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"content": "For example, a country like Pakistan has nuclear arms but, on account of its poor economic status, it is actually being compelled to engage in a war it would otherwise, on its own choice, not engage in. What about countries like North Korea? They embark on nuclear ammunition purely as bargaining chip to draw some of the more powerful countries to conference tables. When we talk about countries like Iraq, they do not even have the threat of nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction. Was that, really, the cause for them to be attacked? This is a case where the Iraqi people have suffered so much. Over one million people died. So, the basic cause of insecurity, instability and threat to stability in the world is still the kind of diplomacy being applied. The emphasis on the disarmament of certain countries that do not have nuclear weapons is unfair. This is because they want to disarm those without nuclear weapons yet they allow powerful countries to remain with the weapons. That is a very unfair situation. I would not say that it is workable. I would not hesitate to urge that we also invest in nuclear weapons. You cannot allow a neighbour to equip herself with nuclear weapons and hope that you can negotiate with her not to use it against you. This cannot work as long as the diplomacy of âthe mighty takes it allâ and the gun reigns. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, on the issue of climate change it is also true that we find the same contradictions are again applicable here. As a country, we are now a victim of global climate change. We have seen rain patterns change. We are affected because we are an agricultural based economy. Our agriculture is also rain reliant. When we have interference with the weather patterns, our means of livelihood gets affected. Unfortunately, when we look at the causes of these, it is the rich countries with industries that have interfered with the global weather patterns. On the other hand, the victims are under-developed countries who are least able to cope with the problems and challenges. So, at the end of the day, this is a very unfair world. It is even unfair when the country is weak. This position should be canvassed more in international fora like this. We have seen how some of these countries have actually committed themselves in some of these international fora to make contributions to assist the poor countries of the world to, at least, close the poverty gap and so on and so forth. However, they never live up to what they promise. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, when it comes to public appearances, the rich countries make it appear that they are concerned with the plight of the poor countries. However, in reality they are not. The situation is even worse for those who are very rich. This leads me to the last issue I want to talk about, which was also deliberated at length at this meeting. That is about the current global financial crisis. As Members of Parliament, we are urged to take an active role in addressing issues of global financial crisis. Once again, it is my conviction that the crisis, as it is unfolding, is the outcome of all the policies which have been pursued for quite a long time by the most powerful countries of the world. While the policies were still working internationally, they did not want to hear about anybody else. However, with the current financial crisis, they are directly on the receiving end. We have seen what is going on in the United States of America (USA). This is right in the centre of all these policies being pursued. The crisis actually started there. At first it was mortgage crisis, it went to financial crisis and now it is going to an economic crisis. We have seen giant companies like General Motors (GM) which was one of the biggest corporate enterprises in the world in the 1950s, go under."
}