ISLAMABAD, 12 April 2003 — Newspaper editorials in Pakistan yesterday appeared more concerned with the question “who next?” rather than “what next?” after the United States’ apparent military victory in Iraq.
For Islamabad’s The News, the war on Iraq ended as expected: Without any victors but many losers.
“The world is no longer safe for states which chart a course that might not be in conformity with American plans for a ‘Brave New World,’” it said in an editorial.
“In generic terms, the idea is to create a robotic state. An entity that will respond to programmed stimulus.”
Among the losers The News listed Islamic states which did not help a “brother state” in distress, the international community for not putting up stronger opposition to war, and Western media for “betraying its professional impartiality” by focusing more on the toppling of Saddam’s statue in Baghdad than on “the ongoing bombing, destruction, and overkill of civilians.”
Urdu-language newspaper Ausaf said though America’s military might prevailed over heroic Iraqi resistance, it also exposed its “real face.” Once its occupation of Iraq is consolidated, the US would turn its sights on Syria, Iran or North Korea, said the newspaper.
“Until Russia and France confront it, the US would continue pursuing its doctrine of use of force,” it warned.
Saddam Hussein met “the fate of all dictators who tyrannize over the people,” said Karachi’s liberal newspaper Dawn, adding the victors face two issues: Meeting the basic needs of the Iraqi people in the short-term, and maintaining Iraq’s sovereignty and integrity in the long-term.
It said looting in Baghdad and Basra testified to the Iraqi people’s deprivations as a result of 12 years of crippling sanctions imposed on Iraq following the 1991 Gulf War. Lahore’s Daily Times said the answer to “What next?” depended on “How will the post-war, pre-peace situation unfold in Iraq, and who, if any, is likely to be America’s next target.”
Washington had planned for a more messy war but victory came easy in its pursuit of democratizing Iraq, and freeing it of weapons of mass destruction, the paper said.
Whether the US now moves on to create more “democracies” will depend on whether it takes its cue from the ease with which it has toppled the Iraqi regime, or from the difficulties it is going to face in winning the peace, the Daily Times said.
Meanwhile, Pakistanis staged demonstrations in different cities yesterday to condemn the occupation of Iraq by US-led coalition forces, accusing them of desecrating Muslims religious sites, witnesses said.
Around 1,000 members of the Shiite community rallied in the city of Multan in central Punjab province chanting “do not colonize Iraq,” and “stop desecration of shrines.”
The crowd also shouted slogans condemning US President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
“The US and its allies will face severe reaction from the Muslim world if they attack Syria or Iran,” Malik Mohammad Saeed Khokhar, the secretary general of Punjab Peace Committee, told the rally.
Another 2,000 mostly women and children demonstrated in the city of Bahawalpur, also in Punjab, under the banners of non governmental organizations which collectively organized the protest against high civilian casualties in the 23-day old military conflict in Iraq.
Hundreds of Shiites participated in a procession in northwestern city of Peshawar to denounce what they called the sacrilegious acts of the invading forces in the cities of Najaf and Kerbala.
Muslims should wage jihad (holy war) to defeat “US designs against Islamic states,” Shiite leader Allama Jawad Hadi said, while prayer leaders in mosques delivered strong sermons against “the usurpation of Iraq by US-British armies.”
A small rally was also organized in the capital city of Islamabad by Shiite Muslims to express solidarity with the people of Iraq.
