Memoirs of a bystander: a life in diplomacy

The skirmish in the Rann of Kutch and the 1965 war with India, the Tashkent Conference, Bhutto's walk-out from the Security Council, Bhutto's rise and fall, and the nuclear deal with France - the author writes of these as a witness, and tells the inside story in this book. Blending description, analysis and anecdote, Iqbal Akhund's account castsa fresh light on these critical and still controversial events in Pakistan's history. There are perspective pen-pictures of the eminent personalities whom he met or had to deal with - Ayub and Shustri, Bhutto and Ziaul Haq, Nasser of Egypt and Tito of Yugoslavia. The book begins in the declining heyday of britain's Indian Empire and describes the way things were under what the author calls the "Brown Raj". It outlines the author's personal reaction to the concept of Pakistan. It ends in Lebanon, in the midst of the civil war and Israeli invasion, drawing a thought-provoking parallel with Pakistan.