Pakistan is out of friends and out of money

PAKISTAN’S ELECTION on February 8th featured state-of-the-art avatars and TikTok videos, but the question it poses evokes an old theme. How long can the continue before it , outside intervention or—hope against hope—political renewal?For decades the generals have ruled nuclear-armed directly or via a stage-managed democracy featuring a recurring cast of corrupt dynastic parties (and the occasional political disrupter). The main political clans agreed to back a new government on February 13th. Unfortunately, after a rigged vote, it begins plagued by illegitimacy and a mounting financial crisis.