Daily Al Thaura (Tripoli, Libya)

People of the Libya Arab Republic have supported the people of Pakistan in their hour of crisis with unmatched steadfastness and sincerity. However, it is necessary that the brotherly people of the Libya Arab Republic should know that they are not supporting their brethren in Pakistan just because they are their brethren, but because they are supporting a right and just cause. International and Zionist propaganda consider the present crisis in Pakistan as a 4'golden opportunity” to eliminate Pakistan and thereby to eliminate one of the most fraternal allies of the Arabs. By their massive and vicious propaganda they succeed sometimes in creating wrong impression about Pakistan even in the minds of her sincere friends. There are some who believe that Pakistan is run by one family. Apparently these people think all the “Khans” belong to one family. The fact is that “Khans” are found all over Pakistan. The word “Khan” is used as a word of respect in referring to people and does not today even indicate the area from where a person comes, let alone his family. As most of the Muslims of the sub-continent have ancestral connections with Central Asia the use of the name Khan (which is true equivalent of the Arab word ‘Sayyid’ ) among Pakistanis themselves, and even some of the non-Muslims is very common. Many East Pakistani leaders also use this name (for example Sabur Khan, Abdul Munim Khan, etc). This is a view which can be easily arrived at just by elementary knowledge about Pakistan.

In all the four five-year plans it will be seen that the public ( government controlled) sector is much larger than the private sector. It is true that Pakistan is not a communist country and has not abolished private capital. However, even private investment in Pakistan is supervised and controlled by the Government to ensure that it conforms with national economic objectives. To label Pakistan as a capitalist economy is to call black white. In order to show how West Pakistan has economically exploited East Pakistan, the anti-Pakistan propagandists have also invented their own economic figures. The fact is that East Pakistan’s export earnings today are 50% of the country’s earnings. East Pakistan’s contribution to Central Government revenue has increased from 26.1% in 1961 to 26.3% in 1968, but her share of Central Government expenditure has in the same period increased from 38% to 53%, that is, East Pakistan contributes a quarter to the Central Government’s revenues, but the Central Government spends more than half on East Pakistan. This is no favour to East Pakistan, it is merely a recognition of the fact that because of the historical, physical, and social reasons the development process is much more difficult in East Pakistan than in West Pakistan. While East Pakistan has a greater population than West Pakistan her area is only one-sixth of West Pakistan. Moreover, East Pakistan is unfortunately more frequently hit by natural disasters, such as floods, cyclones and hurricanes, than any other place in the world.

In West Pakistan the amount of agricultural fund and mineral resources per head of population is much greater, and therefore, development potential of the western wing is higher. Despite these natural obstacles the Government of Pakistan has succeeded in reducing the economic gap between East and West Pakistan. The industrial exports of West Pakistan have to satisfy the needs of the East Pakistan’s economy before earning foreign exchange in international markets. Although East Pakistan has a food deficit, this shortage is not made by spending East Pakistan’s foreign earnings from jute, but it is made up by supplies of surplus food from West Pakistan which could have been sold abroad. All this is to show that the Indian accusations that West Pakistan has economically exploited East Pakistan will not stand up to objective analysis. Some sources said that the Central Government was worried that East Pakistan will control the government after the elections. If this was so, why did President Yahya Khan publicly announce after the elections that Sheikh Mujibur Rahman will be the next Prime Minister of Pakistan? There is no doubt that Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and his party won 98% of the seats in East Pakistan. But, on what basis did Sheikh Mujibur Rahman win the election? Sheikh Mujibur Rahman got 47% of the whole votes cast and 20% of the Muslim votes. Did he say he was fighting the election for the secession of East Pakistan? No, his clear statement was that his six-points programme was meant to make Pakistan stronger and not weaker. Did he not accept the President’s orders before the elections that all parties fighting the elections must accept two points: the first being the national integrity of Pakistan, and the second being the acceptance of the national ideology, which was the Islamic way of life? Yes. He did. But what happened after the people had given him their vote? He refused even to mention the name of Pakistan. Although it is correct that Mujib won 56% of all the seats of the National Assembly of Pakistan, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman refused to even visit the western wing of the country which had elected him to be its next Prime Minister. The flag of Pakistan was torn down by the armed members of his party and replaced by the provincial flag of Bangla Desh.

The President of Pakistan tried to ignore these acts of the Awami League in the interest of national unity, and as Sheikh Mujibur Rahman refused to visit the capital, Islamabad, he himself flew three times to Dacca to come to some agreement with Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. But Sheikh Mujib refused to compromise. He even refused to give a public statement assuring the people of Pakistan that he would not break up their country. He demanded power to do whatever he liked. In the meantime he had set up an independent government in East Pakistan, called the government of Bangla Desh which cut off all communication with West Pakistan. President Yahya, who was accepted as the President of Pakistan before the elections, was referred to as “ our guest” by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, as if he was a foreign national. Sources said that President Yahya Khan used the time in his talks with Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in Dacca to secretly send troop reinforcement to East Pakistan from West Pakistan. This is pure Indian propaganda as not a single soldier was sent to East Pakistan before the crisis broke on March 25. In any case with Sheikh Mujib temporarily controlling everything in East Pakistan it would have been impossible to land troops secretly without his knowing about it. In addition to defiance of his President and his determination to break up Pakistan against his own electors’ wishes ( who it may be repeated voted for his social and economic programme and not for the end of Pakistan) , Sheikh Mu jib’s party began a campaign of pure terror against the millions of Moslem refugees who settled in East Pakistan in 1947 to escape Hindu fanaticism. This time their fate was worse than in 1947. They were simply massacred in the most shameful way, men, women and children, in fact, as if they were snakes or rats.

Under these circumstances did President Yahya have any other recourse than the one he took? As President of Pakistan what was his first duty? Are there any circumstances where it is permissible for a President to agree to the disintegration of his country without the people desiring it? If so, then President Yahya and his Government are to blame. If not, the least we can expect from our friends is to refrain from swallowing every propaganda without even caring to study the situation. As for the reports of army brutality and mass killings it is a fact that none of the reporters saw anything for himself but always quotes “reliable sources”. How do journalists sitting in Calcutta knew what's happening in East Pakistan? To some of our Arab friends who have been, taken in by the BBC campaign against Pakistan, all that can be said is that if you can rely on the BBC for news of the; Middle East then certainly also rely on them for news on Pakistan. But if you know that the BBC and the western news represent the Zionist view of events in the Middle East how can you accept their word for events in East Pakistan where none of them saw what was happening? Sitting in Calcutta, relying on Indian interpreters for their conversation with refugees and competing with each other for dramatic news stories to boost their papers’ readership, can one honestly expect these journalists to give a fair picture? Did they do> so in the Nigerian crisis? A small example will show the quality of the news which the sources seem to have read or been supplied with. Up to now the international ( Zionist) news has referred to the figure of “eight million refugees’5" without any qualification. It is accepted as a fact, it is regarded as so obvious that no time is wasted in explaining how it was arrived at or where the figure came from. This figure has been believed by some friends of Pakistan despite the fact that Pakistan has published the results of a thorough enquiry of the number of refugees which shows that the exact figure is two million. But the volume of propaganda from the BBC, Voice of America, the western and Zionist sources is louder and more impressive. As a result Pakistan has formally asked the United Nations to conduct an independent inquiry into the number of refugees in India and also publish the results of the enquiry. The western media have immediately realised the significance of Pakistan’s request and knowing that the U.N. enquiry will support Pakistan’s estimate of two million refugees have now begun to refer to the of “ eight million” as “Indian estimates”.

Until now they conveyed the impression that they had themselves verified the figure and thence was no further point of disputing them. Well, if this basic pillar in the propaganda was against Pakistan it is so rotten that it crumbles on the first examination. We can safely leave it to our friends to decide what would happen to those propaganda themes against Pakistan when they are in turn subjected to objective examination?