Panetta should stop blaming Pakistan for failures caused by wrong US policies, says Mushahid

Date : June 08, 2012

Islamabad, June 08, 2012  Senator Mushahid Hussain, Chairman, Senate Committee on Defence and Defence Production has criticized the comments of visiting US Defence Secretary, Leon Panetta, which he made in New Delhi and Kabul regarding Pakistan.  In a speech to the Senate today and talking to the media at Parliament House, Senator Mushahid Hussain said that the statement of Panetta about “losing patience with Pakistan” and blaming Pakistan for the US failure in Afghanistan was a reflection both of imperial arrogance as well as failure to accept responsibility for the Washington’s own mistakes.

Senator Mushahid Hussain said that since 9/11, the United States had spent over $ 3 trillion in wars against Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan which had resulted in 225,000 people killed and almost 8 million displaced  according to figures provided by an American university study. It is, therefore, not surprising that the Muslim World, which has been at the centre of the war zone, has lost patience with the United States due to its policies based on military might destabilizing the entire region.

In this regard, Senator Mushahid Hussain referred to the protest by Afghan President Karzai at the US/NATO bombings  in Afghanistan which led to deaths of 18 civilians yesterday and which Afghan President Karzai had condemned as being “unjustified, unacceptable and intolerable”.

Coupled with wrong US policies was a long list of broken promises, and Senator Mushahid Hussain referred to President Obama’s promise of Reconstruction Opportunity Zones (ROZ) in FATA as well as commitment  to close down the notorious Guantanamo Bay prison where 169 detainees were still  being held illegally.  He said that now the US has announced that instead of closing Guantanamo Bay, it will expand this prison and make it into a permanent illegal detention facility.

Concluding, Senator Mushahid Hussain welcomed the statement of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ms Navi Pillay,  where she condemned the US drown attacks as being a violation of international law and she also called for an inquiry into this killing campaign.  Senator Mushahid Hussain regretted that instead of thanking Pakistan for its contributions and sacrifices, especially of its armed forces and people, US policy makers like Panetta were looking for scapegoats. Such a short sighted approach would be a further hindrance in the normalization of Pakistan-American relations.  Replying to a question, Senator Mushahid said he had called a meeting of the Senate Defence Committee on June 13 to discuss this and various other issues connected with defence of Pakistan.