US signed a military pact with India in July 2009.This agreement entitled India to get sophisticated weapons from US but with conditions??? Under the terms of the deal, the US would be allowed to conduct "end-use monitoring," meaning it would conduct regular assessments of India's military policies to verify that weapons systems are being used for their intended purposes. It also allowed US to annually inspect the military hardware purchased from US. Before this, almost couple of years ago, US had increased Military aid to India ,at that time , Pakistan also made diplomatic efforts to get the same assistance but we could not convince US. Interestingly this was projected as diplomatic failure of Pakistan Government.
What I want to convey is that no foreign Govt. grant unconditional aid. Even International development institutions provide loan with strict terms and conditions. (SBP autonomy that exclude it from control of Govt is a condition from IMF).Last year Zardari faced heavy criticism on returning empty handed from US and now when he managed to get an aid package he is being charged of compromising the sovereignty of state. These are double standard.
In this aid package there is no strict condition for non military aid. The dawn has in its editorial has commented on the bill as under
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The aid is meant predominantly for social development, capacity-building and democracy-related projects. However, the bill also authorises “such sums as are necessary” for military assistance to Pakistan and it was this aspect that caused some in Congress to baulk at approving without conditions. But it appears that the sting in those conditions has been removed; earlier versions of the bill made direct references to A.Q. Khan and India, whereas the final conditions include Pakistan’s cooperation in dismantling nuclear supply networks and combating terrorist groups and ensuring that the security forces do not subvert the judicial and political processes in the country. These do not appear to be unduly onerous or unfair.
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I don’t maintain that this Govt is flawless, what I believe is that a worst democracy is much better than dictatorship. We have reached to this level only due to power thrust of Generals. Had the political process been allowed to function, we would have been living in much better conditions.
Democracy is a blessing. If sitting Govt do not perform well, it would be voted out in the next term. But what would happen if a general comes to rescue? Government has a mandate to complete its 5 year but some invisible hands are striving to destabilize it with the help of a well sponsored media campaign. It would be very unfortunate if democracy is derailed again.