Is the Franco-German model relevant for Indo-Pak peace?

One needs to consider ground realities which militate against seeking relevance of the model for regional peace

Twice in the last one month a reference was made to the relevance of Franco-German model for peace between the two neighbours: India and Pakistan. First, in a lecture organised by the German Consulate in Karachi on November 16 to mark the end of 100 years of WWI, the guest speaker from Germany, Ingo Espenschied, rightly stated, “There is no real recipe to improve the relationship between India and Pakistan. However, the success story between France and Germany can give many examples on how to overcome hostilities between the two states.”

Second, Pakistan’s Prime Minister, Imran Khan, while speaking on the groundbreaking ceremony of Kartarpur corridor on November 29, said, “If France and Germany can move ahead while making a union, why can’t we.”

Certainly, after centuries of hostility and armed conflicts, France and Germany, the two major powers of Europe, are at peace and their mending of fences is central to the success of EU. Whereas India and Pakistan, since their emergence as new states in August 1947, have been living as hostile and belligerent neighbours resulting in the rupture of Saarc and marginalisation of South Asia in the realm of global power dynamics.

If France and Germany were able to mend fences in the historic 1963 Franco-German Treaty of Peace and Cooperation, India and Pakistan are bogged down on issues which since 1947 till today are responsible for vitiating their past, jeopardising their present and putting a question mark on their future.

There is no harm in imagining and visualising things but one needs to consider ground realities which militate against seeking relevance of Franco-German model for Indo-Pak peace.

Three contradictions exist when one tries to apply the model in the context of India and Pakistan. First, the absence of a leadership like French president Charles de Gaulle and West German chancellor Kurt Adenauer who acted as a catalyst in making history by signing the historic Franco-German Treaty of Peace and Cooperation in 1963. The Gordian knot in the centuries-old animosity and hostility between the two neighbuors was cut because of the leadership of France and Germany which decided not to carry historical baggage to their future generations.

Unfortunately, in case of India and Pakistan, visionary personalities are missing as the leadership of the two countries since 1947 never seriously tried to mend fences and peacefully resolve issues responsible for the outbreak of wars and armed conflicts that have resulted in the deepening of poverty as well as social and economic backwardness. Second, France and Germany created institutions to strengthen the process of reconciliation at the governmental and non-governmental level. For instance, the Office of Commissioner for Franco-German Cooperation was established for coordinating political relations between France and Germany and to promote societal exchange of the two countries. France and Germany also established Franco-German Council of Ministers on the occasion of 40^th anniversary of Elysee treaty on January 22, 2003 for working on joint projects. Furthermore, at the summit meetings which took place between the governments of France and Germany at Potsdam in July 2005 and Berlin in March 2006, the two sides agreed to a more structured collaboration through joint laboratories for research in biology and information technology.

But in case of India and Pakistan, absence of institutions to build trust and confidence and promote cooperation at the governmental and non-governmental level is a bitter reality. Harsh visa and travel restrictions impede any initiative which tries to institutionalise the process of peace between New Delhi and Islamabad. Indo-Pakistan People’s Forum for Peace and Democracy, Karachi-Mumbai initiative and many other institutional efforts under track-II diplomacy failed to take off because of non-cooperation and hostile attitude of the regimes of the countries.

Third, the visionary leadership of France and Germany in order to get over the hangover of the past and proceed for a better future focused on the youth population of the two countries. They decided to establish Franco-German Youth Office which offers more than 9,000 subsidised programmes each year for the age group of 3-30 years involving exchange of students of the two countries at the school and university level so as to eradicate enemy images and promote positive and forward-looking approach among the youths of France and Germany about each other.

Instead of investing on their youths and empowering them to pursue an innovative approach for peace in the region, India and Pakistan are seldom interested in engaging the future of their countries for unleashing the process of peace and reconciliation. Enemy images, paranoia, mistrust, suspicion and ill-will still shape the minds of the youths of India and Pakistan against each other. Yet amidst the environment of pessimism prevailing in Indo-Pak relations, some of the initiatives to promote goodwill and friendship among the youths of the two countries are Indo-Pak Youth Forum for Peace based in Lahore; Youth for Peace International based in New Delhi; Bargad Foundation, a youth, peace and development organisation based in Lahore; Aaaghazedosti, an initiative to promote better understanding between the youth of Delhi and Karachi, etc.

If India and Pakistan want to learn from the process of Franco-German peace and reconciliation, the two countries must promote exchange of youth delegations and take steps to erase those items in history textbooks which deepen the level of mistrust, suspicion, paranoia and enemy images in the minds of youth.

It is time that the leadership of India and Pakistan, whether at the governmental or the civil society level, took practical steps to reduce, if not eliminate, more than seven decades of animosity. Easing travel restrictions particularly for the youth will go a long way in building bridges of peace between the two countries. Franco-German cooperation is a success story because those at the helm of affairs were not a hostage of the past but pursued a forward-looking approach which not only established longlasting peace between the two former adversaries but also helped unleash the process of European integration.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 6^th, 2018.

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