If you blinked, you could have mistaken Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan's speech at the UN General Assembly (UNGA) as the one he delivered in 2019. Retrofitted with pandemic era phrases, nips and tucks, Khan belted out what was effectively an abridged version of last year's gig, at half past noon on Friday. The layering of the two years' speeches seems like a Khan riff on a wild moment from recent US politics. "Person, woman, man, camera, TV" was a phrase that US President Donald Trump used as an example of a question from a cognitive test he took. Trump explained that remembering the words in order got extra points.

Khan's speech was ordered almost no differently from last year: A wide swipe at the world, "corrupt elites", tree planting, Islamophobia, RSS, Modi, Kashmir and then more Kashmir. The Prime Minister's address was rescheduled from a late afternoon EST slot to the 14th spot in the morning session, which aligned with traditional evening primetime hours in the Pakistan area. Framed against a flag festooned backdrop and a painting of Muhammad Ali Jinnah on the wall behind him, Khan sat at a desk amidst a haze of green coloured props and rattled off a bucket list of macro-level grievances. This was the warm-up routine, quite in line with last year.