THE WASHINGTON DAILY NEWS. JUNE 15, 1971
Editorial
SLAUGHTER IN EAST PAKISTAN
Eyewitness reports, one more ghastly than another, continue to filter out of East Pakistan, telling of the massacre of the Bengali people by the Pakistani army.
Naturally, the military regime of President Yahya Khan denies it is committing selective genocide. But evidence mounts that it is cold bloodedly murdering minority Hindus, Bengali separatists, intellectuals, doctors, professors, students-in short those who could lead a self-governing East Pakistan.
The strongest evidence is that 5 million East Pakistanis have taken the terrible decision to abandon their homes and have fled on foot across the border into India. This starving, cholera-ridden mass is being augmented by 100,000 terrified refugees each day.
If things are now “normal” in East Pakistan, as Yahya Khan’s Gauleiter claim, why are new refugees still inundating India and earlier ones refusing to go home?
Along with other countries, the United States is sending medicine and supplies to the refugees. This is only fair, since India has massive problems of its own and should not have to pay for Yahya Khan’s cruelty to his own citizens.
Our Government is also trying to get a U. N. relief operation going inside East Pakistan itself. The army crackdown prevented rice planting, and millions of Bengalis face starvation if outside food is not distributed. The United Nations must do it, since nobody trusts West Pakistan to hand out supplies to the Bengalis, whom it treats as colonial subjects.
Most importantly the United States is urging the Yahya Khan regime to reach “a peaceful political accommodation” with the East Pakistan. By this Washington means granting self-government to the Easterners-something a great majority of them have voted for.
Is it any of Washington’s business? We think so. This country has poured billions of dollars in economic and military aid into Pakistan for two decades. (Most of the economic aid was appropriated by West Pakistan and the military aid used to crush the Bengalis.)
Now Pakistan needs at least $450 million a year to stave off bankruptcy, and the United States heads an international consortium being asked to furnish it.
Should Washington continue to help? We say no-not until Yahya Khan calls off his army killers and agrees to autonomy for East Pakistan. Otherwise, by strengthening his regime, we become moral accomplices to genocide and enslavement of the Bengali people.
Such a stand, we admit, may complicate our foreign policy but that is a small price to pay for not acquiescing to mass murder.