PAKISTAN: Pakistan's internal contradictions, arising from its complex and tortuous past, are likely to affect its ability to cope with the aftermath of the devastating earthquake that has claimed more than 45,000 lives and left more than 2.5 million people homeless.
President Pervez Musharraf's first challenge will be to establish a swift response to redress the victims' immediate needs as winter looms menacingly. The more redoubtable task of rebuilding the devastated regions' infrastructure will follow.
But the Pakistani president is severely handicapped on both counts. Firstly, his administration has neither the financial muscle nor the economic sustainability to deal with such a massive tragedy. And more importantly, it is short on people with the expertise to manage the fallout.
As an experienced military strategist and realist, Gen Musharraf doubtlessly realises his military's limitations in handling the post-earthquake situation in Kashmir for which he is already being roundly criticised by survivors.
The Pakistani army is not a force trained or experienced in dealing with such natural calamities, despite its vast and considerable operational experience in combating terrorism, stamping out insurgencies and fighting conventional and not-so conventional battles with neighbouring nuclear rival India.
Adding to the general's woes is the fact that there is no significant civilian or independent political machinery to cope with problems and traumas arising from the earthquake as the intimidating military has ruled Pakistan directly or indirectly for over four decades, systematically whittling down these critical state organs.
After Gen Musharraf seized power in a "bloodless coup" in October 1999, political parties dissipated, fled the country or simply became the junta's adjuncts.
Over 1,200 serving or retired military officers - mostly from the army - also took charge of running a web of banks, transport, road building, communication and construction businesses. This, in turn, led to the dilution of badly needed, all-round civilian managerial and technical expertise.
Economic activity across Pakistan has also been restricted, despite the recent 6 per cent spike in the gross domestic product. It remains heavily dependent on financial handouts from the US, Islamabad's close ally in the global fight against terrorism since September 2001.
In addition, Pakistan is awash with Islamic militant and sectarian groups bent upon creating an Islamic caliphate, stretching from Kashmir to the central Asian republics. These groups will, no doubt, see the earthquake as an opportunity to extend their area of influence while the military administration is preoccupied with post-quake Pakistan.
Some of these groups, such as the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) or the United Action Front (an alliance of powerful religious parties) - emerged some three years ago as the country's most organised political force.
The MMA at present holds power in the North West Frontier Province and in Balochistan as part of a coalition government.
Large parts of the North West Frontier Province such as Balakot and Manshera have been severely ravaged by the earthquake and reports from the region indicate that the MMA and its militant cadres have taken the lead in the relief effort to steal a march on the government and show up its inadequacies.
Analysts also predict that the earthquake will kick-start the simmering disaffection in the Northern Areas, the region north of Pakistan-administered Kashmir, whose complex history is intricately linked to that of the disputed principality whose ownership is contested by India.
While the fierce and highly publicised Kashmir dispute has raged between India and Pakistan, decades of dissatisfaction in the Northern Areas has largely gone unnoticed.
The further neglect after the earthquake has added to the woes of this region, which is dominated by Shias and Ismaili Muslims, who are followers of the Agha Khan.
The Northern Areas's 2.8 million residents are the only people in Pakistan whose status remains unspecified. They are neither Kashmiris nor Pakistanis and are federally governed. Local resentments have been steadily mounting as they continue to be deprived of fundamental legal, political and civil rights guaranteed to the rest of the country by Pakistan's constitution.
Persistent denial of educational and economic opportunities and the absence of any infrastructural development have further tightened Islamabad's stranglehold over the Northern Areas. This has fuelled hostility towards the federal authorities, which manifests in calls for independence from its stranglehold, and rioting that is quelled by the army.