Stop this madness now

Nobody is winning. Nothing is gained. Everybody loses — and the sooner this madness stops the better for all


Editorial August 29, 2015
For the first time, General Sharif has linked Indian sponsored terrorism in parts of Pakistan with what he termed “belligerence” along the Line of Control. PHOTO: ONLINE

There are at least eight dead, more than 40 injured — all civilians — and India has once again displayed a callous indifference to both the rules of war inasmuch as they exist and assorted ceasefire agreements. This latest deadly round of shelling started after Indian troops were found to be using an excavator close to the Working Boundary in contravention of agreed standard operating procedures. Firing continued by both sides overnight on August 27-28. The Indians were not firing blind, they knew the coordinates of the villages that they were targeting and would be well aware via satellite imagery that there were no military units in the vicinity. They deliberately and with malice aforethought killed and injured innocent men, women and children.

Nothing has been achieved by this artillery engagement. As far as may be determined, Pakistan did not initiate the action and India fired first. There was no territorial gain to be made, no ground invasion to follow the artillery fire, nor was there any intention of such. The aim was solely to terrorise and intimidate, to raise the political temperature at a time when above all else, it needed lowering and to further impede a peace process that must now be considered dead in the water. The Foreign Office has summoned the Indian high commissioner for a dressing down, but it is no more than a diplomatic minuet, symbolic but bereft of real meaning. Army Chief General Raheel Sharif has likewise condemned the shelling and it is going to be for the DGMOs to broker, if they can, a return to relative quiet.

These ceasefire violations have become increasingly frequent and in increasing severity. The casualties in numerical terms are overwhelmingly civilian on both sides. For the first time, General Sharif has linked Indian-sponsored terrorism in parts of Pakistan with what he termed “belligerence” along the Line of Control and the Working Boundary. For 68 years, India and Pakistan have fought bitterly and unremittingly to the detriment of the people of both states. Nobody is winning. Nothing is gained. Everybody loses — and the sooner this madness stops the better for all, Indian and Pakistani alike.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 30th, 2015.

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COMMENTS (4)

S.R.H. Hashmi | 8 years ago | Reply Unfortunately, the leaders of both India and Pakistan have become prisoners of their own rhetoric and that prevents them from arriving at a realistic solution, keeping in mind that peace, justice etc are ideals which sound good to ears and may be expected to be followed in a just world. However, ours is not a just world and in here solutions which work are not those which are ideal but ones which are realistic, considering mainly the strength of the parties to the dispute. The fact is that there is hardly any possibility of India handing over Kashmir to us on a plate, or even making it totally independent. And it is also a fact that we are not strong enough to snatch from India the part of Kashmir which is under their occupation. And even if we made a dash and grabbed some part of Indian-held Kashmir, we can not retain its possession for any length of time, as the Kargil misadventure clearly showed. We could try to raise the Kashmir issue at the United Nations, invoke international sympathy for Kashmiris, and use that moral pressure to force India to arrive at a just solution for Kashmir. But again, the powerful states that matter are motivated by interests and not by genuineness of the cause. Moreover, our standing even among Muslim countries is not all that good as it used to be decades back. So, even this approach is unlikely to produce significant results. A realistic appraisal of the situation on the ground makes it quite clear that there are very limited possibilities for Kashmir. But having made high-sounding statements, our leaders find it difficult to climb down. And lacking courage and public support, they are not in a position to take unpopular decisions which are necessary to arrive at a solution in the given circumstances. So, they just continue the rhetoric and go through the notions of trying to solve the Kashmir problem, successfully deceiving people into believing they are serious about the issue. However, all they want is to complete their term while preferring to have some meaningless talks going to show that progress is being made on the Kashmir issue. It is also a fact that the price Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto paid to secure release of 93,000 Pakistani soldiers held prisoner in India was to agree to make Kashmir a bilateral issue. According to Simla agreement, Kashmir problem can only be solved by negotiations between India and Pakistan or at any other forum to which both countries agreed. And this means that according to the Simla agreement, Pakistan can not now take Kashmir issue to the United Nations without obtaining prior Indian consent for this. And the fact that India has as a Prime Minister a person like Narindra Modi whom earlier on the American government had refused a visa because of his involvement in Gujarat massacre of Muslims makes matters worse. Modi must be feeling on top of the world at being given a warm welcome in the same country while the US President Barack Obama also visited India. And Modi has scored a success in UAE as well. I think both the top civilian and military leaders who seem to be running the country as a sort of joint venture at least on some issues ought to take a serious stock of the situation, keeping in mind that we are not being looked at all that favourably by the rest of the world, including the Muslim world. And we need to make some drastic adjustments in our policies, including the Kashmir policy despite having plentiful stock of nuclear weapons which provide us a deterrent against our external enemies but are no defence against ourselves, and our faults like indecisiveness, lack of foresight, and incapacity to make bold decisions on various issues including Kashmir. Also, it would help if we remembered that discretion is at times the better part of valour. Karachi
Pnpuri | 8 years ago | Reply @Danish: Kashmiris are always for India, they participate in elections. But there are hulligans, stone pelter or terrorist from across the border who cause mischief. Giblarter launched in 1965 collapsed because Kasmiris whom Pakistan expected to become part of evil design informed Indian forces of presence of intruders. Talk we must, but Kasmir is not an issue for such talks.
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