Basit declares Aizaz Chaudhary ‘worst foreign secretary ever’

ISLAMABAD: A ‘hard-hitting’ letter written by former ambassador to India, Abdul Basit, scorning Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry has surfaced online blaming the latter for foreign policy gaffes during his tenure as foreign secretary.

The letter is dated 5th July 2017.

“The more I think the more I am convinced that you have been the worst Foreign Secretary ever,” Basit wrote in the letter.

He just didn’t stop here. The former high commissioner to India opined for Chaudhary: “…you would end up being “the worst Pakistan Ambassador in Washington D.C”.

He justified his criticism of Chaudhary saying: “First you’re not made for delicate profession of diplomacy”, Basit cited two incidents as example — the joint statement issued after a meeting in the Russian city of Ufa between ousted prime minister Nawaz Sharif and his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi in 2015, and Pakistan’s failure to get re-elected to the United Nations Human Rights Council (HRC).

He pointed out the second reason that: “It is more worrisome [that], your heart is not in the right place”.

Basit called for removal of Chaudhary from his post as the envoy to US. Aizaz Chaudhry should not be given an extension beyond his superannuation in 2018, he said.

“May God help Pakistan when people like you […] are at such important positions,” Basit said.

Before he was appointed the high commissioner to India in February, 2014, Basit served as the ambassador to Germany.

The scathing letter surfaced days after a speech by US President Donald Trump in which he blamed Pakistan for sheltering terrorists.

On August 22, Trump said “We can no longer be silent about Pakistan’s safe havens for terrorist organizations.”

“We have been paying Pakistan billions and billions of dollars at the same time they are housing the very terrorists that we are fighting,” he said. “That will have to change and that will change immediately.”