Shehbaz Sharif, the Prime Minister of Pakistan, congratulated US President-elect Donald Trump on his decisive victory in the US elections on X, the social media platform banned in Pakistan. Putting things under context, a community note underscored that PM Sharif used VPN to access X in order to congratulate Trump, which according to Pakistan's legal framework is a violation.
“I look forward to working closely with the incoming administration to further strengthen and broaden the Pakistan-US partnership,” PM Sharif wrote in a post on Twitter.
Earlier this year, Pakistan's Information Minister Attaullah Tarar announced the ban on social media platform X, citing national security issues. Tarar claimed that the terrorists belonging to the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) were using the platform to spread their anti-national activities.
However, without lifting the ban, PM Sharif's post on X drew criticism from the social media community.
One of the users wrote, "If hypocrisy had a human face, it would be Shehbaz Sharif."
Another user, while tagging Elon Musk, wrote, "Mr. Trump, this joker using VPN to congratulate you... Btw, Elon Musk plate form has been banned in Pakistan !!!"
Meanwhile, on Thursday, Pakistan's Foreign Office spokesperson, Mumtaz Zahra Baloch, said that Pakistan and the US are “old friends and partners," but emphasised that a second Trump term would not impact Islamabad’s relationship with China.
“Our relations with the United States are decades old, and we look forward to further strengthening and broadening the Pakistan-US relationship in all fields," Baloch was quoted as saying by news agency PTI in its report.
When asked about the impact of Trump’s second term as US President on Pakistan-China ties, she stated that Islamabad’s relationship with Beijing is “all-weather, strategic, and a stabilising force” in the country’s foreign policy.
“This relationship has remained unaffected by developments around the world. So we do not need to even consider the possibility that this relationship will be affected by any domestic development in another country," she said.
