Despite their illustrious history, NATO and US have so far failed to achieve any worthwhile results in the eight-plus years that they have been in Afghanistan. In the bargain, they have had very heavy human and material losses too. The irony is that even after all of that, they seem to have no hope of succeeding in the near future, not in next few years anyway. For a country with very meager means, Pakistan has suffered inordinately heavy losses too both in the human and material terms. The loss in terms of economic opportunities that a peace of last eight-plus years would have afforded and the fall out in political terms are also colossal. We had to deal with the veritable cave-in of our northern roof as a consequence of the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. How can we deal with the horrendous dangers of this war being fought in this region, survive and save our people and assets and also protect the world, in particular US and its allied countries in NATO? That is a big ask and the answer lies in the following. The world powers must, once again, nudge India and Pakistan towards the composite dialogue to help solve all or most of their mutual problems, especially Kashmir and the issue of common waters. India must also be persuaded to end its meddling in our western borders and in Balochistan. Concerted efforts must be made to fast track the solution of Israeli-Palestinian problem but it must involve more neighbouring states, especially Arabs and China. We should go back to UN and seek a new mandate for the solution of Afghanistan problem, involving Russia, China and affected Muslim countries. Undoubtedly Pakistan has to continue its robust efforts to tackle its internal religious extremism. And it needs to be rewarded for its contribution for protecting this region and the world. -SULTAN MUHAMMAD, Lahore, November 8.