Pakistan's Musharraf warns of 'iron curtain'

BBC NEWS | South Asia | Musharraf warns of 'iron curtain'

Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has said there is "no time to lose" to prevent an iron curtain falling between the West and Muslim nations.
President Musharraf told the UN General Assembly in New York international disputes had to be solved to give Islamic nations justice.
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President Musharraf said there was global co-operation to tackling terrorism - a threat he called "very close and very personal" - he was the target of two assassination attempts last December.
However he said what the world was doing was insufficient.
The president said the causes of terrorism had to be tackled, pointing to international disputes such as the "tragedy of Palestine".
"Action has to be taken before an iron curtain finally descends between the West and the Islamic world," he said.
"The major powers of the West have yet to show movement by seriously trying to resolve internationally recognized disputes affecting the Muslim world."
On Kashmir, the president praised the dialogue with India and said he looked forward to meeting Indian premier Manmohan Singh on Friday.
"Neither country can achieve ambitions for social and economic progress without peace," President Musharraf said.
He also promised Afghanistan that Pakistan would do all it could to prevent militants from using Pakistani territory to disrupt Afghan elections on 9 October.

This is an excellent story. Read it. Pakistan used to hate the US because we wouldn't give them weapons to fight India. India, on the other hand, was angry because the US had relations with Pakistan. Pakistan was a part of India, but the two nations split between the somewhat-militant Muslim Pakistan and the Hindu India. The two were absolutely paranoid of each other, and still are to a lesser extent.

Of all the Muslim nations in the world, Pakistan is probably the greatest friend of the US. The president of Pakistan was he target of failed assassinations twice, and the Pakistani-US ambassador is believed to be the target of a terrorist plot (anti-aircraft weapons were found in a New York mosque several months ago).

Secretly, Pakistan has been helping the US hunt terrorists. These efforts were most noticeable in the capture of an al-qaeda computer guy and his computer, which had a ton of useful records (this happened around the time of the DNC convention).
Pakistan will not allow US troops to enter its territory (at least not publicly) because Pakistan's leadership may be overthrown. However, the Pakistani military has been incredibly vigilant in capturing terrorists, and have gotten villages to turn in terrorists rather than be destroyed by the Pakistani military after a tip-off.


Pakistan is evidence that Bush is very good with diplomacy. It is also evidence that the Muslim world must change as it, inevitably, comes into closer relations with the West.