Pakistan: Charismatic and tough on America

At a rally in Lahore, Khan drew some 75,000 cheering supporters to listen to him rail against the “decadent, corrupt, and sucking-up-to-America ways of Pakistan politicians,” said Sanjeev Srivastava at Firstpost.com.

Sanjeev Srivastava

Firstpost.com (India)

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At a rally in Lahore last month, Khan drew some 75,000 cheering supporters to listen to him rail against the “decadent, corrupt, and sucking-up-to-America ways of Pakistan politicians.” After a snide reference to the U.S. secretary of state as “Chachi Clinton,” or Auntie Clinton, he demanded an end to U.S. drone strikes on Pakistani territory, saying that the Taliban is not Pakistan’s enemy.

Still, despite his anti-Americanism, Khan is no religious conservative. He has defended women’s rights and was one of the few to stand up against the assassination of a politician who campaigned to repeal the law mandating capital punishment for blasphemy. Khan is “treading the middle path between the fundamentalists and the liberal secularists”—and that could well be a “winning electoral combination.”