Daily Times

Some are calling it a shift in Pakistan’s diplomatic approach to Saudi Arabia after Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi told Saudi Arabia-led Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) to convene a meeting of its Council of Foreign Ministers (CFM) on Kashmir and shun dragging its feet on the issue. “I am once again respectfully telling the OIC that a meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers is our expectation. If you cannot convene it, then I’ll be compelled to ask Prime Minister Imran Khan to call a meeting of the Islamic countries that are ready to stand with us on the issue of Kashmir and support the oppressed Kashmiris,” says the foreign minister in a TV talk show. The OIC’s Contact Group on Jammu and Kashmir has met three times during the last one year, two of which were at ministerial level, and called for resolution of Kashmir dispute in accordance with the United Nations Security Council’s resolutions. But it is a fact the OIC has been delaying the CFM meeting on Kashmir despite Pakistan’s repeated requests. So far, the OIC’s CFM forum has been a great disappointment for Kashmiris and Pakistan. This is the same forum where then Indian foreign minister Sushman Swaraj was invited to speak despite Pakistan’s vehement protest in 2019. Earlier in August last, when the Modi government revoked Kashmir’s special status from the Indian Constitution, the foreign minister made a desperate tour to Riyadh seeking support of the OIC but the forum never issued any statement to support Pakistan’s cause.

The 57-strong forum of the Muslim countries does not have much power to bring about a visible change to world’s situation but still Pakistan has been pushing for the meeting to get a symbolic victory. Saudi Arabia has been a longtime friend but on the Kashmir issue, it has never extended any visible diplomatic support to Pakistan on the Kashmir issue. But Saudi Arabia has never been reluctant to exert its pressure on Pakistan for its diplomatic gains. It forced Pakistan to skip the Kuala Lumpur Summit last December on Saudi pressure, which Pakistan calls “request”. Not on Saudi Arabia, other Gulf countries also take the Saudi lines and see it the other way when there is an occasion to speak on the sufferings of Kashmiris. Saudi Arabia has maintained its hegemony on the OIC even though Pakistan was a founding member of the forum and has always been speaking for fraternal and cooperative relations with OIC member states. It is time Pakistan spoke out and out or gave up its expectation from Saudi Arabia. *