OTHER ARTICLES OF THE SAME PLAGIARISED GENRE REVEALING THE TRUE HOLE OF PAKISTAN
Chinese debt remains the largest Pakistan has to service - officially. The CPEC is facing headwinds with China and Pakistan locked in a tussle over payments, corruption issues and overpayments as per Nikkei Asia. Projects are delayed and their annual summit postponed. The all-weather friendship has hit an air pocket it seems. Pakistan has started cosying up to USA all over again. There was a video in circulation which showed that the Sindhudesh issue is flaring up again. The PDM continues to be a nuisance. The National security advisor says “we ultimately want to see ourselves as an economic melting pot for the region” . On that there is no doubt. Pakistan is a molten lump already. Of what ? I do not know. All we know is that its economy is already in a meltdown. Their love-to-hate affair with India continues. India dominates the top news trends in Pakistan. It has now started urging the international community to take note of Indian actions that undermine regional stability. They now know that it is beyond China to handle India so they have turned to the rest of the world.
Interesting articles of the recent past are being presented to you all over again. Read them and you will get a drift of things in Pakistan. You will see that they are as Chaotic as Pakistan is.
China to Gift 0.5 Million Doses of COVID 19 vaccines @ https://www.dawn.com/news/1602757/china-to-gift-05m-doses-of-covid-19-vaccine-to-pakistan-by-jan-31-qureshi
Pakistan is up the Covid creek without a vaccine. China its iron brother is giving it a measly 50000 doses as gift. Balance 1.1 million doses by end Feb. I am sure the Chinese vaccines will be exorbitant apart from being ineffective. All the best to the 220 million Pakistanis and their Army. Major lesson. We should start to look past this nation. It will remain in a state of suspended ineffectiveness. This is infinitely better than a state which is stable and riecovering or for that matter broken up.
Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi on Thursday announced that China has promised to provide 500,000 doses of a coronavirus vaccine to Pakistan by January 31
But Qureshi said he informed his Chinese counterpart that Pakistan's requirement for vaccines is "more than this", and that it will need 1.1 million doses in the near future.
"At this, [the Chinese foreign minister] said 'we plan to fulfil this requirement of yours as well by the end of February and the 1.1m doses will be made available to you,'"
Clueless State @ https://www.dawn.com/news/1602486/clueless-state
This article gives a real inside view of Pakistan’s hollowness and state of dysfunctiona. lity. Note the line on FWO, the Army organisation formed to compete for civil contracts. Very clearly the Pakistan Army is skinning the cat without mercy. Recommended to read the whole article.
…The government in Islamabad is often found trying to interpret contracts at its own convenience and timing. Though this approach might work locally or in kids’ cricket, when it involves international firms and arbiters, it can result in national embarrassments as witnessed in the Broadsheet and Reko Diq cases, or the seizure of a plane belonging to the national carrier for violation of the lease agreement…
The recent attempt of Pakistan LNG Ltd to import liquefied natural gas met firstly with no bids…No business would want to risk it all by getting into an agreement with a country which drags international companies into petty politics…
…projects proposed to be funded by the BOT arrangement mostly do not fetch any bidders in Pakistan because such projects require a period of 10 to 20 years for returns on investment and in Pakistan decision-makers have a habit of giving political considerations precedence over consistency of policy…
…this government is doing the same with independent power producers, and is now trying to renegotiate the already agreed to terms and conditions of MoUs signed in August last year. Now that the government owes billions to IPPs, they are being offered unviable payment plans as they face a liquidity crunch due to the enormous circular debt...
…Another aspect of any agreement or contract is the provision of a level playing field to all competitors. This is also often violated right under the nose… FWO is a military engineering organisation that bids for various infrastructure development projects in Pakistan including construction of highways across the country. It competes with private contractors in the bidding process…
…the problem is that FWO enjoys tax exemptions while other bidders competing for the same projects do not, meaning that for a project where a private contractor would pay 7.5 per cent to the government in taxes, the FWO would pay nothing…
..Lastly, it is pertinent to point out that most of the cases involving international arbitration result in adverse judgements for Pakistan as these bodies make decisions based purely on merit and unlike the local forums cannot be influenced or coerced to get favourable decisions.
Violence and Afghan Peace Talks @ https://www.dawn.com/news/1602489/violence-afghan-peace-talks
The indications are pretty clear. Afghanistan is descending into chaos. Last time around there were dictators like Zia Ur Rehman and Pervez Musharraf who directed the Strategic Depth drama. That situation is gone. Pakistan thinks it will be the kingpin of manipulation in delivering Afghanistan to USA on one side and China on the other. My prediction is more pain than gain for Pakistan. However, it is not new to them. They will once again see that the Taliban are gaining strategic depth in Pakistan as they did the long time back.
THE two women judges shot dead in Kabul last Sunday were the latest victims of the targeted killings that have swept Afghanistan amid the virtually stalemated peace talks between the government in Kabul and the Afghan Taliban. Those killed in the last few months in what is described as a systematic massacre include journalists, human rights activists, and members of civil society. The latest cycle of violence raises questions about the prospect of peace returning to the war-torn country as the American withdrawal seems imminent.
…Some analysts see the targeted killings as a throwback to the late 1980s when several members of the Afghan intelligentsia in exile were killed in the fratricidal conflict among various Afghan Mujahedeen groups following the withdrawal of the Soviet forces.
….While there is no possibility of any reversal in the US plan for a complete withdrawal of troops, the new administration may increase the pressure on both the Taliban and the government in Kabul to move back from their respective rigid positions. Pakistan will also be under more pressure from the Biden administration to persuade the Taliban to agree to a long-term ceasefire.
No Let-up in Food Prices Despite Massive Imports @ https://www.dawn.com/news/1602504/no-let-up-in-food-price-hike-despite-massive-imports
This is a pretty grim picture. In a left-handed manner, one can say the cost of living in Pakistan is pretty high. That is why life is so cheap there!
In FY21, import of wheat and sugar to control skyrocketing prices of the commodities have played a major role in fuelling the overall import bill. However, the increase in imports of wheat, sugar and palm oil failed to provide any price relief to the masses…
….The import of pulses rose by 13pc in quantity to 568,206 tonnes and 17pc in value to $287m. Average per tonne price of pulses rose to $506 from $487. Pulses rates rose by Rs20 per kg in the wholesale markets recently. Now the wholesale rates of gram pulse, moong, masoor and mash are pegged at Rs140, Rs240, Rs130 and Rs240 per kg, respectively….
…The import bill of palm oil stood at $1.111bn in 1HFY21 — up by 32pc than IHFY20 — while volume of import surged by 7.49pc to 1.629m tonnes. The average per tonne price swelled to $682 from $555 resulting in a jump in ghee and cooking oil prices by Rs40-50 per litre/kg.
…Sugar price saw an increase to Rs90-95 per kg from Rs85 per kg in the last week of December, following continuous increase in wholesale prices….
…Increase in high speed diesel prices by Rs2.95 per litre to Rs113.19 has further escalated the transportation cost.
Roots of Extremism @ https://www.dawn.com/news/1602704/roots-of-extremism
We are going to see new narratives coming out of this organisation being set up. Need to keep a watch on it. Is it part of Pakistan new effort to burnish its image or will it work in conjunction with China to shape public and international opinion?
I learnt that the government has set up a commission “for implementation of national narrative and development of structures against violent extremism and radicalisation” one of whose objectives is “establishing a centre of excellence to conduct degree and diploma courses in CVE [countering violent extremism] and CT [countering terrorism]”. Another objective is “promoting awareness [of extremism and terrorism] through print and electronic media, publications, seminars, conferences, etc”…
…Now we will be establishing centres of excellence to conduct degree and diploma courses in CVE and CT which will be progressively upgraded to HEC-approved universities with their own vice chancellors, provosts, registrars, etc all of whom would have official residences, vehicles, POL and telephone allowances. Meanwhile, friends and relatives would be wined and dined at international conferences and study tours would be arranged to countries that have successfully done what we have now so admirably set out to do….
..As long as there is no honest discussion of how we got this sickness, there will be little hope for a cure. We won’t even know if we are serious in undoing the causes of extremism and terrorism or if we are just going through the motions to tick off a box on some checklist that has been handed down to us to regain good standing in the international financial system of banking transactions...
…The objective conditions in Pakistan today are giving rise to broad trends of conformity, rigid thinking, and loss of imagination that incline societies towards extremism and violence. Everyone being made to learn and think the same truth on pain of being declared anti-national can only yield an unreflecting mass and a submissive society which is what authoritarian rulers drool over in their dreams.
The PIA fiasco
The PIA fiasco finds mention in many articles hence they are being flagged in a few ofv them. It actually represents the dysfunctional state of Pakistan at its best.
Hazards of Governance @ https://www.dawn.com/news/1602707/the-hazards-of-governance
PAKISTAN received adverse references in dispatches last week. Of all the planes at their disposal PIA’s smart bosses chose to send to Malaysia the plane that could be impounded there and the Malaysians didn’t fail to oblige. Apart from losing face, the airline had to dish out over Rs10 million to bring the passengers to Pakistan. Donald Trump’s shenanigans prevented Pakistan from providing the most sensational banner headline to the global media but most Pakistanis weren’t amused.
Farewell Roosevelt Hotel @ https://www.dawn.com/news/1602706/farewell-roosevelt-hotel
The Roosevelt Hotel in Manhattan as well as the Scribe Hotel in Paris, both iconic landmarks in their respective cities and prized assets of the national airline, have been seized (or ‘charged’ in legal language) by a court order in the British Virgin Islands (BVI) as settlement of the liability to the Tethyan Copper Company (TCC) to whom Pakistan lost an international arbitration case after cancelling the contract that awarded them the Reko Diq gold and copper mines.
Biden Administration to Revive Military to Military Ties with Pakistan https://www.dawn.com/news/1602541/biden-administration-to-revive-military-to-military-ties-with-pakistan
The Biden administration sees Pakistan as an “essential partner” in any peace process in Afghanistan and believes that “continuing to build relationships with Pakistan’s military will provide openings for the United States and Pakistan to cooperate on key issues,”…
The Pakistanis are verry happy with this statement…no they are ecstatic…wait… the Pakistani army is drooling. Especially the bit about IMET being reopened for the Army…after all that was the traditional channel to develop contacts in USA to stash money there… you cannot do that with China. The motto of Pakistani Army is rip-off the nation in deals with China and stash it in USA through Pizza’s!
Problem with Pakistan‘a negative approach is that they would keep trying to manipulate and manage but would never make progress
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