 Good morning to everyone joining us here in Washington and good evening to everyone joining us from South Asia Welcome to our webinar on Pakistan and the current coronavirus. My name is the Manas Ali Kuddin I'm the director for South Asia programs at the US Institute of Peace It's my pleasure to welcome you and remind you that you are joining us via YouTube live And you can leave questions in the comment section and please identify yourself if you are asking a question and Are part of the media so we will be taking questions at the end and we welcome you to leave questions throughout the session The US Institute of Peace is a national nonpartisan independent Institute founded by the US Congress and dedicated to the proposition that a world without violent conflict is possible practical and essential for us and global security and The US Institute of Peace is obviously as we're all teleworking We're trying to look at different crises around the world And it's my pleasure today to have a wonderful panel of guests to discuss the crises in the coronavirus Crisis and its impact in Pakistan in addition to the severe human cost the COVID-19 crisis has forced Pakistan's already suffering Economy to a grinding halt and left many of Pakistan's most vulnerable without income and sustenance The crisis has also shown Where the central and provincial governments are working hard to stem the crisis by enforcing a lockdown And having over a seven and a half billion dollar Relief package, but the country's response has still laid bare troubling weaknesses and governance public health and Economic stability So today's panel will hopefully discuss all of these different issues and talk about some of the push and pull Currently as we're going into Ramzan in Pakistan the push and pull between forces on the economic side And also on the public health side With that I'd like to turn it to our first panelist Khoram Hussain Khoram is the business editor at dawn newspaper the largest and most read English daily in Pakistan he's based out of Karachi and he writes a very widely read column and actually wrote a great piece just this morning on The coronavirus crisis and its impact from please we'd ask you to open Thanks, Tamanna pleasure to be here and thanks to usip for the invitation As well, so I'll give a brief overview of The journey that Pakistan has traveled since the whole COVID crisis began and where things stand as of today Pakistan registered its first positive case on February 26th and the first fatality on March 18 And in between a raft of measures had already been taken such as the closure of schools the postponement of the March 23rd parade so Different provincial authorities and the federal government had woken up by even before the first fatality it came in to the fact that the arrival of this infection presents a very serious public health challenge and Vigorous measures are going to need to be taken for social distancing The first lockdowns were announced in in the government of sin few days later by the federal government itself It's been about a month now Since we've been under lockdowns, but since the lockdowns began It took literally a few days almost for a very powerful counter or a backlash One can say perhaps to start building up and that backlash has gathered steam ever since the backlash was led primarily by your business and industrial Concerns of the country It began by the exporting the the exporter community saying that when we have orders in the pipeline and Perhaps we should be allowed to reopen just so we can process those orders in the name of bringing in Important foreign exchange that is going to be required as the country moves forward and those debates continued and in peace means fashion different provincial governments began to grant exemptions to specific exporters and exporter groups certain essential the industries had to be granted exemption So edible oils for example and another foodstuffs had to continue operating and then of course the allied industries had to be granted Exemptions to be able to keep the sector of operational and little by little as this story unfolded What many other industrial concerns were sucked into it and the process of consultation that the government opened with these business and industrial elites grew In scope to include just about everybody Down the road because everybody started stepping forward making a claim that they are somehow either an essential industry or that the work that they perform is essential to the economy To be able to face the kind of challenges a lockdown is facing that the lockdown is creating and Over a period of a couple of weeks. We saw the entire narrative change In fact within days we saw the entire narrative change away from this being a public health emergency towards the present moment being an economic challenge and It didn't take long before the Prime Minister himself actually got on to Got on to this his own commitment to the lockdowns and to the Framing of the moment as a public health emergency was weak to start off with he began by Talking about the present moment primarily in economic terms And this day in all his public pronouncements He continues to say that more than the virus itself the greater danger that Pakistan faces is from unemployment is from hunger and is from providing for the sustenance of the daily wages and This is of course in stark contrast to the advice that is coming from the public health professionals from certain Members of the provincial government such as the government of sin Who want the entire crisis to be framed as primarily as a public health emergency? And that's where we stand today. We stand where the federal government has as of as of A few days ago Sat down with the the Olimon the the religious establishment of the country with the approach of the holy month of fasting Who have added their voice to being to saying that mosques and other religious congregations should be allowed to be open In the holy month and the government caved in to that pressure Announcing a 20 point plan to maintain social distancing in mosques, but permitting them to be open and Of course now the one by one. We are seeing the medical fraternity step forward So yesterday for example a group of doctors representing the two largest medical Associations in the country gave a very emotional press conference at the Karachi press club Urging the government to withdraw its order to reopen mosques during the holy month of fasting And urging them to see the whole affair as a public health emergency and listen first and foremost to the advice being Proffered by doctors and second to the advice being offered by business industrial elites or by the religious establishment Today they were followed up by another press conference held by doctors in Lahore Who have echoed and reiterated the same message. So now the holy month of fasting is set to begin in a few days and That's where the country stands to open or not to open for the time being the government is quite set on its intention One of the others very senior ministers of the government was on the air yesterday when he was asked about this Decision to reopen mosques and he actually took the line that Pakistan does not have the enforcement capacity that many other advanced industrial countries do like Austria and gave the example of countries like Australia and the United States and he pointed to the protests that are gathering steam in the United States Against the lockdown saying that look even in America. They're having a hard time enforcing these lockdowns here in Pakistan our enforcement capacity is even weaker and As a result, we don't have the way with all we don't have the state capacity to be able to take on the religious establishment on the streets and Force a lockdown in this country. So we have no choice, but to seek a negotiated path out with them and So now we're seeing Impassioned appeals coming from the medical eternity and as the holy month begins We wait to see where the infection goes and and how things play out Just to conclude that I can point out that the situation right now is that Pakistan it took about one month for Pakistan to register its first 50 fatalities in Due to the virus The last 50 were registered in the previous three days So between the 18th and the 21st we had 50 fatalities, whereas the first 50 took a month To come in so already we are well on our way Towards exponential growth and the Prime Minister himself in the same announcement in which he said that we are going to be reopening mosques Also said that by May their own projections are showing That we will be into we in Pakistan will be facing up to 50,000 positive cases a figure that right now stands at 10,000 So, you know, even the government is is seeing a very sharp Uptick in The number of cases coming and the doctors are trying to argue that this is the wrong time to start loosening the Lockdown to start opening the country up But that's the state of play in the policy debate at the moment on the very e of the holy month of past Thanks very much Karam. Thank you for talking To us a little bit about how the lockdown is actually starting to unravel in Pakistan and hopefully we'll end the question answer you can Talk a little bit more about that. I'd like to move now to Uzair Eunice Who until recently was director of south asia practice at all bright stone bridge and in this role He helped develop client strategies for long-term growth across south asia He has written regularly on south and central asian politics trade and economics in various publications Uzair we'd love to hear from you about The economic impact of the coronavirus in Pakistan. It couldn't have come at a worse time For pakistan, which was already fragile coming out of an IMF program Please I'd love to hear more about the economic impact both At a national level but also in the provinces. Thank you Thank you tamanna and thanks for inviting me to this discussion. I think Just to put it things in perspective. Let me begin by just saying that what's going on in south asia I mean one could argue around the world But particularly focusing on south asia the series of events unfolding due to this pandemic are perhaps the most Critical series of events that have faced the region as a form of a crisis since partition And I think we need to recognize that whether it's in india, bangladesh, bangsan, shardankara elsewhere And so the impact of that both in terms of social upheaval and economic upheaval is immense For pakistan, this as you said couldn't have come at a worse time The country was only just beginning to stabilize following The implementation of yet another IMF program And if you look at the economy or the economic trajectory of pakistan over the last three decades or so It's always been on the brink And every few years we see growth Take up to four four and a half percent And then the IMF has to step in because the country faces an external crisis in this situation The impact on the external side on the macroeconomy is is is huge and will have big You know will have long lasting impact one on one side You see remittance flows, which come in every year to the tune of about 10 billion dollars just from the gulf country's Will dry up and they will dry up for a long time because of what's happening in the oil markets And and the upheaval we're seeing between the war of Market cash share between russia and south the arabia on the other side on the export side Which is the main markets are the european union and united states for textiles in particular Those economies will slow down and will go into negative growth for a long time to come So pakistan will not find export markets over there So on on that front you will see while a lower oil price will ease up some of the issues Related to pakistan's external sector and a decline in import will happen because the economy is slowing down You will see an issue related to a decline in foreign exchange flows at the same time and that points to some of the Points could have made around exporters coming up and saying let us stay open because We we need that foreign exchange coming into the country But then one could argue that if there is no market for you to sell to why you want to keep it open In the first place and who's going to pay for all this product because no one is buying right now You just look at what's happening in bangladesh I think at the micro level across the country On the remittance side the big impact that I think not people aren't talking about and focusing on is the impact on kp The kp province where a lot of excess labor goes into south arabia's blue collar wage earners and send a lot of money Into that province What happens to that economy remains to be seen? I think the impact will be serious in nature And also a lot of the excess labor from kp kp ends up in Karachi and and works in the industries associated with karachi's economy. And so what happens there? It remains to be seen. I think the government has done a good job expanding the sas program And and the 12,000 rupees over four months and and giving it to I think about 60 million people in total About 12 million households is good. I think they need to expand it From negotiations with the IMF and what the IMF may demand I think the government has to be bolder in its approach, whether it's related to the fiscal deficit or elsewhere To give more money to people Because this crisis is different in Compared to past crises and the reason for that is that when the IMF has stepped in previously or Pakistan's economy has slowed down the informal economy continues to grow In this instance because of the lockdown that's not happening And so you need cash in the informal sector and a stimulus in the informal sector to keep the marginalized communities afloat To keep the lower middle class from going hungry And I think that's the real challenge for this government Which is why they keep going back to opening up the economy and the debate around that Which I think is flawed in in the sense that you know if your empire if you have empathy for the poor And you want them to have a decent living and I'll conclude with this Is that the rich will stay at home and protect themselves with PPE or whatever measures they can take to keep themselves healthy The poor person will go out to seek a living and they will be the ones infected. They will be the ones who will be in clusters Dying by the tens of thousands if this continues So I think the government as the doctors have said in Sindh and Punjab and probably KP will be next Must reconsider what it's thinking about and let the healthcare professionals who are on the front lines of this Give advice and determine when to open up the economy Thanks so much. Is there that's a very startling and You know to talk about this as the most critical series of events since partition is Something that we need to really examine and think about in a long term way. I think your comments do They echo what prime minister Khan said earlier this week that we have to save our people from poverty from hunger So we have a push and pull between the health concerns and the real economic and And living concerns of day-to-day people in Pakistan With that I'd like to turn to Cyril Almeida who is a visiting senior expert here at usip He is a Pakistan journalist who's very well known. He had a very famous column and was assistant editor at dawn He has written widely on a variety of issues including national politics and civil relations Cyril, I'd like to really ask you with this what what quorum talked about as a unraveling almost of this lockdown and the dire economic impact that That was there talked about what what are you seeing as the the political balance in this? What are the provinces doing and you know really what is the governance impact here? Hi Thanks to mana. I'm just as this Session started. I saw a gentleman with the large rather large hammer outside my windows in case you hear some handling Forgive me, but you know what I'm going to do is I'm going to try and pick up on what quorum and there talked about and I'm going to try and first understand or Sketch out the implications for the population of the state policy choices made so far Then I'm going to move on to which you just mentioned sort of the foreseeable effects on politics in Pakistan of the coronavirus Epidemic pandemic and finally I'm going to try and by way of a couple of examples talk about So the unexpected or perhaps the the range of implications in in areas that you may not have thought of before that this Virus may be creating so starting with you know sort of building on what quorum and was I talked about I think it's fairly clear right now that paistan has taken a high risk strategy Which I would describe as unflattening the curve Prime minister mran khan is on tv right now. It was until a little while ago talking expansively about how he envisages Uh, the next month month of ramzan that for a mention Um, what he expects of business and what he expects of society And so essentially what you're seeing in pakistan in this sort of is will be an unflattening of the curve And it's based on two things which I think Need some sort of thought about first of all there will be minimal social distancing The debate may be about soft lockdown hard lockdown, etc But the capacity for pakistan or for businesses or for society to maintain social distancing when shops are open Other than perhaps maybe Large-scale exporters the formal economy maybe in some sections of that you might be able to manage social distancing But outside that the semi formal economy the informal economy once that opens up I think in many ways it's game over the other thing is of course testing the other plank on which A strategy of prevention can be based on right now's initial strategy And at the moment pakistan has a testing rate daily testing rate of far below 10,000 I think it's about five or six thousand it changes may have crept up a little bit today And the stated aim of the government the federal government is to get up to 25,000 Tests a day by the end of the month, but that seems ambitious So if you think about it with the population of 225 million if the aim is to get up to 25k tests a day and then at the same time you have this sort of You know opening up of the economy which will inevitably mean minimal social distancing I think it's important to think through What will at that point be the response of the population itself? Prime minister Khan was on TV just a little while ago and he mentioned that by next month they expect that perhaps there will be up to 50k 50,000 infections in Pakistan But moving forward from that if you think about what happens when there's 100k what happens when there's 250k What are the worst case and best case scenarios? I think You know obviously the best case scenario is the prime minister and people in a circle seem to be hoping for is that The population will be able to take both sickness and death If not in its stride, but that they will be able to maintain a level of economic activity and social life Which will allow for Pakistan to sort of limp through the next few months But if the worst case scenario comes through and I think at this point it's important to point out that anecdotal evidence At least so far suggests that maybe the death rate isn't as high as was feared Perhaps it could just be that they are not cataloging or documenting the deaths People aren't going to hospitals. They're afraid But if the you sort of best case scenario or sort of rather worst case scenario comes through What is the spike in deaths? What will be the effect of the on the population itself? anecdotal evidence again suggests that there is There is some genuine concern and a level of fear in the population Nobody wants to get corona So what happens if it starts spiking and people are falling sick in neighborhoods, etc I think you know sort of so far the focus has been largely on the state and the health sector and the responses We need to start thinking a little bit through to on what the population itself how it will respond to These strategies or tactics of the government is deployed The other thing I mean switching to politics. There's always politics in Pakistan I think the script of the first 18 months is out In in an almost remarkable way Prime Minister Khan has got an opportunity to Reset and start again almost a third of the way through his term And at this moment, I'd say at least it looks to me that Prime Minister Khan Imran Khan is strategically well positioned He started out by talking about protecting the poor So in a country which is poor and where there is poverty and particularly over the last 18 months with the economic soda His his political rhetoric at least probably aligns him on the right side of public opinion On top of that you have essentially austerity is out spending is going to be up budget deficits won't matter the debt rescheduling etc There's a lot of space that has opened up suddenly for this government to spend to give handouts to big business etc. So many of the Interest groups the government may have alienated in his first 18 odd months Will at this moment perhaps be like, okay. Yeah, these are the guys to go with Of course, nothing lasts forever in Pakistan. There's politics and I think The opposition will look to attack on the covid if there is a covid spike in covid infections The next opportunity that comes up for the opposition is of course the budget session upcoming budget session It could be rowdy. It could be noisy and this point. I'd like to make a point maybe Point we're considering Um, Prime Minister Khan might be one of the most fit or physically fit Leaders in the world, but the rest of the Pakistani leadership is not quite And you have to think about they talking about a budget session where everyone is in parliament, etc Whether corona could strike at the heart of the political leadership or the opposition in the country And what that could mean going forward So my guess is going forward on politics If corona spikes if the debt count or the I think more importantly the infection and the hospitalization rates go up You'll see all all political parties getting in of throwing Acquisitions back and forth because that's just you know, sort of that deflect scrutiny and deflects accountability And so unfortunately my my guess is going forward. We're going to see The politics in the country will be noisier than it has been For a while if that's possible And finally, I think I'm just going to try and by way of a couple of examples tease out some of maybe the things that bear or to be kept in mind about how corona impacts areas that At first you may not have thought of and so for example, Khurram just mentioned The religious right in Pakistan putting pressure on the government Putting pressure on the state and saying, okay, we have to keep moss open, right at some point going down in the next Six weeks eight weeks well weeks, etc Um, there are militant groups in Pakistan that who have been muscled of late Because of pressure from the u.s by the u.s the f atf Pakistan's own policies, etc Um, those groups have welfare organization arms welfare arms Are those groups going to say hey, hang on a second. Look, there's this uh, societal crisis There's a economic crisis. We need to feed people. We need to Look after people, etc. You gotta let us operate again, etc So will that kind of pressure start to build on the state again and the consequences that could have For sort of Pakistan's international position a little bit. I think Elizabeth will talk a little more about that And the other thing of course something closely to my heart the issue of the media in Pakistan Um, you've seen already the arrest of a business media owner Me, Shakil Rehman owner of the biggest Media group in Pakistan on specious charges That of course you've seen in other parts of the world, you know, sort of authoritarian tendencies coming in But I think for the media there's also this problem coming and it's right there already Which is that the business model itself may be collapsing or on the verge of collapsing In Pakistan the media depends on advertising And some of the newer houses that have come into this business depend on funding from their other businesses So with the economy at a standstill of slowing or contracting I think you're going to look forward or you're going to expect the media in Pakistan That is only even more pressure not just by the state but by a failing business model That's that's those are my thoughts Kamanna Thanks so much, Sarah. That was uh, very interesting. Um, I'd like to shift now to thinking about all of these both the economic crisis and the real health crisis that Pakistan's facing. It's Most commentators would say that such a large scale outbreak and economic crisis Pakistan's capacity to weather this without international assistance is limited And so I want to talk about sort of the international Assistance and the international impact in terms of Pakistan's foreign policy, etc So I want to turn to elizabeth to talk about a little bit of the so what what does this all mean for us here in washington but also You know in terms of india pakistan relations in terms of pakistan afghanistan relations, please elizabeth Just to know elizabeth is a senior fellow and deputy director of the south asia program at the stimson center and before joining stimson, she was a foreign service officer in At the state department and has served in islamabad and in peshawar. Thank you elizabeth Great. Thanks so much to mana. Um, really appreciate the comments of my fellow panelists as well And I'll try to kind of zoom out a little bit And run through the view from dc as I see it On how the coronavirus has impact both u.s interest in pakistan, but the broader bilateral relationship And what policymakers here in dc will likely be focusing on in the weeks and months ahead So as I see it the challenge going forward will be to First help manage the immediate impact of of covid-19 in pakistan While second also trying to maintain the positive momentum we've seen in the relationship over the past year or so These issues were among those that were highlighted in the readout of yesterday's phone call between president trump and prime minister in moran han And I think will be relevant not just in the near term, but over the The coming months as well So on that first point in terms of managing the immediate impact of the coronavirus We've heard from others today about just how the situation is looking in pakistan There was a 40 spike in cases over the past five days. Um, it's as things are are looking increasingly dire, unfortunately Um, and what that means in the terms of the bilateral relationship The fact that corona virus is a pandemic Raises unique challenges that complicate relief efforts. So in the past the u.s Is then out in front in providing assistance to pakistan for example after the 2005 earthquake or the the 2010 flooding But simply by virtue of the fact that we are facing our own Um massive outbreak and and confronting supply shortages That constrains u.s capacity. The u.s is is simply less able to provide the sort of assistance that It has in the past to pakistan when it's faced future or uh or past disasters But simultaneously because it is a pandemic and it has the potential to and spread and affect all of us around the globe It is all the more important to contain the spread of the of the disease um And I think it drives the point home that the weakest links the money among us make us all vulnerable and so that speaks to the need to provide that outreach and seek ways of providing assistance Because it is both in the u.s interest in and more broadly and in global interests In addition to obviously being in pakistan's own interest and out of its people So one way of doing that that we've heard a lot about recently that uzare touched on is through this question of debt Relief. So we saw the last week's imf approval of the 1.4 billion dollar zero interest loan to pakistan pakistan altogether has has gotten about two billion In loans to tackle the immediate crisis There's also an expectation that pakistan will request about 1.8 million In payment deferment from g20 countries. So that will start to to help um with the immediate challenge But I think one question in terms of the broader bilateral relationship that I would imagine u.s policy makers will be thinking through um Is how to ensure that debt relief is used for its intended purposes? and doesn't indirectly go towards um china funded projects so this The c-pack debt load for example. So the existing imf program had careful firewalls that were in place to prevent that from happening um But it's likely to be much more difficult to ensure that And demonstrate that with this sort of emergency relief So I think that's one thing to keep in mind in terms of um a future hurdles that could present themselves down the road I think in terms of what the u.s and pakistan um can do because we are simultaneously going through this here in the states Sharing best practices and and some sort of governance innovations that might come out of this So we're facing similar challenges. I think quorum put it well in his column this morning It's how do you balance life and livelihoods? um, so public health with the economy with jobs With freedom of religion and with politics. So we've seen Thus far here in the states, um, there's been a rise of virtual learning of virtual worship services of doctors visits that are conducted by phone or um through zoom and other platforms Obviously, there are constraints in terms of bandwidth and capacity and access in pakistan But that could be one area where the u.s is positioned to share best practices um, I think also uh to the point that seril was making in terms of how this works for legislators the idea of remote voting um and remote legislating and how um Our systems of government can continue to function. Obviously, this is an election year in the u.s And we've seen some challenges in wisconsin and elsewhere with voting um and indeed in congress too So if there are ways that we can share best practices and information I think there's a lot of room for that and indeed not just from the u.s to pakistan but from pakistan to the u.s if there are things that um either side is doing particularly well not just at the national level but also at the provincial and even local level too And then of course just scientific and and government Expertise and public health experts can provide Information because the u.s is a little bit further along in our outbreak In terms of numbers in terms of how best to control the spread. I think that's going to be key Uh, and then in terms of that second basket that I mentioned So how to maintain positive momentum in the relationship going forward I think three things in particular come to mind some of which have already been mentioned. Um, so first is how to facilitate um continued progress in the afghan peace process So this was mentioned prominently in the trump on call yesterday um, obviously pakistan has done quite a bit to um facilitate those talks to to put pressure on the taliban to participate I think the next step is to find ways of moving towards intra afghan negotiation Admit the challenges of the coven pandemic. Um, so two things that come to mind immediately are The push for a broader ceasefire Between the taliban and afghan security forces, particularly with the spring offensive likely to Begin soon. So to the extent that pakistan is is able and willing to provide that assistance and continue to put pressure on the taliban To come to the table to participate in talks and to prioritize public health In this emergency moment that will go a long way In continuing to maintain momentum in in the bilateral relationship I think also prevention of a crisis between india and pakistan along the loc the line of control And fortunately we've seen that firing incidents have increased recently. There's also rumors of increased infiltration across the line of control And a greater security force presence as the weather warms In kashmir and so I would argue the last thing that pakistan india the united states needs right now is a crisis on the subcontinent and so Simply by virtue of the fact that there is there's too much else going on Finding ways of containing that potential so that we don't find ourselves simultaneously in a moment of crisis management Will be very important to tamp down firing along the loc And then lastly, I would just say to ensure continued progress on counterterrorism objectives So we did see that the financial action task force Extended the deadline for its next review from april 30th to october 30th, which will give a little bit of extra time Um, but those same challenges that pakistan was facing in terms of its demonstrating its compliance to avoid blacklisting Will continue across that time And as seril alluded to there's been a few concerning developments that I would highlight recently So we saw the report that Um around half or 3,600 names had been removed from the nacta prescribed persons list Um that was explained as as being part of cleaning up that data removing Duplications, but I think it is concerning to the extent that that that might be Speaking to some backsliding in terms of of ct compliance Likewise, the acquittal of the murder suspects of daniel pearl by the centai court earlier this month Was concerning it's now been appealed to the spring court, which is a positive development But that's certainly a case that the u.s. Will be watching And then as seril mentioned lastly Just the potential for groups that are linked to prescribed organizations like jamat al-dala, for example Or a fellow insomniac foundation Those are groups that could find a space um find an opening through the covet pan pandemic to provide a relief and and attract funding um and so finding ways of Providing public health services while ensuring that those groups that are linked to militant organizations do not find ways of benefits Benefiting from the crisis will be very important Um, so I hope that's helpful in just kind of outlining some of the steps that I think might go towards maintaining the momentum of the relationship while also Um responding to the immediate crisis Um, I think the challenge is going to be doing both simultaneously But if if we're able to both the u.s. And pakistan Um, these are ways of ensuring that once this immediate crisis is passed We'll be able to pick up where we left off effectively And build on that previous momentum that we've seen in the relationship. Thanks Thanks so much elisabeth. That was very useful Now we're going to open up the floor to questions. Um, please If you have questions in the audience feel free to put them on youtube In the comment section and our moderators. We will get the questions to the panelists I'm going to take the prerogative of the chair to ask an opening question. Um, kuram for you You mentioned, you know, the various responses a little bit I I want to get a sense of how the different provinces Are actually reacting. I mean, we've seen a lot in terms of garachi doing a good job with the chief minister of sin um getting a lot of attention for preventing what could have been a Worst crisis in pakistan's largest city and its economic hub. But how are the other, you know, sin, then we've heard kp Good stories out of kp as well. Um, can you talk a little bit about the push and pull between center and provinces and the different provincial responses sin and the center Uh, the reason for that is that the other two province the sin is the only province that is ruled by an opposition Uh, so there's going to be some amount of built-in tension in that relationship to start off with Uh, but on the other hand, but because sin has placed, uh, the entire crisis first and for framed it first and foremost as a public health emergency And they say this in their in their own meetings. I met with the chief minister send only a few days ago on back on sunday Uh, and he was very clear on this and this is first and foremost a public health emergency And the one thing that he lamented more than anything else to all this when he was asked Was the absence of a national narrative Framing it as a public health emergency and he said that i'm not getting the kind of support that I would like to see from the center um because They want to see this whole affair to other lenses other than a public health emergency Now in panjab and kp what we've seen happen is initially In the province of panjab floundered for a response But leadership eventually emerged from within the poles of the panjab bureaucracy A group of people were pulled together And they did were uh, they did put together some amount of they did do some amount of work in how to implement lockdown how to sharpen The focus but in the meantime What we saw happen in panjab was that the testing regime went all over the place So if pakistan has conducted something like 120,000 tests Thus far give or take But it's about that much More than half of those just about more than half Slightly above half of those have been done in panjab And so after 60,000 plus tests that cumulatively that panjab has done Again more than half of all of those have been done privately have Have been done in an untargeted manner meaning you just come up you pay and you get a test done Versus testing being done in the context of world health organization guidelines such as for instance as part of a contact tracing effort such as Testing those who have a travel history to countries that are that are in the midst of an outbreak or testing those who have advanced symptoms Of kovic So less than half of the testing done by panjab has been targeted has been what we might call spot testing and kp has produced again leadership emerged in kp in the form of the minister health over there the provincial minister health Temul jagra who's also the minister of finance and He found support from among his own cabinet colleagues And they have experimented and they've tried a slightly different model for a lockdown again sharply focusing their testing specific, you know by following guidelines Very closely and providing a more sort of a local government based response Over there You see the results when you look at the number of tests done and the number of positive cases found So in that the national average is about 10 percent 10 percent of all tests have found a positive case The idea behind smart testing is that the more you focus your testing the higher that percentage should be The higher it is the better because that means you are actually finding the people who are most likely to be positive cases And that and using your scarce testing resources on those people to to to to confirm So kp has a 13 percentage 13 percent return on on on its number of tests done Panjab was the lowest Of course, which means that their testing is going all over the place. It's more a shotgun approach to Testing And that I think feeds into a little bit of a leadership vacuum that Panjab has been struggling with through all this Balochistan found itself in the bit of a spotlight because the first in the initial spurt of cases that came came through the province of Balochistan These were the returnees coming from Iran from pilgrimage over 6,000 of them were interned or quarantined in Balochistan province and That's where the first And largest case of Infections was discovered. Of course, they're they're known as the Zireen the returnees Who are coming back from Ziarat from pilgrimage to holy sites in Iran And in that the Balochistan government's own defense was that They were supposed to manage the quarantine, but the federal government was supposed to provide the testing backup And whereas the quarantine was implemented the testing Facilities never began until it was very late. So there was again a central province issue that that's played up over there and the next largest spurt of cases came from Panjab, uh, the the Raiwin, uh, the Tbiliri, the religious congregation in in Raiwin province Half of all the cases that have tested positive in the city of Lahore, for example Half of them are the Tbiliri Jamaat So the the Jamaat turned into a major major node for the spread of the infection and now they're being They're testing positive all over the country I haven't seen today. Yeah, sorry. No, thank you. I'm I'm I just want to We'll come back to you. I want to get uh, ozer may actually have to fall off our Webcast here. So I want to quickly get you a question. We have a couple questions one on the Chinese debt and how you see that going forward what's going to happen there Was there and second in terms of the expansion of the ASAS program? I mean, it's a lot of money austerity measures are gone Will there be any transparency any? Accountability on all of the money that the government is spending Yes, so on Chinese debt, I think Important to put into perspective that when the IMF data came out When Pakistan entered the IMF program was that if you add up sovereign debt Owned by China as well as commercial bank debt owned by China It comes to about a quarter of Pakistan's total external debt if you add in what is owed to Saudi Arabia and the UAE one could argue give or take It's about a third of total external debt So when you look at the G20 and debt restructuring China in particular will have to take a lead in in in taking unbearing the burden of that along with the Paris Club countries And I think that will be a different set of circumstances compared to what we saw in 2001 following 9 11 when restructuring happened with the Paris Club And so I think There I don't foresee personally Any scenario where the Chinese will play hard to hard ball with the Pakistanis given everything that is a stake Both between the strategic relationship in terms of the strategic relationship But also what at stake for the belt and road initiative and what China is trying to do in the wake of this pandemic to take a more leadership Approach into global affairs So I think the Chinese will play a key role in the G20 level and they will bear the burden of free scheduling and restructuring Pakistani debt both sovereign and commercial bank on the assasin. I think look it was called the Benazir income support program. That's what The people's party put it together long known for corruption But it is one of the most effective cash transfer programs in South Asia Maybe in the world if one could look at the data And the testament to a success is that the PML and when it came into power expanded it the PTI when it came to power rebranded it but expanded it and Sanya Nishita is a very credible person who's running this program And they are indicating that they will develop or I think release data On a portal that showcases the transactions that are occurring at the same time I would say that look at any point in time when stimulus like this is unveiled even in the united states We saw harvard getting funds that they shouldn't have Right. So even in a country like Pakistan there would be leakages We should be okay with that because at this point in time The goal is to get money to those who need it at a rapid pace And if that means that five percent ten percent of the funds to go to people who are undeserving I think that's fine. Look the problem in Pakistan is that someone who's poor has to go through five filters Or six filters before they get the 12,000 rupees for four months while you're in this industrialist or a crony capitalist You get to meet the prime minister and get what you want the next day. Look at the construction package, right? So I think we should be okay with that As long as there's transparency, that's fine. And that's what they're indicating and even if in transparency we find leakages The crisis is such that some sort of leakages should be tolerated and should be okay for the time being Thanks so much is there We are getting a lot of questions and thank you all for putting them in but continue to add your questions on youtube I'm as quorum alluded to about both the zireen who came back from iran and then that the bleaky jamaat in Punjab at raiwin um, I want to talk a little bit about this sort of sectarian nature and the reaction to Religious gatherings that we've seen in pakistan and for that I want to turn to seril if you can one of the questions we saw online is if you can talk about the sectarian nature of the response and of accusations maybe You know people are reacting negatively To minorities, etc. So seril, I'd like to turn to you for that Sure, um, I think as quorum mentioned When the start in the the first mass outbreak in pakistan was linked to the pakistan- iran border um, and of course returning shia pilgrims from there and I think in the pakistan media online particularly There was a bit of a backlash. You could see people criticizing them at all. Of course. Yes. This is a shia thing But then once it turned to the the bleaky jamaat and the the bleaky jamaat, uh, the sunni organization They turned into super spreaders. I think some of that sort of fell away And I think in the initial stages at least when it was new it was novel people were still trying to understand what this was and there was fear Um, they were pinning it on particular communities But I my guess is and it's a guess at this point as it washes through and it courses through pakistan through all communities rich poor Through all ethnicities through all sex, etc. You might see a diminishing of it Where you might see an increase in competition or tension is when there are scarce resources I think again going back to the prime minister speaking just before the show He's been quite adamant and clear and I think that way you've got to give him credit for being transparent But there is only so much money pakistan has there's only so much it can do or there's only so much his government can do in that case, uh, going forward if there is a spike if there's a growing crisis in the country, uh, competition of resources, etc could see, um A sort of a reemergence of sectarian tensions and of course finally, um, I think what elizabeth mentioned too Of course, there are groups in pakistan and have existed before Within a word sectarian nature Uh, pakistan is no stranger to violence and sectarian violence So going forward, um, you could see that but at this stage, I think, uh, the initial outrage and outburst over the returning shia pilgrims Someone dissipated and now it seems to be a fear of all pakistanis are opposed to just a particular group spreading it within the country Thanks, saral. That's very uh, very useful Elisabeth, I want to turn to you. We're getting several questions about kushmir and also about the loc Can you comment a little bit about how the rate of reported or rumored incidents this year along the loc compares previous years and anything further in terms of the impact In kushmir and between india pakistan on this and what do you see as we go forward? I mean kushmir has on the indian side has been in lockdown since august Um, how is this impacted that? Sure happy to um, so in terms of absolute data, um It's obviously hard to to get firm numbers on this What I have seen is that the the current numbers we're seeing now are certainly the highest that have been A year, I think two years as well. Um, so that dates back to before the pulwama bala code incident of march 2019 um, and that's significant simply because There is always a risk that That conflicts those firing incidents along the loc could themselves escalate Or that they're an indication of broader tensions in the bilateral india pakistan relationship I think that's especially worrisome because what we're seeing right now in um, indian administered kushmir as you alluded to is Uh, the snow is starting to melt. Um, we're coming to the spring and Make analysts have been concerned for a while about what that could look like in kushmir after months and months of lockdown and following the august fifth decision to repeal article 370 and 35a of the indian constitution which had granted kushmir limited autonomy and so to the extent that The cumulative effect of that lockdown and frustration over that decision Could now express itself a little bit more clearly now that the winter is over the snow has melted. Um, there's a potential for um an uptick in violent incidents in kushmir and As I alluded to in my comments Given the already strained capacity not just of pakistan, but india as well. Um, which is facing its own significant coronavirus outbreak That sort of domestic instability that could spark an international crisis would be especially troubling and concerning at this time when the u.s. Um, which has traditionally played a role of Facilitating crisis management in the region is likewise distracted from the coronavirus epidemic and so That's all to say that it's worth watching those sorts of incidents along the llc and for both sides to Continue to ensure that they only have one crisis at a time to handle Thanks very much. Elizabeth. That's very useful. Uh, let's turn. We're getting us several questions about civil military balance And i'm going to ask both quorum and seril to comment, you know, the coronavirus crisis has really formalized military's role in further formalized Military's role in national policymaking. We see ncc ncoc They're already playing a lead role in supporting the national disaster management authority So is the military prepared? What are ways that they can be constructive? In uh addressing this crisis and then what is the impact? Actually on the government the civilian government and on the civ mill balance. So I'd ask quorum and then seril to comment um The civ mill balance has been uh, it's it's undergone some complex recalibration through uh through all of this uh, there are moments when we have seen very tight coordination and You know, the two of these authorities working together in ways that we've not seen in the past Or at least we haven't seen in a long time In the power thing together to solve problems um And there have been times when we've seen the two of them sort of talking past each other or at least Sending out mixed messages. Let me give you an example of the matter A few weeks back the prime minister on one saturday gave a public address in which he Listed all of the disadvantages of a lockdown And talked about how it's simply not possible for a country like Pakistan to undertake The kind of a lockdown that many other advanced industrial countries are taking that people are talking about the entire Elevised address was understood by people as his reason why The lockdown uh after being tightened should in fact be loosened and in fact done away with all together The very next day we had the military come on the air And pretty much announced a lockdown nationwide and the the Dg is pr was on the air saying and he had his words were that this is the most serious crisis Pakistan has faced and He himself announced a ban on or non-intercity movement and and what not upon reaching series of Restrictions that basically amounted to a nationwide lockdown. This happened the very next day Um, this was obviously this is one of the moments when the the differing approaches between the military and the civilian authorities um, it's sort of a big, you know Came out in full public view and and we saw that the military was in favor of Uh, proceeding, uh, as if this is a public health emergency and treating it as such Um, of course, they were also extremely concerned about the spread of the disease among their own ranks And uh, among the soldiers, especially those uh in deployments in the western and the eastern borders Um, that could be an extremely difficult situation for them. They were mindful of this Um, we've seen the the civil and military authorities work very closely Together and another example of that. Uh, there are not many. I'll just give you one Um, is the building of the field hospital in karachi At the expo center, which was a provincial government initiative to build A thousand bed facility in the city of karachi convert the expo center into a thousand bed And they reached out to the core commander karachi to Have the the medical core helped them build As a field hospital and the military came and built it basically was funded by and the the premises were arranged by the The provincial government and the facility was built by the military Over there and it's now functioning. It's operating as per my last count 162 patients Housed over there under isolation So we've seen both happening Over here, but off late. We've been hearing less and less from the military Which means there's no public pronouncements except at a very general level As we simply state like the core commander's meeting recently simply said that the military will continue supporting the civilian authorities but we've seen less and less of the sort of You know the military directly intervening in or the or taking charge At least in a public way, but at the national command and control authority The the military is there. It's headed by a general the the NDMA the national disaster management authority That's doing a lot of the procurement of the testing kits and the personal protection equipment for hospitality staff Is headed by a serving general at the national institute of health where that's Running the kovat dashboard that's Running the testing facilities Is also headed by a by a general So there is significant amount of military input into the coordination of the overall response on the health side of this Great. Thanks for them There'll anything you'd like to add our I mean our and my question here to be add would be are there red lines or Further down the road if if lockdown unravels and You know things get worse. Where do you? Where do you think the military would step in? What the gentleman with the large hammers back? Um You know, I mean this it's a tricky area. Well, it's it's an opaque area too. So it's hard to guess from the outside, but Um, you know, you can make a few educated guesses. I think at the moment as things stand it seems pretty apparent that Prime Minister Khan has become more assertive in recent days and the military has differed to his Initial approach of look, this is what we can do. That's be realistic of what we can do So as the initial panic perhaps has has subsided and there's a more measured response to it I think to a large extent, uh, they're Squaring the circle around largely what Imran Khan has wanted Going forward, of course, that's the x factor. I think whatever one's watching if social unrest spikes if corona spikes if there is You know, large-scale protests in the country Some of that has been mitigated by the very fact that the prime minister is opposed to lockdowns and the most obvious way for Protest to spike would have been if the lockdowns were forced and were severe and the military was drawn into impose a curfew for example, so I I think we're not Closer to stage. I would say, um, you know, maybe county intuitively Imran Khan right now is in a stronger position than he was even a few weeks ago You saw the sharpening of the political rhetoric between the PPP and PTI Once again, I'm sure in certain power centers made people think hang on, you know Maybe Imran Khan is not being as sensible as we would like him to but what's the alternative? Right. We can't go back to the PPP. We can't go to the PMLN Can't change course midship and of course behind that would be the I'm sure the calculation that If you replace or try and you know, so swap out leaders the question would be like, oh, well What about you the person who made the choice initially? So At this moment, I think, you know, uh, we have to keep watching. I think through Ramzan, etc I would it looks to me from afar at least that Imran Khan is in the more secure position Then he has been in in quite some time and for now the military is happy to work in a role of facilitating The governments rather than sort of taking over the process Of course, you know, this is Pakistan and when you have a room full of generals, the civilians will inevitably sort of Receive So let's see how that goes Thanks, sarah Elizabeth, I want to turn to you. We're getting some questions about Pakistan's relationship with China How do you see it evolving in the future? Given that, you know, there's been an overall lack of international coordination among countries You mentioned the US is largely constrained But is it mitigated by maybe the public perception That the virus came from China? It's a complicated time for China as well Yeah, absolutely. I think it's it's a good question and one that's worth watching over the coming months As I've seen it from from here in DC, it seemed to have evolved Quite a bit over the past couple of months. So initially when reports of the virus spread There was the controversy over whether or not Pakistan would repatriate its students who are based in Wuhan There was quite a bit of of criticism there leveled. I think largely at the Pakistan government But in general just an awareness of the fact that this China did or this virus did originate in China Since then though, what we've seen as the virus has spread The US itself has struggled with the response At least publicly there seems to be a little bit of a Return to this narrative of China as the state that was able to combat the pandemic that it took the the right response And the China as the all-weather friend of Pakistan will be there to share those best practices and help Pakistan through The coronavirus as well There's been public rhetoric along those lines. We saw some key visits by Pakistani leaders to to China Just kind of trying to reemphasize the importance of that relationship in the midst of this pandemic I think what's interesting to me though is I've heard from from friends and contacts in Pakistan a little bit more privately that some doubts are starting to emerge about the way that China did handle the crisis And leaving me to think that there might be a little bit of A challenge in terms of trust in the relationship. So questions for example over whether China minimized the the casualty count of coveted and was not Reporting the correct numbers, which in turn led other countries to face greater challenges as they were preparing for its response and its impacts So doubts over the the figures that were coming out of China Both about its ability to contain the virus itself and then just more broadly about what that says that It wasn't communicating the the real data. And then also there's been concerns over The effectiveness of some of the test kits that have come out of China Some reports in the media From Pakistan but also more broadly that those are less effective than they were initially reported that there have been fake test kits Those sorts of issues as well. And so I think going forward Pakistan is likely to rely pretty heavily on China In its own response and relief efforts. And so I don't see Any sort of broad change in the relationship in that respect But I think watching the extent to which there might be a growing trust deficit between the two sides in terms of Of how trustworthy the the Chinese data and then those Chinese relief supplies are something to watch going forward Thank you Um, Khoram, uh, we have a very interesting question Elizabeth actually alluded to in her opening comments about how Things are changing here with telework and other things But the question is is how should Pakistani businesses adapt to the current past changing environment? And what are you seeing, you know, is social distancing or other methods tell them, you know Products other things. What are they doing to actually adapt to and address the crisis? Yeah, that's very interesting because we're seeing a massive increase in the use of all digital tools So including those that were always available, but were rarely used So just the other day. In fact, I was speaking with And we ran a story on this as well with some people in the telecom industry Just asking, you know, what are they seeing in terms of the changing patterns of usage? Um, they said like video conferencing facilities of the sort that we are using right now Are driving a great deal of mobile usage A lot of consumption of bandwidth Anyways, you know businesses can I think adapt by using digital tools to the absolute maximum first of all They're that cuts down significantly on their costs Many businesses are right now in the process of learning that they don't even need Formal offices anymore. I mean, I can tell you that our newspaper is in large measure right now being put out by people working from home And when the whole thing does pass and it's safe to come back out and go back to officers I think many businesses are going to find out that renting expensive office premises keeping them maintained investing in hardware to Keep them equipped up. Maybe a cost that you can save you know, because you can actually do all that from home and Coupled with this, I think there is a massive opportunity right now to give a boost to mobile money and digital payments I'm a bit Perplexed as to why they've chosen not to use mobile money for the sr's program and its distribution Why they're insisting on doing that distribution through banks And in cash where people have to actually assemble at They're saying 17 000 locations around the country, which is actually very small if you think about the number of people That are being served by the program And you're seeing massive crowds forming outside these centers I mean if they give that same Contract or if they opened it up to mobile money Through the telecoms you could have Instead of 17 you could have easily 80 90 thousand Outlets where people could collect their cash or simply just continue transacting in Mobile money, but mobile payments have seen a very significant uptake In the past Since the lockdown began and I think that's going to continue that trend and it's going to receive a big boost as well I think making maximum use whether for payments purposes, whether for communications Or any other or for any other kind of coordination Of the digital tools that are available to us This is a fantastic opportunity To give all of that a big boost and you know serve as a cost saving measure in many ways and a transformative measure in others Thanks so much Karam We will end with one last question We're getting a lot of questions in terms of the impact on the afghan peace process and on pakistan's ability to actually Work in the process to play a constructive role And the impact on the thalaban so I would just Ask sarul and then elizabeth to briefly comment on afghanistan pakistan relations in the peace process Sure. Thanks. Um, um, you know when it comes to last one I think in this terrible mess Perhaps the only silver lining in all of this so far has been The timing of corona could not have been better from a pakistani state perspective Imagine that the first phase of the afghan deal had not been concluded at this point And the bickering was still going on and pakistan said we need to go back to the imf needed all this money He needed his debt ratio dealing etc. So in terms of timing, um, I think pakistan in some ways Obviously, it's a pandemic, but lucked out and you can also see going forward. Perhaps here in the u.s You know, we're all looking at twitter all the time expecting that tweet or at any moment Announcing a pull out from afghanistan, etc. So I think so far at least in these early stages pakistan may have um May now be a more advantageous position than it was in terms of protecting its interests as articulated by the pakistani state in afghanistan That was even weeks ago, but elizabeth sure All right. Um, I think in terms of how corona virus is likely to impact progress going forward You know to serals point it is interesting timing because right now the ball is very much in the afghan government's court In terms of resolving the political turmoil Moving forward with intra afghan negotiations I think the corona virus provides just about the best opening that we could have hoped for for an announcement of a ceasefire for Forward movement on presider releases all of these things are going to be impact by corona virus in afghanistan And so to the extent that that either side Was looking for a way of kind of moving down for maximalist positions the negotiating table and saying in the interest of public health We are making this gesture. We have seen some limited progress in prisoner releases on both sides, which is significant But I think it's also important bearing in mind The the u.s. Perspective here. So we saw the Pompeo visit to Kabul The threatened cut of one billion dollars in assistance And just by virtue of the corona virus response and the economic challenges we're facing here in the us That I think is there mentioned, you know, this is something that is going to cut pretty strongly against the funding that's available for Afghanistan as well even though it's it's orders of magnitude different, right? So we're talking trillions in the u.s. And and this is just a billion in afghanistan But nonetheless, I think in terms of how politically palatable it will be going forward to put Still not in substantial chunk of change towards A situation in afghanistan that has kind of fallen out of the headlines here in the u.s That is just going to raise the potential For future continued funding for afghanistan to be more difficult to come by going forward In a post corona virus world And so to the extent that that I think now more real possibility could put Additional pressure on afghan elites to resolve the political turmoil to to come to the table Even if it isn't actually a table that everybody's sitting around themselves, but you know skype calls and all the rest I think it's positive that we've already seen some virtual engagement between the two sides but important going forward also to just think through the modalities of how potentially virtual intra afghan talks could Progress usefully because this is going to be new ground and in peace processes and I think room for future research from us ip and others Thanks so much elizabeth and and for those who are Interested in the afghan peace process just to pitch usip did a great webinar on this yesterday On the state of play and you can find that archived on our website with that I'd like to thank everyone who joined in from home for our webinar I want to thank our great panelists and we hope to continue to hold these webinars On the current crisis and other conflicts across south asia So please come back and join us next month for more webinars and thank you again and stay safe