Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi is facing heat over his remarks against Saudi Arabia for refusing to interfere on Kashmir issue.
The differences in their relations surfaced when Pakistan was made to pay back USD 1 billion to Saudi Arabia. This reflected the fact that Islamabad is gradually losing the support of other Muslim countries.
Recently two Pakistani journalists — Rauf Klasra and Amir Mateem — held a discussion on the sudden policy shift of Saudi Arabia towards Pakistan.
“Sometimes Qureshi speaks emotionally. He gets carried away,” Mateem said.
“As Pakistan, which is in a financial crisis, is dependent on Saudi Arabia, Qureshi should have been cautious of making any statements”, he said, adding: “As we are very much dependent on Saudi Arabia, we should complain only to a limit. Amid such a situation, Qureshi should have been careful because Mohammed bin Salman is young and has impulsive behaviour.”
Mateem further said, “It should not have been expected that as Saudi Arabia is a friend of Pakistan so it will automatically be against India’s stance on Kashmir. This is not a college but an international arena.”
The development comes even as Pakistan has been pushing for the foreign ministers’ meeting of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) since India abrogated Article 370, which gave special status to the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir.
After Pakistan failed to gather support from the OIC members on Kashmir on May 22, Prime Minister Imran Khan said, “The reason is that we have no voice and there is a total division amongst (us). We cannot even come together as a whole on the OIC meeting on Kashmir.”
Though Pakistan reportedly made attempts to push its narrative of raising the issue of rising Islamophobia in India in its agenda, Maldives, an ally of India, thwarted the move and said, “Isolated statements by motivated people and disinformation campaigns on social media should not be construed as representative of the feelings of 1.3 billion.”