Pakistan: What price Sovereignity ?

Wahid Butt of Lahore writies;
Reference ‘Perked up Nationalism’ by Sadaf Sartaj (May 28/2005). The good lady has drawn attention to what Lt-Gen. David Barno, Commander US Forces in Afghanistan, said which is reproduced here: “Collectively we feel that there is a need to under take a military operation in North Waziristan to keep pressure on the terrorists”. The learned writer has a question: Isn’t it interference in our internal affairs? If it is, then what price our sovereignty?
The US General is fully aware of the fact that General Pervez Musharraf acquired power through a coup d’etat. He runs a sham democracy at home and is so weak that he accepted to become a front-line ally of the US against terrorism on just one telephone call from the Secretary of State General Collin Powell.

        The ‘elected’ parliament in Pakistan, actually a rubberstamp, has passed a bill allowing General Musharraf to remain as President and COAS in uniform until 2007. Hence what price sovereignty, dignity and independence. These are mere words for this tin-pot dictator.

-WAHID BUTT, Lahore, via e-mail.

www.nation.com.pk   dated June 30th, 2005 (letters)