PML Secretary General Mushahid Hussain was decorated with one of the highest awards of Cambodia at an investiture ceremony held at Phnom Penh, capital of Cambodia.
The Award, Grand Order of the Kingdom of Cambodia, was awarded for
‘Mushahid Hussain’s services for promoting Asian causes and bringing
Asian peoples closer together’ on Sunday.
The award was presented by the Prime Minister of Cambodia, Hun Sen,
while the former Speaker of the Philippines and former Vice President
of Indonesia also received similar awards.
Mushahid Hussain is the first Pakistani to be so honoured by an
Asian country like Cambodia. Before getting the Award, Mushahid Hussain
also was keynote speaker at an International Forum on “Asian Century:
Challenges and Prospects”, which was attended by an audience of 500
invited guests.
In his speech, Mushahid Hussain spoke about the sacrifices and
contributions of Pakistan since 1979, when it helped the West win the
Cold War by helping to defeat the Soviet Red Army in Afghanistan and
hosted the world’s biggest ever refugee population of nearly 3 million
Afghan refugees for over 3 decades.
Mushahid Hussain said 3 events in 1979 had influenced the course of
modern Asian history: the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan,
the Iranian Revolution and China’s historic decision to reform and open
up its economy, which resulted in lifting 500 million people out of
poverty within a generation, now making China the world’s second
largest economy.
He also referred to the resilience and sacrifices of the Pakistani
people since 9/11, when over 40,000 Pakistanis were victims of
terrorism, including 10,000 from the security forces. Regarding the
financial costs of the war on terror, Mushahid Hussain said while the
United States was spending $ 2.5 billion every week on the war in
Afghanistan, it had promised Pakistan $ 12.5 billion aid over a 5 year
period, which came to the same amount of money that the US was spending
in just 5 weeks of the Afghanistan War.
He also compared the US strategy in Afghanistan with the American war in Vietnam and Cambodia in the 1970s.
Mushahid Hussain also presented a profile of 21st century Pakistan,
terming it as a ‘dynamic democracy with a free media, an independent
judiciary and a vibrant civil society’.
The International ‘Asian Century’ Forum was also addressed by former
Prime Minister of Thailand, Thaksin Shinawatra, and presided over by
Cambodian deputy Prime Minister Sok An. Diplomats, ministers,
professors and students were among those attending the Forum, which
lasted for over 4 hours followed by a lively question-answer session. SANA
