By Ahsan (Five Rupees)
Take a good, long look at the picture below. It is from the signing of the Simla agreement between the goverments of India and Pakistan in 1972. There are four people in the foreground. The two leaders shaking hands are easy enough to identify — perhaps the subcontinent’s two most iconic leaders ever: Indira Gandhi and Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. The bearded man on the extreme right is Swaran Singh, then Indian foreign minister. And just who do you suppose is the timid-looking young lady between Messrs Bhutto and Singh?
I bring this up because for the life of me, I can’t get over Bilawal Bhutto accompanying his father to a high-level meeting with Barack Obama and Hamid Karzai. I know there are more important crises in Pakistan right now (the refugees, the economy, the Taliban), but I can’t let this go, even though I probably should. I mean, just look at this picture, sent to me by reader Nabeel from the White House page on Flickr.
I just have one question: WHY IS BILAWAL SITTING THERE? Actually, I have one more question: what does it say about Zardari’s priorities that Bilawal is sitting closer to his father and Barack Obama than either Pakistan’s foreign minister (Shah Mahmood Qureshi, on Bilawal’s left) or Husain Haqqani, Pakistan’s ambassador to the U.S. (to Qureshi’s left)?
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(Submitted by a reader)