No cricket lover would have forgotten the above Pic which exposed the betting racket in Pakistan's cricket. Cheating as a habit is ingrained in Pakistan's policy makers. Hence, Pakistan since the capture of Afghanistan with the help of Taliban a few months ago has been doggedly pursuing a global campaign to garner support for the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, its senior officials including the Foreign Minister and PM made all out efforts to ensure that Taiban Govt gets global recognition.
The gist of Pakistan’s plea has been that ; failure to engage with the Taliban will lead to humanitarian disaster. Even Imran Khan In his speech at the United Nations General Assembly, said, “There is only one way to go. We must strengthen and stabilize the current government, for the sake of the people of Afghanistan.”
They expected that world sooner or later on the excuse of humanitarian crisis will fall in line and they all will go laughing to the banks. Unfortunately their calculations went astray.
This inability of Pakistan to get Taliban recognized by the world community and bring funds must have caused immense embarrassment to them and might have emerged as an irritant between Taliban and Pakistan. And it knows that from security point of view the region would become a headache for them rather than for rest of the world.
Now they have played the last card that was available to them, rope in OIC ; The organistaion of Islamic countries and use their clout to get funds and global recognition for the regime. They are hoping that Islamic brotherhood may work .
Pakistan has many times emphasised that the lack of immediate response would lead to food shortages and create a massive humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan. Thence the Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said ;
"The OIC Extraordinary session in Islamabad would prove to be a stepping stone in finding solutions to the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan and this was also an opportunity for world capitals to know about ground realities from Taliban representatives."
It has been reported that Special representatives on Afghanistan from the United States, Russia, China and European Union would also attend the event. Later a meeting of Pakistan, China, Russia and the United States and Germany, Japan, Italy and Australia would also be held in Islamabad to discuss the Afghan situation.
Ostensibly the aim is to exploit the influence of Muslim Nations collectively to compel the Global community to recognise Taliban.
The Pakistan media has also reported that a delegation from Saudi Arabia including Afghan affairs department head Prince Abdullah bin Khalid bin Saud al-Kabir and Prince Jiluwi bin Turki are attending the special meet.
But the fact is many Islamic countries themselves are wary of fundamentalism and do not wish to encourage such elements in their societies including Saudi Arabia. How far would they go to support the Taliban regime would be known only after the meet is over.
However, The Central Asian nations, foreign ministers have already skipped Pak's OIC meet and instead are attending India-led dialogue .
The future will only tell us whether Pakistan once again be able to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds and be able to dupe the West or this time its Bluff will be caught.