Intercepted: U.S. Endorses Pakistan’s Sham Election

Deconstructed

The Intercept

News

4.8 • 4.7K Ratings

🗓️ 6 March 2024

⏱️ 42 minutes

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Summary

The U.S. State Department this week congratulated Pakistan's new prime minister on assuming power, following elections that were marred by widespread allegations of rigging, voter suppression, and violence targeting supporters of imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan. On a special crossover episode of Intercepted and Deconstructed, hosts Murtaza Hussain and Ryan Grim discuss the aftermath of Pakistan's February 8 election, as well as growing calls inside the U.S. to hold Pakistan's military-backed regime accountable for its ongoing suppression of democracy. Hussain and Grim also discuss U.S. interests in the region, and the historical ties between the Pakistani military and its supporters in Washington.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	The This is intercepted. Welcome to Intercepted. I'm Martaza Hossein. This week the United States
0:39.6	announced its recognition of a new government in Pakistan, led by a coalition of parties opposed to
0:44.4	former Prime Minister Imran Khan.
0:47.3	The recognition comes on the heels of a brazenly fraudulent election this February that saw
0:51.4	massive voter suppression rigging and outright violence targeted. election this on politically motivated corruption charges, his party still garnered more votes than any other party.
1:06.1	The result of this election has further bled away legitimacy from the military-run Pakistani regime
1:11.1	at civilian clients, who are now relying on Washington to give them the
1:15.0	legitimacy that they seem to lack domestically.
1:18.2	Joining to discuss today is my colleague Ryan Grimm, host of Deconstructed, who's also reported on Pakistan with me over the past year.
1:25.6	Ryan, welcome to the show.
1:27.2	Thanks for having me here.
1:28.8	So Ryan, you've been a staple at State Department briefings in DC talking about Pakistan both before the election and since then can give us a little glimpse of what the US official response has been to this election which has struck many people around the world in Pakistan beyond as
1:45.0	maybe one of the most rigged and the most unfair and unfree elections Pakistan's had
1:50.0	certainly in recent history.
1:52.0	Not just Pakistan, it's probably... certainly in rigged election in a country where you expect some basic level of democracy.
2:08.0	Now obviously Pakistan has had a flawed and challenging time.
2:12.0	The democracy movement there has serious adversaries internally
2:16.8	in Pakistan. What I mean by the fact that you might expect it to be democratic is to compare
2:21.5	to something like Saddam Hussein, or Bashar al-Assad. Like when Saddam Hussein
2:25.4	wins like 98% or 100% to zero, nobody says I'm so shocked because Saddam Hussein has such strong democratic bona fides that I can't
2:40.7	believe he would undermine democracy like that.
2:43.8	But in a country where you have contested elections and you have an election commission that is
	...

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