The Islamic Republic of Pakistan and Ukraine are very similar in their fate. Both countries gained their independence through the collapse of a larger country and as a result of war and global international political processes.
Pakistan emerged after the Second World War as a result of the weakening of Great Britain’s position on the international stage through the separation from British India. Ukraine followed the path of Pakistan decades later, gaining independence due to the weakening and collapse of the USSR.
As a result, both young countries became the object of armed aggression by a much larger and stronger neighbor, which until then had dominated them for centuries.
At the same time, Pakistan, like Ukraine, continues this military confrontation until now. Part of the territory of Pakistan, like part of the territory of Ukraine, is currently under temporary occupation and is disputed. Periodically, military confrontations occur on their borders.
Both states use similar mechanisms for resistance and rely on the protection and assistance of other countries. However, Pakistan created its own nuclear weapons in the 1990s, and Ukraine got rid of its own at that time.
When Ukraine sold its tanks to Pakistan, it did not worry about the safety of citizens, and Pakistan willingly bought Ukrainian military equipment.
The experience of Pakistan in the current state of the hot phase of aggression against Ukraine is very important and can be used by Ukraine for more successful protection of its territories. They have already been through it.
However, now Pakistan has stable relations with the Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China, which, of course, creates some difficulties for it and mostly determines the consistent positive neutrality of Pakistan in the matter of Russian aggression against Ukraine and the temporary occupation of part of the territory of Ukraine.
Ukraine has also always tried to avoid any involvement in the Indo-Pakistani conflict and to cooperate with both conflicting countries, so this behavior of Pakistan is not surprising.
However, Pakistan’s position on the resolution of interstate conflicts is fundamental. It is determined on the basis of preserving the territorial integrity and sovereignty of states, as well as resolving conflicts exclusively by peaceful political means.
Despite the territorial distance and cultural differences, the armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine in 2022 greatly affected the political and economic processes in the middle of Pakistan and currently led to a political and economic crisis.
It so happened that on February 24, 2022, on the day of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan was in Moscow and had a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin regarding economic cooperation.
Imran Khan’s government refused to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, abstained from voting on the corresponding resolution in the UN General Assembly, and insisted that the country does not want to belong to any of the global blocs, instead seeking to resolve its own economic issues.
The visit to Moscow ultimately resulted in the fall of Imran Khan’s government, which was accused of both economic mismanagement and foreign policy miscalculations.
This was the result of a conflict with the military department of Pakistan, which may have been influenced from the outside. The confrontation between Imran Khan and the military is intensifying.
Currently, they are trying to arrest Imran Khan on criminal charges, and he is organizing anti-government protests and trying to return to power. Imran Khan’s party is gearing up for a rematch in the fall 2023 elections and has a large following among the population.
Currently, protests continue, there are victims, and it is similar to the situation in Ukraine in 2014. Incidentally, it is symbolic that Pakistanis also call these actions “Maidan”.
But the new government of Pakistan, headed by Shehbaz Sharif, does not give up cooperation with the Russian Federation and the policy of neutrality. The new prime minister met with Putin twice – in September 2022 at the SCO summit in Uzbekistan and at a meeting on cooperation and confidence-building measures in Asia in Kazakhstan in October 2022.
Now Pakistan’s attitude towards Russia is gradually changing. They see that due to military failures, it is clear that there is no such “big Russian army” that they had heard about before and had the experience of confronting it since the war in Afghanistan.
At the same time, the American and British influence on Pakistan’s politics remains significant. Traditionally, there are many influential politicians in Britain who are of Pakistani origin. This contributes to the involvement of Pakistan in the use of more active aid measures to Ukraine.
Thus, the Prime Minister of Great Britain from October 25, 2022 is Rishi Sunak, who is a descendant of migrants from Punjab, a province whose territory was divided between Pakistan and India in 1947 during the partition of British India.
At the beginning of January 2023, many Ukrainian mass media published information that Pakistan had started supplying Ukraine with weapons and sent 159 containers of ammunition to Ukraine. However, the governments have not officially confirmed this information.
And already at the beginning of February 2023, it became known that Pakistan increased military supplies and that Ukraine will receive more than 10,000 rockets intended for use in Grad multi-barrel rocket launchers.
As for relations at the level of individuals, now many citizens of Pakistan who left Ukraine in 2022 want to return to Ukraine, but cannot do so due to the lack of air connections between the countries and the numerous refusals of Moldova and EU countries to issue them transit visas.
Also, many Pakistanis show a desire to take part in the defense of Ukraine by becoming servicemen of the foreign legion, but Ukraine does not take the necessary steps for this, does not help them in this and mostly refuses to issue them visas.
However, the high level of mutual understanding between Ukraine and Pakistan in the political and diplomatic sphere, the traditionally active development of Ukrainian-Pakistani military-technical cooperation, and the significant potential for mutually beneficial cooperation in the trade and economic sphere create favorable conditions for the further activation of Ukrainian-Pakistani relations.
The protection of the rights of free and independent people, legal security, support of small and mediumsized businesses in Ukraine, in the countries of the European Union, America, Asia and Africa
Advocate Mr. Oleksandr Yevsiutin is the founder of the company “United International Partners”, which helps migrants, expats and all those who seek a free way of life, establish their own business, migration through the business program, helps in obtaining grants, investments and assistance for the creation of small and medium-sized businesses, solving various legal issues of migrants.
United International Partners
www.UiP.company
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