‘Inflection point’: US hearings on Pakistan shed light on complex relationship | Politics News

islamabad, pakistan – The US Congress will hold hearings next week on Pakistan’s “future of democracy” and the current state of relations between the two countries. It comes weeks after Pakistan’s controversial election that the country’s main opposition party claims was rigged.

But foreign policy analysts say a March 20 House Foreign Affairs subcommittee hearing could change the course of relations between the two countries, which have been volatile, although they have improved over the past two years. He said that the gender is low.

Pakistan formally welcomed the hearing and said it hoped the deliberations would “contribute to promoting positive dynamics in bilateral relations” between the two countries.

“Pakistan values ​​close relations with the United States and believes in constructive engagement on all issues. And we respect the privilege of the legislative body to discuss and debate international issues,” Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. officials said Thursday.

The hearing follows a February 29 letter to President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, supported by 31 members of Congress, urging them not to recognize Pakistan’s new government and to move forward with an investigation into allegations of election fraud. This follows.

Pakistan held public opinion polls last month that were marred by widespread allegations of fraud, unusual delays in results and numerous other irregularities.

The biggest winner in the polls was a candidate backed by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), despite being denied the use of the election symbol, a cricket bat, days before the vote. It won 93 seats. The party’s leader, former Prime Minister Imran Khan, has been imprisoned since August 2023 and was found guilty on multiple charges just before the election. Many other political party-backed candidates were unable to campaign due to repression by authorities.

Despite winning the maximum number of seats, the PTI refused to form a coalition with Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN) and Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), which won 75 and 54 seats respectively.

The PMLN and PPP then worked together to form a coalition with smaller parties to form a government. This is almost a repeat of the coalition government formed in April 2022 when the PTI and then Prime Minister Imran Khan were ousted from power. Vote of no confidence in Parliament.

Mr Khan, who has been in power since August 2018, has repeatedly accused his overthrow of being orchestrated by a US-led conspiracy in collusion with Pakistan’s powerful military. Both the US and Pakistani military have repeatedly denied the claims as false.

The former cricketer-turned-politician specifically accused Donald Lew of the US State Department

Officials said they passed a message to Asad Majeed, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States at the time, in which he allegedly suggested Washington remove Mr. Khan from power for his involvement with Russia despite the Ukraine war.

Mr. Lu, who currently serves as assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asian affairs, is scheduled to appear as a witness at a Congressional hearing on March 20.

Earlier this year, Khan and former colleague Shah Mahmood Qureshi were sentenced to 10 years in prison for leaking state secrets. This incident was related to a message from Mr. Lu that was sent to Ambassador Majeed by secret wire.

U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Thursday that the U.S. government looks forward to the Congressional meeting, repeating previous statements denying Mr. Lew’s allegations.

“As for the underlying allegations against Assistant Secretary Lu, they are false. They have always been false. You’ve heard me say that more than once, more than twice, probably more than a dozen times. Of course. , we take seriously any threats against U.S. officials and condemn any efforts to threaten the safety and security of our nation’s diplomats,” he said while answering questions.

Maliha Lodhi, Pakistan’s former ambassador to the United States, United Nations and United Kingdom, warned against reading too much into the subcommittee hearing.

“The U.S. diaspora is generally supportive of the PTI, and they have managed to push for subcommittee hearings. However, these hearings happen all the time and have little operational impact,” she said. told Al Jazeera.

Kamran Bokhari, senior director at the Washington, D.C.-based New Lines Institute for Strategic Policy Studies, argues that the movement by parts of the diaspora against Pakistan’s new government is mistakenly confusing U.S. domestic politics with prospects for foreign policy change. He said there was.

“Local legislators are willing to make statements to appease you in order to gain the trust of their constituents and for their constituents. This subcommittee hearing is a product of local politics in America. , has nothing to do with the foreign policy of the US government,” he told Al Jazeera.

Abdul Basit, a research fellow at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Relations, agreed.

“Will it turn out that way? Probably not. [hearings] Most are cut out for gallery and optics. “I don’t think it makes a big political or policy-level difference,” he added.

Basit further said that Pakistan is not a priority for the United States and that bilateral relations are primarily framed around Pakistan’s relations with its regional neighbors India, China, and Afghanistan.

“The US wants Pakistan to maintain peace on the eastern front with India while influencing the Afghan Taliban since the US withdrawal (in 2021),” he said, adding that Pakistan and the US He added that the relationship “is not about the state itself.”

Former ambassador Lodi agreed, saying relations between the two countries are currently at a “tipping point”.

“Relations have been in a rather tentative state since the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan. In fact, the US withdrawal completely changes the status of this relationship, where Afghanistan has been the only common issue between the two countries for the past 20 years. ,” she added.

Bokhari also said that from the State Department’s perspective, the US wants to avoid taking sides in Pakistan’s multiple crises at a time when US diplomacy and the Biden administration are also busy with several challenges. added.

“Pakistan is not on the priority list at the moment. Americans are busy with the Middle East crisis, the war in Ukraine, the China issue, and this is election season. They have no shortage of problems,” he said.

Lodi said it was unlikely that anything significant would happen between the two countries until the US elections, scheduled for November this year.