Print

Mail

wiki links

US aid to Pakistan should help to improve image

AFP, ISLAMABAD
Friday, Oct 14, 2005, Page 9

ILLUSTRATION: MOUNTAIN PEOPLE

When a massive earthquake and tsunami hit Asia late last year the swift US response, supplying military muscle vital to relief efforts, improved the country's often negative image in the region, analysts said.

As the disaster unfolded, a US battle fleet was quickly mobilized with aircraft carriers, its 15,000 personnel and helicopters proving vital to saving lives.

And in Indonesia, the world's largest Muslim country where most of the 220,000 tsunami victims died, the perception of the US' role in the world improved, Kusnanto Anggoro, a political analyst with the private Center for Strategic and International Studies in Jakarta, said earlier this year.

This week, after a huge earthquake left up to 40,000 feared dead in South Asia, most of them in mainly Muslim Pakistan, the US was again swift to supply military muscle to help save lives in the Muslim world.

From their bases across the mountains in Afghanistan, a fleet of five giant US Chinook and three Blackhawk helicopters were flown to Pakistan to ferry aid in and casualties out of the quake-devastated areas.

`However, a total change in the attitude of the ordinary people toward the US cannot take place until the US works toward finding just solutions to contentious issues like the Palestinian problem.'

And on Tuesday, Pakistan's military said the US is to send 24 more giant Chinooks while the US in Brussels, urged NATO to consider diverting resources from its peacekeeping force in Afghanistan to help victims of the earthquake in neighboring Pakistan.

"I was told one of the biggest concerns for the government of Pakistan is not enough airlift capacity to get into the rural areas where people are suffering," US President George W. Bush said on Sunday.

"Pakistan's a friend, and the US government and the people of the US will help as best as we possibly can," he said.

At the same time, an association of Pakistani-US doctors announced plans to dispatch a team of medical specialists to the country, providing people-to-people assistance to Pakistan from the US.

"We are deeply saddened by this disaster and the association is doing all it can to help the victims," Hussain Malik, the president of the 10,000-member Association of Pakistani Physicians of North America, said in Washington.

The US' assistance is far from unique. Many countries around the world have offered aid and assistance to Pakistan, including its neighbor and rival India. And two German helicopters and four Afghan helicopters are also due to arrive in Pakistan in coming days, Pakistan said.

But the military capability that has enabled the US in recent years to provide aid and logistical assistance to places as far flung as Liberia, Indonesia and Pakistan makes the US' assistance different and so does the geo-political role of the US in the world.

According to some political analysts here, of course, Washington's speedy response to Pakistan's call for help is a simple pay-back for Islamabad's support in the "war on terror."

"Pakistan is a US ally in the fight against terrorism... The US feels it has an obligation to help," political analyst Hamidullah Tarzi said in neighboring Afghanistan.

But rights activist Nader Nadery said he did not believe the US' operation was the result of any obligation, or that the main purpose of the operation was improving the US' image.

However, it might have that effect, he said, and if it did this would have global implications.

"I don't see it as a particular effort to improve its image, but certainly that would help improve that image," Nadery said.

Certainly, the US is conscious of the need to improve its image in the Muslim world.

Solid majorities in key Muslim countries continue to view the US unfavorably, according to an opinion poll made public in June by the Pew Global Attitudes Project, a non-partisan research initiative.

Robert Hathaway, director of the Asia program at the non-partisan Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, said he believed the US assistance could have a positive impact on its image.

But he cautioned that aid alone would not be enough if the US wanted to see a fundamental shift in Muslim opinion.

"If aid is delivered quickly and distributed fairly then it could have an impact, among the recipients particularly, and impact on their views of the US.

"But I would not place too great a stress on this aspect. I think people, particularly in other countries, are going to need more than simply an active American generosity to alter their thinking about the US and about the properness of its policy."

And Pakistani political scientist Hasan Askari agreed.

"It can create some greater goodwill for the US, whose role in world politics has become controversial amongst the ordinary people in Pakistan," he said.

"However, a total change in the attitude of the ordinary people toward the US cannot take place until the US works toward finding just solutions to contentious issues like the Palestinian problem."
This story has been viewed 1662 times.