COVER STORY

Cautious peace-making

B. MURALIDHAR REDDY
in Islamabad

It will be a long road before India and Pakistan can get down to the fundamental issues that dog bilateral relations. The talks process remains on course, but the optimism is tempered with caution.

B.K. BANGASH/AP

Pakistani Foreign Minister Kursheed Kasuri, right, meets U.S. delegates (from left) Ambassador to Pakistan Nancy Powell, Assistant Secretary of State for South Asian Affairs Christina Rocca and Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage.

THE summer heat invariably brings the Pakistan-India cauldron to the boil. It melts the snow, creating fears of infiltration, stepping up violence in Jammu and Kashmir and also raising expectations of peace or war between India and Pakistan. This has been the pattern, particularly for the last four years.

The Kargil battle took place in May-June 1999. In July 2001 it was the Agra fiasco and the sabre-rattling that followed it. Last summer more than a million troops stood eyeball to eyeball along the India-Pakistan border. And this time it was a dangerous war of words with India finding Pakistan to be a perfect target for pre-emptive strikes a la Iraq.

And then, out of the blue came the Vajpayee peace initiative, that too from the eye of the storm, Srinagar. It is over a month since the Prime Minister spoke those magic words and there has been a flurry of activity, political and diplomatic, on both sides of the border. Every concerned citizen in India and Pakistan has only one question in mind: will it be different this time? Or, to borrow a phrase from Vajpayee himself, will he be third-time lucky?

How will the two sides approach the nascent peace process to make sure that it does not become a victim of hyped expectations? Will Pakistan realise the reality that its theme song, `Kashmir is the Core Issue', will be the surest way to wreck the course? (see box) Will India climb down from the high horse and agree to treat Pakistan as an equal partner in dialogue? Answers to all these questions will definitely engage the thinking mind in the weeks and months ahead.

Much has been written and discussed on the dynamics of and motives behind the latest offer of friendship. That the hand of Uncle Sam is nudging Islamabad and New Delhi to cool off is evident. Vajpayee himself made a pointed reference to the fate of Iraq and how it should serve as a lesson to all developing countries. The Prime Minister's statement could be interpreted in several ways; only he will be in a position to explain what exactly he had in mind when he said it.

Since the point when relations between India and Pakistan hit a new low after the December 13, 2001, attack on the Parliament building, there have been several attempts by Washington to bring New Delhi and Islamabad to the negotiating table. New Delhi spurned the advice and at one point even wanted to know why the U.S. itself did not negotiate with Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. So one thing is clear, at least as the Pakistan establishment perceives it: if at all there is any change in attitude it is only in New Delhi.

The U.S. has made several efforts in the last two years to mediate between the two nuclear rivals in South Asia. In the past year, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage has visited the region four times, Secretary of State Colin Powell has come three times and Assistant Secretary of State Christina Rocca has come calling 10 times. These facts indicate the importance of the region in the U.S. scheme of things.

Armitage has now led the first high-profile U.S. delegation to come to the region after the Iraq war. In fact, it seems that after Iraq, the U.S. has turned its attention to two of the world's longest-running conflicts - those of Palestine and Kashmir.

As he toured the subcontinent, Armitage has left behind hopes for peace and many questions, the answers to which appear to be complicated. He left behind two catch phrases, one from each capital. The first is his belief in Pakistan President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's statement that "there are no training camps in Azad Kashmir, and if there are any, they will be gone tomorrow''. The expression he used in New Delhi was "cautiously optimistic''. Between these two ideas lies the crux of the new initiative and the U.S. role in resolving the situation in the subcontinent. More important, the Deputy Secretary declared that it was not for him to carry assurances or commitments and it was for India to judge on the basis of the ground realities.

Is it a case of once bitten, twice shy? His statement could be interpreted in two ways. One, he would not like his credibility to be affected by delivering a message from Musharraf that might not be translated into action. A commitment he relayed from Musharraf to New Delhi at the height of the tensions between the two countries in June second week last year has not been forgotten.

Second, perhaps Armitage is suggesting that the Bush Administration is convinced about Pakistan's sincerity in halting infiltration, and that New Delhi should give him the benefit of the doubt. Islamabad has argued for several months that it was not possible in practical terms to seal the porous border. As Pakistan Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri told this correspondent in a recent interview, if India does not believe its word, it should agree either to strengthen the existing mechanism involving United Nations military observers or a mechanism involving neutral observers from half-a-dozen countries that are acceptable to both sides.

Without doubt, the decision of the Pakistan government to ban the entry of the chief of the Jaish-e-Mohammad, Maulana Masood Azhar, to Pakistan Occupied Kashmir (POK) was a direct result of the Armitage visit. It seems that Pakistan has decided not to allow any of the militant outfits to operate from "its soil'' in the POK. But the moot question is, why did it take so long to arrive at this turning point? Had not Musharraf promised similar action in his January 12, 2002 speech and in a subsequent commitment he gave Armitage?

IT is against this backdrop that his public posturing in Pakistan and India assumes importance. Armitage, a frank and down-to-earth official, took a stiff stance as he said that "all violence should end", without committing himself on the issue of whether or not the infiltration has the blessings of Pakistan's establishment. To India, the advice was: no `action replay' of the summer of 2002. He outlined to the neighbours the expectations of the U.S. - that the U.S. was definitely interested in getting the subcontinent quietened, but at present at least, it was not interested in getting involved with the nuts and bolts of a solution to Kashmir. It has its hands full in Afghanistan and Iraq; the U.S. wants the simple absence of a crisis in South Asia. Hence the urging and the urgency to get the dialogue going.

The perception in Pakistan is that for once the coaxing is being done in a more even-handed fashion. Although the U.S. has often used Pakistan as a front line state, Pakistan's dependence on the former for its economic and military needs has given Washington the latitude often to side with India when it talks about cross-border terrorism.

REUTERS

Shiv Shankar Menon, India's newly appointed High Commissioner to Pakistan.

This time, however, Armitage conveyed a slightly different assessment - "cross-border violence and lethality are down as compared to the same time last year''. At the same time, however, some misgivings are being expressed. One is that the U.S. is basically interested only in keeping the tension in the nuclearised region defused and does not have a clear-cut policy with regard to Kashmir or South Asia in general. In fact, the U.S. says it does not have a road map for Kashmir as it has for Palestine. It is perhaps respecting or playing to India's long-standing position against third-party mediation. The other worry is that the U.S. might go for a settlement that favours India more than Pakistan. One of them is the proposal to convert the Line of Control (LoC) into the international border. Opinion-makers in Pakistan are totally opposed to this. However, the local media have been running stories to the effect that the latest Central Intelligence Agency maps do not show Kashmir as a disputed area but show the LoC as the international border.

It is certainly not a coincidence that the chief of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) was in the U.S. around the time Armitage and his entourage were in the sub-continent. The ISI chief had meetings with top officials of the Bush Administration - which provides a hint about how Pakistan figures in the matter of the U.S. manhunt for Al Qaeda remnants.

This continuing operation underscores why the U.S. should be so serious about maintaining peace or rather avoiding an armed conflict in South Asia and so is `facilitating' a dialogue. The columnist Dr. Rashid Ahmed Khan said in The Nation: "It would not be an exaggeration to say that Mr. Vajpayee's statesmanship and Pakistan's prompt and positive response have created an unprecedented environment for the U.S. to be an effective facilitator. But despite that, the U.S. role in Pakistan-India normalisation suffers from serious limitations. These limitations emanate from the wide gap between the Pakistani and Indian positions on Kashmir."

This reality is showing through the latest high tide of expectations. Days after Armitage left, the talks process remains on course but the optimism is certainly tempered with caution. The speed is slower than expected but hopefully steady. Islamabad took its time to take the first step that could be counted as a concrete diplomatic move - naming a High Commissioner to New Delhi.

In an interview to a private producer for Doordarshan, Pakistan Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali blurted out that Islamabad had zeroed in on its Ambassador in China, Riaz Mohammad Khan, as its High Commissioner to India. Here Jamali had committed a diplomatic faux pas, as Islamabad is yet to send the required papers on Zafarullah Khan to New Delhi for what in diplomatic parlance is known as an `Agrément'. The name of a nominated envoy is not made public till the host country gives its consent.

However, what has intrigued observers is Pakistan's move to imitate New Delhi in the choice of its High Commissioner. With India naming Shiv Shankar Menon, its Ambassador in Beijing, both New Delhi and Islamabad appear to be on the same wavelength at least on the question of the choice of their envoys in the respective capitals. Some people have even wondered if there is a `China factor' involved. Not many people are perhaps aware of the fact that Beijing had played a quiet diplomatic role in defusing tension between India and Pakistan at the height of the Kargil battle in 1999. Informed circles suggest that China had stepped in to persuade Pakistan to withdraw from the Kargil heights at the urging of Washington.

For several months now, India has been telling Pakistan to follow the `Chinese model' in pursuit of bilateral relations. The message from New Delhi is that if India could have excellent bilateral relations with China in all fields despite the existence of a serious border problem, why Kashmir should come in the way of Indo-Pakistan ties. The answer from Pakistani critics to the formulation is that Kashmir is not a territorial dispute.

GIVEN the bitterness between the two sides particularly in the last 17 months, there is little doubt that the Vajpayee peace initiative has moved forward. There are two distinct elements to the initiative. The first relates to normalisation of ties, and connected to it is the movement towards dialogue. Normalisation itself is expected to take several weeks before some kind of negotiations can begin at the official level. Richer by the Agra experience, New Delhi wants to take the slow track, while Islamabad is prepared for any manner of approach. This was evident from the Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) announced by Vajpayee and Jamali respectively.

The Indian Prime Minister confined himself to the appointment of a High Commissioner and restoration of air links. In contrast, Jamali unveiled eight proposals seeking restoration of full diplomatic ties. The India-centric measures announced by Jamali include the immediate restoration of snapped rail and road links on a reciprocal basis; the restoration of air links as proposed by Vajpayee; the release of Indian fishermen in Pakistani jails besides 20 Sikh youth and 14 members of a cargo boat as a goodwill gesture; the resumption of sporting ties, to begin with in cricket and hockey; restoration of the staff strength of the Indian and Pakistani missions to the pre-December 2001 level and a dialogue between the two countries on issues of nuclear security, as agreed in the Memorandum of Understanding in the Lahore Declaration.

The SAARC-related CBMs that will have a bearing on India-Pakistan ties are a decision by Pakistan to add 78 items to the list of items that could be imported from India; a decision to approach the SAARC Secretariat in Kathmandu proposing dates for the SAARC Summit scheduled to be held in Islamabad and a decision by Pakistan to hold the South Asian Federation (SAF) Games that had been postponed three times.

Jamali sought to address the two issues that are New Delhi's biggest concerns - cross-border infiltration and the dismantling of the infrastructure of terrorism. The Pakistan Prime Minister declared that his country was opposed to terrorism in all its forms and manifestations and that it would not lag behind anyone in tackling the menace. However, this came with a rider. "Pakistan condemns terrorism in all its forms and manifestations and would continue to cooperate with the international community to eliminate this scourge. Of equal importance is the promotion of regional peace and security in regions of the world suffering from tensions and unresolved conflicts," he said in an obvious reference to Kashmir.

"We should begin talks from where they were left off at Agra and work out an agenda for a tiered dialogue including Summit level interaction," he said. This was in contrast to the Indian emphasis on Shimla and the Lahore Declaration as the starting point for a dialogue.

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