Pakistan President General Musharraf is back at his favourite game of blowing hot and cold against India these days. At the Economic Meet in Davos, he replayed the Kashmir tune and pleaded for demilitarization of Kashmir and self-rule for the people of the state. He described these as “out of the box” proposals even though he has said so umpteen times earlier. Talking to reporters later he sounded more hawkish by saying that there could be no business with India “when we are enemies”. “If we are killing each other, how can other interests bring us together,” he observed.
Adding to this latest spree, he told the Newsweek Magazine that cross-border terrorism and Pakistan backed groups indulging in violence are a pretext used by India for not moving forward. He described this as a farce and justified demilitarization of Kashmir on the ground that the Indian security forces there were “killing many people on the slightest pretext”. He also blamed India for not coming up with counter proposals when he was making such proposal every time.
Is the General too innocent to believe genuinely that India is not taking him sincerely or does he thinks the world is too gullible to believe each word he expresses?
Surely, Pervez is neither innocent nor does he think that the world really believes in what all he says. He is too sure that his utterances do not go down well with his own people but still keeps on riding the high pedestal of democracy, self- rule, and demilitarisation in a bid to hoodwink the world. It does not lie in the mouth of an Army General, who has usurped power in his own country, to talk of demilitarisation in Kashmir.
A General, who is not prepared to throw off his uniform when holding the post of the country’s president, cannot speak about the army in another country killing civilians “on slightest pretext”. What his men in uniform are doing with the civilians in Baluchistan is no longer a hidden story. The Baluch leadership has come out openly against the General for inflicting atrocities on the people there. Does it cut any ice with opinion makers in the world to hear from a General about the virtues of self-rule, who himself has kept elections in his own country at bay.
Is Pakistan prepared to talk of self-rule in Gilgit, Baltistan and Pak occupied Kashmir, when it talks of self rule in Kashmir?
Is that not enough to explain why India does not respond to his so-called “out of box” proposals to the Kashmir issue?
The General is simply trying to hoodwink the world by giving an impression that he means business and is prepared to go to any length to resolve the Kashmir issue. He also tries to paint India as a country, which is recalcitrant, stubborn and reluctant to budge from its position. But it is time for hi to realize that his tactics does not work.
To be fair to the General, he has mastered the art of misleading the world to perfection. Those who listen to him, think, for a while, that the General has a point until they realise soon after, that what he is preaching for others has no place in his own scheme of things. And it is here that his high-flying ideas come down as a pack of cards.
At the recently held Foreign Secretary level third round of talks in New Delhi, India took a sharp stand on terrorism. Shyam Saran minced no words when he told his Pak counterparts that “despite assurances at the highest levels, there has been no end to cross border terrorism from Pakistan”.
He went on to say “our ability to carry forward the peace process will be deeply impacted unless it happens in an atmosphere free of violence”. How can the General call India’s observations a farce when one after the other Pakistan based terrorist outfits and Pakistani nationals are found involved in terrorist activities in this country?
How can the General explain 32 persons reported missing after they came to India on proper visas to witness a Cricket match, months ago? Three of these have already been arrested for being involved in Bangalore blasts.
If Pakistan is genuinely interested in improving relations with India, soften the borders and create an atmosphere of trust and good will, why does it take a lot of persuasion to make Islamabad agree to open more bus routes between the two countries? Why has Pakistan refused to open Kargil- Skardu bus link at least for the time being?
The Kashmir-centric attitude adopted by General Musharraf is not going to lead us anywhere. Kashmir is too ticklish an issue to be resolved in a minute as the General once observed. It requires building of trust by following a road map to create a proper atmosphere. This has to be understood sooner than later. Not realising this, can endanger the peace process itself which serves nobody’s cause.
The General will do well to listen to one of his seasoned diplomats, Javid Hussain, who in a blunt speak dubs Pakistan’s India policy as ‘confusion of thought, a tendency to take extreme positions, pious hopes and the absence of a carefully worked out long-term strategy, marked by a sense of lack of direction. “This approach”, he writes in the Karachi daily, The Dawn, (Feb 12), “has predictably led to disappointments and frustration on our part, and to flip-flops of our India policy. The combination of strategic overstretch and over-reliance on the military at the expense of the political, diplomatic and economic dimensions of policy in managing our relations with India drained our resources and weakened us gradually vis-à-vis India”.
According to Javid Hussain, two developments relevant to Pakistan-India relations stand out in the present global strategic environment. “One is the rejection by the international community of terrorism and resort to violence by non-state actors which has had an adverse effect on freedom movements in Kashmir and Palestine. The second is the gradual emergence of India as a major player on the international political stage”. Both these developments have important implications for Pakistan’s India policy which are too obvious to need any elaboration.
The diplomat for once gives up any pretensions of diplomatisque to come down heavily on ‘the policy flip-flops’ as exemplified by the travel from the Lahore Declaration through to Kargil, the Agra Summit and the Pakistan-India Joint Statement of January 6, 2004, and more recently by the talk about economic union with India. Such pendulum-like swings in policy betray the absence of steadiness of purpose and a carefully worked out long- term strategy based on national consensus. These exemplify instead a preoccupation with quick results flowing from short-term and arbitrary approaches.
That Pakistan must undertake a fundamental review of its India policy is clear to any observer, though not to the General as of now. The earlier he realises that Pakistan’s options in an admittedly difficult strategic environment are becoming limited the better for his rule. He will do well to pay heed to Javid Hussain’s counsel that Pakistan’ strategy should aim at avoiding a confrontational approach towards India and that a satisfactory settlement of the Kashmir dispute is not feasible in the immediate future because of its emotional overtones and historical background. There is no alternative, at least in the short to medium term, to the process of composite dialogue, which can help, as experience shows, in defusing tensions between the two neighbours. More so, when the current strategic realities favour India.
Courtesy : Syndicate Features
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