We are happy to hear young Pakistanis, who represent the new generation in Pakistan, take up the cause of letting their people know what happened in Bangladesh and come to terms with the genocide that was orchestrated by the State of Pakistan. Their recognition of the truth is heartening. Facts have been trickling through the facade maintained over the years in Pakistan, and some younger people have been questioning the official narrative on the role of the military during the war, as several of them did in Dhaka recently.  

As we near the 50th year of independence that cost millions of lives, there has still been no formal apology from any Pakistani government, much less the trial, on the orchestrated mass murders that took place in 1971. It is unconscionable that successive governments in that country have suffered from collective amnesia when it comes to owning up to the fact that the Pakistan armed forces carried out atrocities during '71, events which have been covered up, and history books portray the war as only a conflict between India and Pakistan. The facts of 1971 must not only be made known to all in Pakistan, but appropriate lessons from it must be drawn by the government. 

An official apology is in order and it can be possible when Pakistanis are made aware of the horrors perpetrated in the name of patriotism. It is up to the post-'71 generations of Pakistan to build pressure upon the Pakistani government to come to terms with history and settle the issue with an official apology and trial of those that wreaked one of the worst genocides of the 20th Century.