'Battle of diplomacy'

This is apropos a Business Recorder op-ed "Battle of diplomacy" carried by the newspaper yesterday. The writer, Andleeb Abbas, seems to have made an unfair comment on the role of country's media in relation to PTI government's decision to boycott the Kuala Lumpur summit. She says, for example, "When things go wrong even good is turned into bad. While Pakistan media was busy criticising Pakistan [the PTI government] for not participating in the Kuala Lumpur Summit, Indian diplomats were ruing over how Pakistan will now have a bigger say in OIC."

Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohammad of Malaysia had made it clear that "it is not the intention of Kuala Lumpur Summit [KL Summit] to take over the role of Organisation of Islamic Conference [OIC]." In other words, the KL Summit was not meant to rival the OIC. We must not lose sight of the fact that Malaysia is paying a big economic price for taking just and upright stance against Narendra Modi government's August 5 Kashmir action.