Duplicitous Nawaz Sharif tries to fool the UN General Assembly yet again, with Kashmir talk

Sharif should realize the world knows Pakistan is a state sponsor of terrorism.

UNITED NATIONS: It’s a hard task to keep a straight face for people who are duplicitous, especially when speaking directly to a large body of people, but then the Prime Minister of Pakistan, Nawaf Sharif, seems to have mastered the art of lying, and being treacherous. This was in full view here at the United Nations General Assembly meet in New York where Sharif whined in a 20-minute speech about his country being “the principal victim of terrorism” (instead of exporting it liberally to many countries, including India and the US), and pleading “Pakistan wants peace with India” (while secretly fomenting terrorism in Kashmir, killing soldiers of the Indian Army with surreptitious attacks).

When Sharif addressed the United Nations last year, in 2015, he tried to fool the world by saying these words: “When I assumed office of the Prime Minister in June 2013, for the third time, one of my first priorities was to normalize relations with India. I reached out to the Indian leadership to emphasize that our common enemy was poverty and underdevelopment. Cooperation, not confrontation, should define our relationship.”

Then too, nobody in the room believed Sharif. Nor even the citizens of Pakistan. Most knew It was just political rhetoric. The exiled Pervez Musharraf, architect of the Kargil War, could have said the same things sitting in a room in London, and nobody would have believed him too.

But India and prime minister Narendra Modi took Sharif’s words seriously. Like time and again, gave the beleaguered leader of Pakistan yet another chance to mend his and his country’s war-mongering ways, transform themselves, cut away from escalating, harboring terrorism in its neighborhoods.

A failed Pakistan (not that it isn’t at present with daily anarchy on its streets with multiple terrorist attacks and rumors of coups in the offing) would become India’s biggest headache. So it made sense, one would reckon, to nod benignly at what Sharif said. Let the regional stalemate continue, as India marched to economic prosperity, experts suggested. For India, jobs mattered more than jihad.

Sharif, in his subdued and almost foolish-sounding speech today, heavy on the topic of Kashmir, sounded like a tired parrot who has lost the willpower to lie repeatedly, but who has to unspool and spew it anyways, from past memory, to get his lunch. He, however, didn’t convince anybody in the room that Pakistan is innocent of being a terror-exporting nation.

If some in the room were pondering as to how much Pakistan really knew of the motives of the terrorist Ahmad Khan Rahami and his wife who planned to bomb New York and New Jersey, others might have wondered how much did he personally know and was part of Pakistan’s plans to attack Uri in India, which took the lives of 18 soldiers.

Sharif seemed obsessed with Kashmir in his speech today. At one point he even praised the late Kashmiri terrorist Burhan Wani, who was killed by the Indian armed forces.

“Burhan Wani, the young leader murdered by Indian forces has emerged as a symbol of latest Kashmiri ‘intifada’,” Sharif said. He added that Pakistan “fully supports Kashmir’s right to self-determination”.

Here are the top 5 incredulous statements, and blatant lies uttered by Sharif at his speech at the United Nations today (read most of what he said as ‘Pakistan will continue to attack India surreptitiously through terror operations’):

1. “Pakistan has been the principal victim of terrorism including that supported, sponsored and financed from abroad. We will not allow externally sponsored terrorism and threats of destabilization to cause turbulence in Pakistan.”
2. “Confrontation should not be our destiny in South Asia. Pakistan wants peace with India. I have gone the extra mile to achieve this, repeatedly offering a dialogue to address all outstanding issues… But India has posed unacceptable preconditions to engage in a dialogue. Let us be clear: talks are no favor to Pakistan. Talks are in the interest of both countries. They are essential to resolve our differences, especially the Jammu and Kashmir dispute, and to avert the danger of any escalation.”
3. “Pakistan fully supports the demand of the Kashmiri people for self-determination, as promised to them by several Security Council resolutions. Their struggle is a legitimate one for liberation from alien occupation.”
4. For its part, Pakistan is committed to the establishment of strategic stability in the region. It neither wants, nor is it engaged in an arms race with India…But we cannot ignore our neighbor’s unprecedented arms build-up and will take whatever measures are necessary to maintain credible deterrence.”
5. “As a responsible nuclear weapon state, Pakistan will continue to cooperate with all international efforts that seek to promote fair and equitable solutions to disarmament and non-proliferation challenges… We have introduced ‘state of the art’ measures to strengthen the safety and security of our nuclear materials and facilities. We have adopted a comprehensive export control regime that is fully consistent with international standards.”

(Sujeet Rajan is Editor-in-Chief, The American Bazaar. Follow him @SujeetRajan1)