fresh start at political negotiation between India and Pakistan. A Musharaf departure can allow a new government to begin confidence-building measures with a clean slate.
It happened once before. In 1971, military rules General Yayha resigned paving the way for a new elected and representative government. That government signed the Simla Agreement that held peace in place until the nuclear detonations of 1998.
Since 1998 the two countries have thrice come to conflict. Clearly a new treaty is needed to prevent the recurrent tensions and the threat of nuclear annihilation.
Last November, I travelled to New Delhi to meet with the Indian leadership. I discussed with the models of conflict management that could give the one billion people of South Asia a safer region.
My Party is committed to dialogue and to a peaceful resolution of the Kashmir dispute in keeping with the aspirations of the Kashmiri people.
Earlier my Party successfully concluded the first and only nuclear confidence building treaty between New Delhi and Islamabad. This was the treaty not to attack each other’s nuclear facilities.
We signed an agreement to establish a hot line between army headquarters patterned on the hotline between Moscow and Washington during the Cold War.
More nuclear confidence building measures are now needed between Islamabad and New Delhi to reduce the chances of nuclear catastrophe.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Let us remember that building moderate, stable and democratic political structures can marginalize the Osamas, the Talibans and extremists of this world before they unleash their war against the people of the world community.
The goal of the Socialist International must always be to simultaneously promote stability and strengthen democratic values.
These democratic values are critical to the future direction of my country.
The democratic future of Pakistan is dear to me. It is also critical to regional peace and global security.
For whether out of coincidence or otherwise, a nexus is emerging between events relating to Al Qaeda and the rise of tension with India.
Last December, as the bombing of the Tora Bora mountains was driving Al Qaeda militants to despair, the Indian Parliament attack took place diverting international attention to Kashmir.
And this May, as the international troops moved in the mountainous region bordering Pakistan, forcing al Qaeda into a corner, a suicide attack in Kashmir once again diverted international attention to an Indo Pak war.
Let us remember that when Pakistan’s military dictator joined the war against terror last September, he said and I quote that he was joining “the lesser evil meaning the West to fight the larger evil meaning India”.
The West has gambled for decades that dictators can impose stability. But the dictators have come back to haunt the world.
The Shah of Iran created a backlash that resulted in the Iranian Revolution.
Pakistan’s General Zia nurtured the fanatics in the Afghan Mujahideen who became a Frankenstein’s monster.
How many more September 11nths, how many more near nuclear conflicts before we all come to realise that the greatest protection of freedom from terrorism is replacing dictatorships with democracies. With governments responsible to the people.
The stakes are high. The long term implications great. Democracies don’t start wars and they don’t promote international terrorism.
Elections in Pakistan are scheduled for October of this year. The Socialist International could ensure that they take place, that they are fair free and impartial and open to all parties and candidates.
History has taught us the very hard lesson that when the world turns against democracy, it turns against itself. That is why it is critical that in the war against terrorism and in promoting peace in South Asia we keep sight of democratic values.
Thank you Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen.