ISLAMABAD: America is set to lose the battle for the hearts and minds of the Muslim world under the new Democratic President Obama because of the draconian and ill-advised measures, such as the new US airport security measures that include highly-invasive body scans and strip searches of all passengers coming in from 13 Islamic states and Cuba, was the consensus view of three prominent parliamentarians belonging to the three largest political parties of the country.
Senator Mushahid Hussain (PML-Q), Senator Islamuddin Sheikh (PPP) and MNA Ahsan Iqbal (PML-N), adopting a unanimous stance against the placement of Pakistan amongst the 14-nation high security list of the United States, stated that no Pakistani parliamentary delegation should visit the United States and neither should any US parliamentarians be entertained in Pakistan till Pakistan was taken out of the list. The three legislators also wanted the National Assembly and the Senate to adopt unanimous resolutions against this action and wanted the Organisation of the Islamic Countries (OIC) to take up this matter, both with the US and the UN, as it was a matter concerning the violation of human rights and human dignity.
They were expressing their views in the weekly Geo programme 'Kehnay May Kya Harj Hai', hosted by Mohammad Malick. The three leaders were also united in their view of this policy being nothing more than racial and religious profiling.
Ahsan Iqbal said that PML-N would move the resolution within a day or two in the National Assembly while pointing out that the latest security measures were in violation of Article 4 of the US constitution itself while Senator Mushahid wanted President Zardari or Prime Minister Gilani to form a delegation of Muslim heads of states, including the Saudi King, president of Indonesia, president of Nigeria, and prime minister of Turkey, and take up the matter with US President Obama and impress upon him that such demeaning actions would only alienate the Muslim world and create greater animosity towards the United States.
Senator Islamuddin Sheikh wanted the Americans coming to Pakistan also strip searched in a tit-for-tat move. Ahsan Iqbal made a pertinent observation when he argued that the policy of subjecting all travelers from Pakistan to invasive scans and body pat downs on arrival in the United States harboured serious adverse ramifications for trade and commerce. He opined that such humiliating procedures would discourage American and other businessmen from travelling to Pakistan or maintaining proactive relations.
Senator Mushahid and Ahsan Iqbal said that it was in the United States' own interest to immediately review this policy and rescind it because it would only fan immense hatred in the Muslim world.
Gerald M Feierstein, Deputy Chief of Mission, US Embassy in Islamabad, while defending the new deplorable invasive US airport security regime insisted that the measures were neither anti-Muslim nor a racial profiling of any sorts. When it was pointed out that barring Cuba, all other 13 countries were Muslim majority countries, he asserted that the decision to include these countries was based on well-calculated risk assessments and not for any other cause.
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