Baby steps
India and Pakistan edged closer through recent conciliation measures, but the big issues are still pending, Iffat Idris reports from Islamabad
Indo-Pakistani relations took a positive turn recently as first India, then Pakistan, offered confidence building measures (CBMs). The question on the tip of everyone's lips is whether such limited measures can effect normalisation and long- term improvement of relations between India and Pakistan.
The Indians got the ball rolling on 22 October when Foreign Minister Yashwant Sinha announced a list of 12 measures aimed at promoting normalisation between the traditional enemies. Notable measures included the restoration of key transportation routes and services between the two countries, the facilitation of visas for travel between the two countries, including an initiative allowing the elderly to cross the border unmolested, the resumption of Indo-Pak sporting events, and several maritime initiatives.
India's emphasis on travel measures comes just months after road links and the bus service between New Delhi and Lahore were resumed. All transportation between India and Pakistan was cut after the December 2001 attack on the Lok Sabha, which India blamed on militants backed by Pakistan. Air and rail links remain suspended. Anyone seeking to fly between the neighbouring countries must thus use a lengthy circuitous route. An attempt was made to restore air links through failed negotiations in Rawalpindi in August. Reconnecting the two countries by plane and by train is considered an important step towards normalisation.
One of India's CBM measures -- an offer of free medical treatment for 20 Pakistani children -- follows the case of a young Pakistani girl who was taken to India for a heart operation. Her plight touched the entire country, which flooded the girl with gifts and other forms of support and assistance. Treating 20 Pakistani children will, the Indians hope, have a similar effect of creating goodwill on both sides of the border.
Notably absent from the Indian measures was an offer of dialogue. The Indians have ruled this out until they are satisfied that Pakistan is not sponsoring what it calls "cross-border terrorism" in Kashmir. New Delhi seems to be of the view that small, incremental steps of the kind they have offered contribute to improving the general atmosphere, enabling concrete progress towards the permanent resolution of their differences.
Pakistan has always taken the opposite approach: that long-term peace is only going to be possible if the two countries address and resolve the core issues between them. Islamabad was therefore disappointed not to receive a 13th offer to resume dialogue on contentious points, particularly Kashmir. An initial Foreign Office statement issued in response to the Indian list made this clear. "We are disappointed that while making these proposals, India has simultaneously reiterated its rejection of Pakistan's offer to resume substantive and sustained dialogue to resolve all issues, notably Jammu and Kashmir," it said.
A more substantial response was issued a week later. Again expressing disappointment at New Delhi's rejection of dialogue, Foreign Secretary Riaz Khokhar said Pakistan was accepting most of the Indian CBMs and putting forward some others of its own.
Of the Indian proposals, Islamabad issued reservations on a new Mumbai-Karachi ferry service and a new road/rail link between Sind and Rajasthan. Islamabad's thinking seems to be that established travel routes, especially air and rail, must be restored before considering new routes. Pakistan was especially concerned about a Kashmir bus service proposal because it implies recognition of the 490-kilometre-long line of control as the permanent international border. Pakistan sees Kashmir as disputed territory.
Rather than reject the proposal outright, however, Khokhar said it would be acceptable, provided checkpoints were manned by the UN, and passengers carried UN travel papers. India -- which rejects Kashmir's disputed status and hence rejects any outside intervention -- wasted little time in nixing this idea.
Pakistan's own CBMs relative to Kashmir were based on humanitarian principles. It offered medical aid and other assistance to Kashmiri victims of violence and rape, as well as 100 scholarships for Kashmiri students to study in Pakistan. In doing so, Pakistan sought to highlight the plight of Kashmiris living under Indian rule. A cardiology institute in Karachi had already offered free treatment for 20 Indian children. New Delhi welcomed the offer to treat Indian children, but rejected the offers of humanitarian assistance for Kashmiris.
The reservations and rejections demonstrate mutual doubts each country harbours for the other. An atmosphere of harsh rhetoric thus still exists. Indian Defence Minister George Fernandes recently told Pakistan, "You have only two options. Sit across the table and sort it out or go to the battlefield."
With such belligerent voices still emanating from what is supposed to be a developing dialogue towards peace, the timing of the Indian CBMs is possibly critical. One theory about their issuance is that international pressure was applied on New Delhi to move the faltering peace process forward. The last successful measure of that process before the CBMs had been the reappointment of High Commissioners and the resumption of the Lahore-New Delhi bus service. Pakistan had twice publicly (first by Prime Minister Zafarullah Jamali, then by President Pervez Musharraf at the UN) invited India to hold talks, but nothing panned out, due largely to India's position on Pakistan's alleged sponsorship of cross-border terrorism. In the CBMs, India may thus have been looking for a conciliatory tone -- of appeal to the international community -- that didn't involve, however, much in the way of major concessions.
The other argument is that India has gained all it can hope to gain through belligerence and a hard-line stance against Pakistan. Furthermore India knows that if it is to realise its superpower ambitions it will first have to resolve its problems with Pakistan.
Looking to the future, the general consensus seems to be that the CBMs offered by both sides are a positive step in the right direction. But they will only lead to long-term peace if they are presented with sincerity and followed up by dialogue on the core issues of difference between India and Pakistan. CBMs that ignore Kashmir -- as these do -- will have only limited impact.
Al-Ahram Weekly Online : 20 - 26 November 2003 (Issue No. 665)
Located at: http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2003/665/in3.htm