Arun Joshi

The designation of the Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Masood Azhar as a global terrorist is directly linked in its immediate context to the February 14 terror attack in Pulwama, though diplomatic compromises led to the deletion of the references to the place and what is going on there.

By Pakistan Foreign Office spokesperson’s own admission, the matter of the listing of Masood Azhar, who had founded the Jaish-e-Mohammad in early 2000, to carry out armed militancy in Kashmir, as international terrorist, “had been under consideration in the sanctions committee for several years (since 2009)”. But he was not listed for all these years because Pakistan’s all-weather friend China stood by Pakistan and shielded it from such an embarrassing designation internationally that would have cemented the worldview that Pakistan is a hub of terrorism is South Asia.

It was only after the Pulwama attack that left 44 CRPF personnel dead in a devastating terror attack in the 30-year-long militancy related violence in Kashmir that the world veered around the Indian point of view that the terror network of the Jaish-e-Mohammad, led by Masood Azhar, needed to be plugged by designating the Jaish supremo as international terrorist. Deniability is ingrained in Islamabad’s mindset.

India, in its dossier to Pakistan on the Pulwama attack shared with other countries as well, had provided irrefutable evidence as to how the attack was planned and directed by Masood Azhar’s group from Pakistan. The voice over given to the video of Adil Ahmad Dar, the suicide bomber, was given over phone from Islamabad.

Pakistan was left answerless, informed sources said

Diplomatic compromises do happen in international relations, and the main objective that the Government of India, wanted to achieve, did take place exactly 75 days after the Pulwama attack. What could not happen for a decade, how happened in two and a half months’ time? This question is being asked.

Pakistan may take solace from no reference to the Pulwama attack and the violence in Kashmir. The fact, however, remains that Pakistan and the terror groups based there are active in Kashmir and causing mayhem. Kashmiris know it, and Pakistan knows it better that its soil is being used for terror activities in Jammu and Kashmir.

The ultimate fact is that Azhar Masood, the pampered terrorist group top executive, with definite connections with the pan-Islamic groups like the Al-Qaeda, whom Pakistan wanted to shield from the UN sanctions committee all through, could not save him from getting declared a global terrorist.

This is not due to Pakistan’s initiative to curb the menace of terrorism that it broadcasts around the world. It was the strong voice raised by India, which culminated in the diplomatic success and a giant step against the perpetrators of terrorism on Wednesday.

Of course, there would be an irritation that the date and place did not find the mention in the statement, but when larger goals are at stake, such things do happen.

Courtesy:The tribune,May03,2019