No ‘quick-fixes’ to peace

We would be better off taking a dignified pause. Our doors for dialogue should remain open. Let India make up its mind

Speaking of peace, there can be no two opinions on the need for peace between India and Pakistan — the only nuclear-capable countries in the world with a legacy of outstanding disputes and a history of conflictual stand-offs. Their problems are real and will not disappear or work out on their own as some people in Pakistan had lately started believing. Sure, in today’s world, there are no military solutions to problems. Dialogue and constructive engagement are the only acceptable means for resolving disputes.

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif knows this reality and had, in fact, initiated a process for sustainable but honourable peace with India soon after he became prime minister in his last tenure. In June 1997, an agreed framework for a sustainable peace process, familiarly known as the ‘composite dialogue’ was the first time in their 50-year history that India and Pakistan had agreed in black and white on pursuing a structured, agenda-based dialogue to address their issues and improve their relations. In less than two years, the process culminated in the historic Lahore Summit in February 1999, which indeed was a high watermark in India-Pakistan relations.

We were planning to grapple with all issues through the agreed mechanism, but unfortunately, the Kargil crisis derailed the process. Even after Kargil, the region remained under dark war clouds. While the post-9/11 world was focused on the US military campaign in Afghanistan, India thought it could also take advantage of the global anti-terror sentiment. In a blatant show of brinksmanship, it moved all of its armed forces to Pakistan’s borders as well as the Line of Control (LoC) in Kashmir. In mounting unprecedented war hysteria, the Indian leadership was motivated by political opportunism, both external and domestic, without realising the gravity of implications for regional peace and security.

South Asia was dragged into a confrontational mode that served no one’s interests, not even India’s own. Intense diplomatic pressure by the US and other G-8 countries averted what could have been a catastrophic clash between two nuclear states. It was again the constant pressure from the same influential outside powers that the stalled India-Pakistan dialogue was resumed in January 2004 on the basis of the “January 6, 2004 Islamabad Joint Statement”. In that joint statement, General (retd) Pervez Musharraf implicitly accepted India’s allegations of Pakistan’s involvement in cross-border activities and solemnly pledged not to allow any cross-border activity in future.

General (retd) Musharraf needed America’s continued support and during the last couple of years of his tenure, under Washington’s prodding, he even made a dubious ‘backchannel’ effort for a status quo-based ‘out-of-the-box’ Kashmir solution. India never responded to his unilateral gestures of flexibility. Ironically, Nawaz Sharif, on his return to power, not only adopted the same policy, but astonishingly, also took some of General (retd) Musharraf’s men and women in his team. One could understand General (retd) Musharraf’s anxiety to go beyond all limits in making gestures of flexibility on Kashmir, but for a popularly-elected leader to be motivated by the same considerations was inconceivable. He now seems to understand the ground realities and perhaps, also realises that his visit to New Delhi for Narendra Modi’s oath-taking ceremony was an ill-conceived move that brought him no dividends in return.

What should now be abundantly clear to Nawaz Sharif is that relations between the two neighbours will not be built on the sidelines of oath-taking ceremonies or through the exchange of gifts. India-Pakistan issues are complex and rooted in history. A serious and purposeful dialogue and constructive engagement on a sustainable basis would be necessary to address these issues. For this, India will have to come out of its current bind. For Pakistan, there is no point in relentlessly begging for dialogue. It betrays weakness. And weakness begets indignity. Peace based on indignity will never endure. And peace in South Asia will remain elusive as long as Kashmir remains under Indian occupation.

The world must know that there is but one fair, just, legal and moral solution to Kashmir, which was provided by the UN, and which both India and Pakistan mutually accepted in UN Security Council resolutions. There can be no compromise on this issue. But when we talk about not compromising, it doesn’t mean we declare war on India. Not at all. War is never an option in a nuclearised region. On other issues, of course, we cannot ignore India’s illegality in Siachen and its ongoing water terrorism in Occupied Kashmir by building dams and reservoirs on Pakistani rivers in violation of the Indus Waters Treaty.

Looking at the current scenario, while India’s strategic vision is rooted in Kautilya’s cold-blooded realpolitik, we in Pakistan are guided not by our own interests, but by the interests of others that we have chosen to be allied with. If you give up on your just causes only to live on the terms of your larger neighbour or to please your post-colonial masters, you don’t deserve to be an independent state. Woefully, the post-independence generation in our country, including the ruling hierarchy, has no idea what it means to be an independent state. It doesn’t even understand that the peace it wants will never come by giving up on our vital national causes.

We would surely be better off taking a dignified pause. Our doors for dialogue should remain open. Let India make up its mind. Meanwhile, we should be focusing more on our domestic perils, including the curse of terrorism. To negotiate an honourable peace with India, our own country must first be at peace with itself. Remaining firm on our principled stand and vital interests does not mean we can’t have normal relations with India. But our own domestic consolidation with a special focus on the security and economic situation should be our top priority, and not our relationship with India. We must free the country of its current weaknesses and ignominies. Only then can we sit at the negotiating table with some dignity and honour.

Also, those who mistakenly believe that trade with India on its own terms will bring prosperity to Pakistan just need to look at other countries in India’s periphery that opened their markets without the provision of any level playing field, and are left today with no industrial potential of their own. They are just consumer markets for India’s industrial goods. In the ultimate analysis, the success of the India-Pakistan peace process would depend entirely on the freshness of the political approach that both sides would be prepared to bring with sincerity of purpose, by taking into account the legitimate aspirations of the Kashmiri people. There will be no quick fixes.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 8^th, 2014.

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