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| Sir Zafrullah Khan with King Faisal of Saudi Arabia |
Source/Credit: The News International
By S Iftikhar Murshed | November 20, 2011
The Mansoor Ijaz affair is the most disgraceful diplomatic episode in Pakistan’s history. It demonstrates the extent to which the foreign policy establishment has deteriorated because of the appointment of persons of questionable probity as envoys to key capitals.
Yet there was a time when the foreign service of Pakistan was considered amongst the finest in the world. The first foreign minister of the country, Sir Muhammad Zafarullah Khan, who is also credited for drafting the Lahore Resolution of 1940, was a legend in his lifetime. He inspired the first diplomats of the newborn state by his example, and in the process won many laurels for his country.
Sir Zafarullah Khan’s speech on the Palestine problem in October 1947 at the UN General Assembly is said to be one of the most forceful ever made on the issue and prompted King Abdul Aziz al-Saud to write to him on May 5, 1948. In the letter he acknowledged that the Pakistani foreign minister’s “high principles have created a desire among all righteous persons to identify themselves with the efforts of Your Excellency, not only on behalf of the Arabs but Muslims all over the world as well.”
Supported by a team of dedicated officials of the foreign ministry, Sir Zafarullah struggled relentless for the Palestinian and Muslim causes, and this was acknowledged by the leading Islamic statesmen of the time. The secretary general of the Arab League, Abdur Rahman Azzam Pasha, wrote to Sir Zafarullah on Nov 15, 1951: “Reading your speech in the UN (General) Assembly, I prayed to God to save you and preserve your health in the service of Islam.”
Despite these encomiums, 23 years later the man who the Islamic world cherished so fondly would be declared a non-Muslim in his own country with the adoption of the Second Amendment to the Constitution on Sept 17, 1974, under which Ahmadis were excommunicated from Islam. It is strangely ironical that in March 1958 he had been invited for Umra by King Saud ibn Abdul Aziz, and in 1967, during the reign of King Faisal ibn Abdul Aziz, performed Haj.
The Second Amendment, an outcome of spineless political opportunism, was not tabled by the religious right but by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s supposedly secular Pakistan People’s Party. Bhutto fancied himself as a revolutionary, as an agent of change and, in the process, destroyed institutions including the foreign service, which till then had served the country so well.
With the breakaway of East Pakistan, the country lost half of its diplomatic cadre and Bhutto moved quickly to fill the vacancies by arbitrary recruitments based primarily, but not exclusively, on political considerations. A few of the lateral entrants, as the new inductees were disparagingly called, were men and women of rare competence and two became foreign secretaries. But by and large the appointments into all ranks were based on patronage and, as a consequence, merit was ousted from her ivory throne.
Those inducted by Bhutto into the foreign service 38 years ago have retired, but since then politicians have interfered in postings, promotions and the appointment of ambassadors. Alongside this an unwarranted practice emerged of reserving a sizeable proportion of ambassadorial slots for political appointees.
The armed forces also demanded their pound of flesh from the carcass of what was once a superb foreign service. A quota was accordingly set aside for inductions from the military at the recruitment stage, as well as at the ambassadorial level where retired generals, admirals and air marshals could be parked.
With one or two exceptions, the performance of non-career ambassadors has certainly not been stellar while some have caused embarrassment to the country. This also applies to the envoys accredited to important world capitals such as London and Washington, as well as the United Nations where one would have expected that top-of-the-line diplomats would be assigned.
Pakistan’s permanent representative in New York has a well-deserved reputation for his culinary expertise and is said to be capable of producing mouth-watering gastronomical marvels. But this hardly qualifies him to deal with the nuanced intricacies of multilateral diplomacy. He is urbane and gives the impression of having been brought up under the enervating influences of what was once a pleasure-loving aristocracy. The envoy is undoubtedly articulate, but unfortunately what he says at times verges on puerility.
For instance, he recently bragged to the media that Pakistan had been elected to a non-permanent vacancy in the UN Security Council because of his efforts. Like a spirited adolescent, he described how he had persuaded India not only to support but also to persuade other countries to vote for Pakistan. What he did not say was that India’s vote for Pakistan, if this is really the case because the balloting is secret, was in reciprocity for Islamabad’s support to New Delhi for its membership of the Security Council last year. Nor did he explain how a small country like Kyrgyzstan was able to garner 55 votes in its contest for the Asian seat against Pakistan.
The exploits of the high commissioner in London are far more outlandish. Pakistan’s ambassador extraordinary and plenipotentiary to the Court of St. James’s was shown by Geo News several months back spiriting away loads of evidentiary documents from a court in Geneva after the government withdrew the charges against President Zardari. Such conduct is not only unbecoming of a diplomat but also demonstrates the level to which politically appointed ambassadors can stoop to be of service to their mentors.
But even this pales into insignificance in comparison to the allegations of Mansoor Ijaz, a dodgy Pakistani-American businessman. He claimed he had served as courier at the behest of a top diplomat for the transmission of a message from President Zardari to the US leadership requesting help to pre-empt a possible military coup in Pakistan. The unnamed diplomat was identified as the ambassador in Washington, Mr Hussain Haqqani, by Tehrik-e-Insaf chief, Imran Khan, during his hugely successful rally in Lahore on Oct 30.
Ambassador Haqqani has denied any involvement in the disgraceful affair and has stated that he is willing to resign. But a simple resignation is no longer sufficient now that the text of the Mansoor Ijaz memo has been published and Admiral Mike Mullen has confirmed having received it. If the authenticity of the memorandum is established, then it amounts to treason.
The government has to come clean and the only course available is a thorough and impartial investigation. This was also what former foreign minister Shah Mahmood Quershi demanded on Nov 14 while announcing his resignation from the PPP and the National Assembly. Whatever the outcome of the inquiry, the ambassador in Washington will have to be replaced.
Rumours are already doing the rounds in Islamabad about the likely successor to Ambassador Haqqani. The speculation is that the frontrunners are three women. Other persons are also being mentioned in television talk shows, but what has been ignored in these discussions is the need to restore professionalism to diplomacy. Only then can there be a semblance of the return of the halcyon era as at the time of Sir Zafarullah Khan when Pakistani diplomats were among the most respected in the world.
This is not a far-fetched dream and can be achieved if, like India and several other countries, only career diplomats are appointed as ambassadors. “Leave diplomacy to diplomats” was the title of my article in this newspaper in January 2009. If this is adopted as the norm for the conduct of foreign policy, then it is unlikely that national interests will be compromised for internal political gain.
The writer is the publisher of Criterion Quarterly. Email: iftimurshed@gmail.com
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