30 June 2008

If you're a diplomat, don't try this without supervision...

Hussain Haqqani, Pakistan's ambassador to the United States, was booted out of a meeting of Pakistani American doctors on Sunday. The docs were upset at a speaker from the MQM, whose party helped Musharraf disrupt the lawyers' movement in Karachi in May 2007. This is when Haqqani stepped in to try and pacify the gathering. The Dawn's account is hilarious. Here's the operative part:

[All] hell broke lose when Ambassador Husain Haqqani came to the stage and urged the people also to listen to those who disagree with them.

“Stop pontificating (bhashan band karo),” shouted the audience.

“If this is how you treat your speakers, why do you invite them,” asked the ambassador. “If you invite people who differ with you on certain issue, you must also listen to them.”

But people were not in a mood to listen. Desperate and angry, the ambassador held the microphone tight and shouted: “Today you are insulting me but tomorrow when you need passports, you will come to me.”

This proved to be the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back. People lunged to the stage. A lady doctor, Ghazala, tore the microphone away from the ambassador. Others tried to grab him but he evaded them.

“Listen to me. Let me explain. Please try to understand what I am saying,” the ambassador appealed. “We do not want to listen to you. Get out,” the audience shouted back.

This forced the US diplomatic security guards to intervene. They came to the stage to save the Pakistani ambassador from angry Pakistanis and took him away.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hahahah...remove the sophisticated veneer of our Pakistani brethren and they are still a carbon copy of us, despite 60 years of trying:-)
This was a great post...look forward to more on the lighter side of international relations in the future