An unproductive meeting in New York

One can just not comprehend why elected governments are unable to muster the courage to defy extremists with peace.

There is little that can be done in bilateral relations, unless the nations concerned are blessed with courageous leaderships that can defy the odds and meet the challenges with sobriety and integrity. Without the basic courage that really determines the presence, or absence, of political will, leaders of nations can continue wasting taxpayers’ money for meetings that signify nothing.

India and Pakistan have, in recent times, not been so blessed, and hence, the yardstick of expectations has fallen dramatically. Now, we as a people, applaud when heads of government meet with a ‘at least they are meeting’ sigh of relief. Because we know, on both sides of the border, that our leaders are capable of stalling talks on one pretext or another and find it easier to line up our respective armies across the Line of Control (LoC) in the ‘eyeball-to-eyeball’ confrontations we are so notorious for.

The Manmohan Singh-Nawaz Sharif meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly at New York was one such non-event. While we peace lovers tried to hail the meeting as a ‘movement forward’, our applause was feeble at best as there was little hope that relations between the two nations would finally turn the corner. The point here is not what was said off the record. After all, public perceptions are fed by ‘on-the-record’ briefings that determine the public mood and the opposition response. The Indian briefings made it clear that ‘terrorism’ remained the key issue and while the talks were cordial, the atmospherics certainly were not. On the Pakistan side, of course, a journalist (we have similar scribes in India) queered the pitch by quoting the Pakistan prime minister as being almost defamatory in his remarks about Dr Singh, a claim that was denied. The denial was not really believed, at least in New Delhi, with the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi, citing the rumour in one of his public rallies, as if it was indeed a fact. It fed into the current BJP propaganda within India. It is for Pakistan to determine whether the journalist’s claim was mischievous or genuine, with both carrying their own significance.

The damage thus has been done and the Indian premier, at least, has given up hope of visiting Pakistan in his last weeks before the general elections. The New York meeting was expected to open avenues, but given the semantics and the resultant perceptions, it has closed the tiny window of opportunity that both sides had worked to open. Given the domestic pressure, Dr Singh is unlikely to visit Pakistan, with his 10 years in office unable to break new ground with the neighbour, despite some iffy backchannel efforts.

In a totally unproductive meeting, the one positive that emerged was the seeming commitment of both prime ministers to restore the ceasefire along the LoC and ensure that peace returned rapidly. Unfortunately, even before Dr Singh had landed in New Delhi, the peace at the LoC was further shattered with both armies engaged in a confrontation that negated their political leaders’ efforts to restore the ceasefire and has instead, restored an uneasy status quo that keeps the LoC volatile and violent. There are extremists on both sides who have been waging a war against peace ever since Partition. Their stand is understandable as it feeds into their ideologies of divisiveness and hatred without which they might as well wind up shop. However, one can just not comprehend why elected governments are unable to muster the courage to defy the extremists and counter them with peace that is really the most deadly weapon against warmongers. Terrorism has to be countered with full force and this has not been done for decades. But given the change of mood amongst the people in Pakistan and the fact that the Frankenstein’s monster has turned, this could have been turned into a calibrated strategy by the political class of both countries, whereby terrorism itself could have been uprooted once and for all. But this could have been done only through a commitment to peace, not a commitment to war as there is great truth in the old adage that violence begets violence.

Meanwhile, taxpayers in both India and Pakistan should accept the New York meet of their prime ministers as yet another failed cheque, paid for but unable to deliver. Perhaps, another time, another place. Until then, we can continue to wallow in hatred and misery, and drag South Asia down with us as well.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 5^th, 2013.

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