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… and making money out of Pakistani misfortune

• Someone in the Zardari government is colluding with the Indians and flooding Pakistani markets with Indian produce
• Zardari govt. colluded with US to allow Afghan-India trade at Pakistan’s expense
• Whose side is the Pakistani govt. on: India’s side, America’s side, or Pakistan’s side?
• Stop benefiting Indian cotton producers at Pakistan’s expense

EDITORIAL
TheNation
Friday, 27 August 2o10.
WWW.PAKNATIONALISTS.COM

LAHORE, Pakistan—For anyone still believing in Indian altruism towards Pakistan in its hour of suffering and need, a brief look at Indian actions recently will put an end to any such illusions.

If India really wanted to offer aid to Pakistan without seeking political capital from it, it would have given it through the United Nations fund. But that was never the Indian intent.

After all, India has continued to release water into Pakistan’s overflowing rivers deliberately to aggravate the flood situation. This is why India has refused to put in place a telemetry system on its dams on Kashmiri rivers as part of the Indus Waters Treaty infrastructure.

Nor is this all.

Indian opportunism knows no bounds and the Indians are already exploiting Pakistan’s misfortunes as a result of the flood devastation – especially in the agricultural sector.

Already the markets in the cities are filled with Indian vegetables and one needs to ask how these are coming in? Have we removed all restrictions on Indian trade through Wagah?

But it is not just the vegetable market India is eyeing. The Indian government has already moved to take advantage of the destruction of the bulk of Pakistan’s cotton crop as a result of the floods. Knowing that the textile industry would suffer a shortfall of local cotton, the Indian government has lifted an earlier ban on cotton export to enable India to meet the Pakistani textile industry’s anticipated demand. The ban had been in place to keep domestic prices down. Now, with a bumper cotton harvest and ample rain, Indian producers are all ready to export cotton to Pakistan in October. Apparently Pakistan has been importing cotton from India earlier also. However, the dynamics are different now with India’s suspect role of releasing water into our overflowing rivers. There is also the present Indian hostile posturing towards Pakistan and its refusal to renew the composite dialogue. Finally, there is the renewed killing of Kashmiris by Indian forces in Occupied Kashmir. As it is, our government has maintained a shameful silence on this issue and no official voice has been raised in support of the new Kashmiri intifada.

To allow Indian cotton producers to benefit from our flood disaster would be immoral and politically ridiculous since it would effectively reflect a tacit condoning of India’s hostile posture. Not only should Pakistan’s textile industry look to other cotton producers like China, the Pakistan government should make its India policy, especially in terms of trade, transparent. What exactly have we given to India in terms of trade access? At a time when India is actively seeking to undermine Pakistan on all fronts including abetting militancy within the country, especially in Balochistan, Pakistan’s government needs to stand firm against any Indian intrusion into our economic sphere – especially at the cost of the people of Pakistan’s interests.

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