No More Cards

Here is one piece which appeared in the Urdu press and not in any English newspapers from Pakistan.

Quoted in Nawa-e-Waqt (September 2, 2004) ex-ISI chief Hameed Gul said that Pakistan had played all its cards to get India to resolve the Kashmir dispute and now there was no card left to play. He said Pakistan first declared ceasefire unilaterally, then allowed India to fence the LoC and then talked of a solution outside the UN resolutions but nothing had happened.

Hameed Gul is right about the first part. Pakistan has played all its cards, the last one being jihad, which put the integrity of the state at stake. It is now time to change tack or sink. The new policy is to bind the wounds inflicted on Pakistan by jihad. It has its own cards, but they are different from the ones that were played in the past but got ruffed. [Khaled Ahmed