DAWN Editorials - 20th May 2025

[zarnishhayat]

Celebrating Sirbaz

SIRBAZ Khan has achieved what no other Pakistani has before him. The scale of his accomplishment also makes him one of the few in the world in this category of mountaineering. It has been an eight-year journey during which he has entered the ‘death zone’ on 14 occasions to become the first Pakistani mountaineer to have summited all 8,000m peaks in the world — and without bottled oxygen. His successful ascent of Nepal’s Kangchenjunga on Sunday completed his set. The 38-year-old Hunza native had also scaled the mountain in 2022 but with oxygen support; Sirbaz’s unwavering will to do it on his own lung capacity took him back to Nepal. Last month, he also went back to summit the Annapurna because his previous ascent was achieved with supplementary oxygen. After Kangchenjunga, his name will be in the history books.

Some 20 years ago, when he was in ninth standard, Sirbaz went to the K2 base camp as an assistant cook. Eventually, he became a high-altitude porter, a job that involves carrying the load for climbers and comes with little recognition or pay. But Sirbaz’s life took a turn in 2016 when he got a sponsor for an expedition to K2. It was ultimately unsuccessful but Sirbaz then summited Nanga Parbat in the autumn of 2017 before returning to finish his ascent of K2 a year later. Since then, there has been no stopping him and in pursuing his goal, he has also fulfilled the dream of his mentor — the late Ali Sadpara, who died in an attempt to scale K2 in the winter of 2021. Sirbaz has made Pakistan proud by raising its flag on the world’s highest peaks. It is time for the country to give him his due. His feat should be celebrated, and he must get the recognition he deserves — in addition to the support and facilities that are needed to train Pakistan’s next generation of mountaineers.

Published in Dawn, May 20th, 2025


Unusual benchmarks

THE IMF has slapped Pakistan with several ‘new’ structural benchmarks — some of them quite unusual — under its ongoing funding programme. These goals are mostly linked to regular government practices such as notification of electricity tariff rebasing, semi-annual gas rate adjustment, approval of budget, and inflation adjustment in unconditional cash transfers to the poor. These signify business as usual. The unusual benchmarks — submission of legislation in parliament before end June to lift quantitative restrictions on the commercial import of used vehicles, making captive power levy permanent, and removing the cap on debt service surcharge on consumer power bills — are meant to enhance transparency, and improve the standards of economic and financial governance. Additionally, the IMF has tightened a few select quantitative performance indicators for the current fiscal year such as the upward revision in the gross reserves target from $12.75bn to $13.9bn and downward adjustment in the net domestic assets ceiling from Rs15.8tr to Rs15tr. The floor on the new tax returns is also adjusted up from 450,000 to 850,000 filers. Pakistan has sharply outperformed these QPIs in the first half of the year and it will not be difficult for it to meet the ‘tightened’ targets going forward.

Broadly, the ‘enhanced’ programme targets are aimed at achieving policy priorities by advancing structural reforms to consolidate the government budget, end subsidies, support vulnerable segments, strengthen competition, raise productivity and competitiveness, and improve energy sector viability. A few of the new goals target preferential treatment for certain sectors such as the auto industry and gradually withdraw protection enjoyed by them starting FY27 to FY30. How such actions as allowing the import of used cars to increase competition in the auto industry will help move us closer to the broader goal of electrification of the transport sector to reduce carbon emissions is debatable though. That said, it must be acknowledged that Pakistan’s performance to stabilise the country’s moribund economy has been commendable so far. However, this stability remains fragile because it has been achieved by suppressing growth. As the Fund has commented in its report, continued implementation of the programme priorities is key to not just protecting Pakistan’s hard-won economic stability but also supporting sustainable growth going forward. Any slippage or digression may bring us back to the brink — something that we can hardly afford.

Published in Dawn, May 20th, 2025


Drawdown

IT appears that the ceasefire will hold, at least in the near term.

As Islamabad and New Delhi retreat cautiously from the precipice of a full-blown war, talks between senior military officials have continued to build on the groundwork laid by the Trump administration’s diplomatic intervention.

The most immediate relief is that the two sides seem to have acknowledged that, their respective political leadership’s statements notwithstanding, the break in hostilities does not have an ‘expiry date’ and will be adhered to without a recurring need for formal renewal.


Meanwhile, the DGMOs in Pakistan and India are in touch to ensure that the ceasefire can be made more ‘sustainable’. The Foreign Office spokesperson has said they have maintained periodic contact and agreed to develop a structured mechanism for de-escalation. This will likely involve a phased reduction of forward deployments and regular troops along the international border, with the Pakistan Rangers and India’s Border Security Force soon resuming normal operations.

These are, of course, positive signs. A gradual return to normalcy will allow the two states to reflect on the recent crisis and, hopefully, find a mutually acceptable means to address its root causes so that the region does not find itself on the brink of nuclear conflict in the future. It will also provide the breathing space needed to dial down the rhetoric and refocus public attention on the bigger picture.

One hopes there is some realisation by India that the status quo is not in anybody’s strategic interests, and that continuing to stoke hostilities instead of removing the irritants from the equation will only create more difficulties over time — not only for the two states but also for the South Asian region. There is a strong incentive for not allowing the feelings of heightened acrimony to linger and to reinforce the military drawdown with some soft measures.

It has been encouraging to note that Afghan transit trade has resumed through the Wagah-Attari border. Sikh pilgrims, in particular, have been hoping that the thaw will lead to the reopening of the Kartarpur corridor, which New Delhi had closed, to allow Indian pilgrims access to the shrine of Guru Nanak in Pakistan.


While officialdom deliberates and talks, there is no reason for the people to be deprived of the benefits of trade and spiritual pilgrimages. Public feelings of animosity for the other, made particularly worse by recent events, should be carefully calibrated down if there is a commitment to finding durable solutions to the existing problems.

Allowing people-to-people contact can help immensely in this regard. Both countries have come very close to achieving a breakthrough on their issues in the past, and there is no reason that it cannot happen again. It may require a lot of hard work, but it is certainly not impossible.