Shantanu Mukharji

 With the passage of time, Pakistan under the premiership of Imran Khan, who completes years as the Prime Minister this month, is increasingly getting obsessed with the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project. Perhaps coincidentally, ever since the QUAD grouping has gained momentum, CPEC has featured more prominently than before in the Pakistani and Chinese media, both in print and electronic.

Besides, it’s invariably in the agenda of talks between China and Pakistan. Just to recapitulate, in the recently held talks between Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, CPEC dominated while other bilateral issues got eclipsed.

Pakistani media, as usual, blamed India for trying to derail the CPEC. The major newspapers dared the Indian External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar for his statement that CPEC and the Belt Road Initiative (BRI) were encroaching on India’s sovereignty. The newspapers alleged that India would never want a strong and developed Pakistan hence all this negative publicity was meant to wean China away from Pakistan.

However, independent and neutral observers find it difficult to fathom how India comes into the picture between China and Pakistan entering into some semblance of mutual cooperation?

Meanwhile joining the media campaign to vilify India, the Pakistan Foreign Office in a recent statement has debunked the Indian assertions against the CPEC. Such statements have become a routine and lack seriousness and acceptability. In fact, it’s becoming more like the ‘crying wolf’ syndrome of Pakistan.

Meanwhile, Imran Khan has appointed Khalid Mansoor as the Special Assistant to the Prime Minister of Pakistan (SAPM) to deal with all affairs of CPEC. The CEPC is gaining more currency than even the measures to address the menace of the COVID pandemic afflicting Pakistan or the fallout of the Taliban resurgence in Afghanistan.  This becomes imperative to mention because fresh reports indicate that Pakistan-sponsored terror outfits like Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) have lent their trained armed cadres to Taliban for fighting alongside them in Afghanistan to target government security forces. Sadly, Pakistan is turning Nelson’s eye to this unholy nexus and most belligerent collaboration between the two evil terror partners.

It also shows how Pakistan is buckling under pressure from China on the CPEC to its day to day functioning. Some are describing it as if Pakistan is acting as a vassal state of China. Khalid Mansoor has a long and illustrious career behind him having handled energy and power companies including Sindh Engro Coal Mining Company (SECMC) and Algeria Oman Fertiliser Company in top position. It also means Imran Khan, ostensibly at the behest of China is trying to give a facelift to CPEC to signal that the project is on course and without any irritants. Khalid Mansoor’s predecessor was retired Lt General of the Pakistan Army, Saleem Bajwa who had been pleading for a long to be relieved of his responsibilities.

Reverting to the earlier mention made on alleged Indian interference into the CPEC partnership between China and Pakistan, a section of the media is continuing with its campaign of manufacturing anti-India stories by alleging that there are more than 500 NGOs and fake media sites and outlets working to impair the CPEC and the Sino-Pak ties. Such manifestations, experts believe, are part of a blueprint of systematic psychological warfare scripted by the Pak Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). The agency has all along been blaming Indian for engineering disturbances in Baluchistan and other areas affected by the CPEC project. Pakistan’s harping on the same old tune is unlikely to yield results as Quad looks set to strategically take on China causing knee jerk reactions in Pakistani military, political and media circles.

(Writer is a retired IPS officer and a former National Security Advisor to the Prime Minister of Mauritius. The views are personal)