10 - 16 January 2002
Issue No.568
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 10 - 16 January 2002 Issue No.568 |
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A step back from the brink
Although the leaders of Pakistan and India shook hands at a regional summit, there was little warmth in the gesture, reports Iffat Malik from Islamabad
Since the 13 December suicide attack on the Indian parliament, political tension in south Asia has been on a rapid upward curve. The continent's biggest powers, India and Pakistan, had appeared to be heading inexorably for war. That threat has not disappeared, but a ray of hope has been offered by recent developments in the region.
Indian Prime Minister Atal Behar Vajpayee (left) shakes hands with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf at the regional SAARC summit meeting in the Nepalese capital Katmandu (photo: AFP)India has threatened that unless Pakistan clamps down on groups based in its territory that carry out attacks across the border in India, it will have to resort to force in the same manner as the United States in Afghanistan. Having earlier asked that Pakistan arrest the leaders of Jaish-e-Mohamed and Lashkar-e-Tayyeba and freeze the groups' assets, India issued a list of 20 alleged terrorists and demanded their extradition.
Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf's line from the first day of Indian accusations was that his government would take action against anyone in Pakistan responsible for terrorist attacks -- if India provided it with sufficient evidence.
In the absence of such evidence, Musharraf has taken action against religious extremists in Pakistan. Hafiz Mohamed Saeed, until recently the leader of Lashkar-e-Tayyeba and Maulana Azhar Masood, head of Jaish-e-Mohamed, were both arrested. So, too, were several dozen activists belonging to those and other extremist groups.
Some members of the Indian government welcomed Pakistan's actions, but others dismissed the arrests as "cosmetic." Fears were also voiced in New Delhi that Musharraf's government might have been staging a temporary clamp-down. Those observers speculated that once the pressure on Musharraf had abated, he would again allow anti-India groups to operate from Pakistan. Hence India's insistence on extradition.
It is worth noting that resistance to the arrests carried out by Islamabad has been minimal. There has been no domestic religious backlash. One reason for this could be -- as some Indians suspect --that the jihadi groups and the Musharraf government have reached an understanding to halt operations while the international spotlight is focused on Pakistan.
But the more likely reason is that Pakistan's religious groups have been fatally weakened by the Afghan conflict. Their support for the Taliban proved a miscalculation, and their calls to the Pakistani public to take to the streets against the government fell on deaf ears. With their leaders in detention, the extremist groups' capacity to resist the crackdown on their activities was reduced.
The bigger ray of hope was offered by the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) summit in Katmandu, Nepal. With meetings at the head of state and foreign minister level, the conference was viewed by many in the international community as an excellent opportunity for India and Pakistan to get together and find a way back from the brink of war. India, though, had ruled out the possibility of any meeting between Musharraf and Vajpayee. And no talks took place between Jaswant Singh and Abdul-Sattar during the foreign ministers' summit on the first two days of the conference.
During Saturday's inaugural session, in which all heads of state addressed the assembly, President Musharraf repeated a long-standing plea for the international community to address the causes of terrorism as well as terrorist acts, and to distinguish between terrorism and legitimate freedom movements.
Musharraf then walked up to Prime Minister Vajpayee and offered his hand. The Indian leader had no choice but to grasp it. That was the first personal contact between the leaders since the current crisis started.
In his address to the assembly, Prime Minister Vajpayee said that India had been the victim of terrorism for over two decades, and urged the Pakistani leader to follow the handshake gesture by clamping down on "terrorism." Referring to Kashmir, he dismissed related issues as "historical baggage that must be jettisoned."
However, the handshake did yield some benefits. The inaugural session was followed by an unscheduled one-hour meeting between Foreign Ministers Jaswant Singh and Abdul-Sattar.
Despite the public posturing, the military build-up continued apace on both sides of the border. Cross- border exchange of fire continues and villagers in the area are still fleeing their homes.
Until Indian and Pakistani forces stand down from their current state of high alert, and actually pull back from the border, the risk of war remains all too real.
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