A spark of optimism

As has been noted in these columns previously, backchannel communication between Pakistan and India is functional even in the worst of times. Diplomacy is rarely played out in the public eye, and arguably that is as it should be. Leaders and their attendant diplomatic cohort need the time and space to craft the wiggle-room within which matters of import may be negotiated. ‘Negotiated’ is the key word. The meeting that has happened between the national security advisers of both India and Pakistan may seem like something of a surprise, but the backchannels will have been humming before the two sides sat across from each other in Bangkok. It lasted four hours — an aeon in diplomatic terms — and was attended by the foreign secretaries of both countries. A range of issues were on the table — peace and security, terrorism and the Kashmir issue all got an airing as did other subjects.



The back-story is beginning to emerge. The ‘informal meeting’ between Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the sidelines of the Paris Climate Change Conference is now seen as of rather more substance than mere happenstance. Both sides played it down in order not to raise false hopes, such as those attendant on the meeting between the two in Ufa, and the Bangkok moot was the fruit of discreet work behind the arras.

In this instance, it was India that acceded to Pakistan’s demand that foreign secretaries be included in the talks and crucially that any meeting was not limited to terrorism-related issues. That was the key, and must not be seen as ‘weakness’ on the part of India, more a recognition that from such negotiated positions may flow other consequential elements, and just possibly, a whiff of amity if not peace on the breeze. Pakistan and India have much to gain from each other, but only so long as they are able to see past the hurdles they create for themselves. Therefore, India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj’s visit to Pakistan deserves a warm welcome and we hope for better times ahead.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 9^th,  2015.

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