An article published in The Diplomat claims that China had been upset with Pakistan and has downgraded Pakistan’s status from “highest priority” to just “priority”. Many are denying it and others are saying that indeed Pakistan has diminished in global affairs including in the Chinese calculus.

China is upset with Pakistan. Its interests are not as secure in Pakistan as they used to be. For the first time, at least ever since I have been paying attention to global politics, I have seen Pakistan’s all-weather friend to push this relationship kind of under the weather. Regardless of the veracity of the claims made in The Diplomat article, Pakistan has seen its relations with China and Afghanistan turn cold recently. A friendly alliance with both states have earned enormous criticism for Pakistan for decades. That critique was in the West primarily.

And that leads me to the issue of silence in the western journalism. I had written in this space a while ago that the major American publications such as The New York Times, The Washington Post and others were always extremely critical of Pakistan and its army because they were seen as looking out for their own national security interests and ignoring those of the United States. I had written that while that critique and a never ending bad Pakistan, which was always sold in newspapers and documentaries, used to make me very upset, today’s total silence about Pakistan is even more upsetting. Because this is a sign of a diminished Pakistan and a sign of a Pakistan that is right on track looking out for American interests at the price of its own. The absence of critique about Pakistan in the Western media today means that as far as America is concerned, Pakistan is on the right track. No whipping needed. Just like the silence of the Chinese in the past meant that Pakistan was on the right track as far as the Chinese interests were........

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