Distant Drums

IT certainly will not be the first SAARC summit when attention will be focused on Indo-Pak ties almost to the exclusion of all else. Indeed, with the nuclear tests and the raising of tempers on the Kashmir issue, much is bound to be read in any interaction between the Pakistani and Indian prime ministers in Colombo later this month. Certainly, after forcing their way into the nuclear club, Colombo is no ordinary meeting for Nawaz Sharif and Atal Behari Vajpayee.

And once the photo opportunities are exhausted and the two leaders get down to the business of talks, a slew of different versions of the discussions held are likely to make the rounds. But while the letters from the two prime ministers to each other seeking talks made front-page news here, editorials warned that expecting too much from the meeting—the modalities of which are yet to be worked out—would be premature. SAARC summits have proved to be quite ineffective in the past, say analysts, and there seems no reason to expect otherwise this time.

Besides, at the moment, Pakistan is too caught up with Sharif and his domestic political problems to pay much attention to the proposed talks. Foreign office sources only say the modalities of the talks would depend on the two leaders, who will inevitably stay in close touch during the summit and the subsequent retreat.

Of immediate concern not only for Islamabad and New Delhi, but for the West also, is whether these two adversaries, armed to kill, will take the initiative for future dialogue. "In their own interest, both India and Pakistan should take effective measures to muzzle their nuclear weapon programmes and conclude a sincere, transparent and verifiable agreement to ensure that these weapons are not used under any circumstances and are eventually eliminated. It is obvious that their introduction will raise the threshold of a conflict to a level that neither side can win and will only lay waste this vast region of ancient culture," says Air Marshal (retd) Zafar A. Chaudhry.

Sadly, a critical ingredient will be missing at the Colombo conclave—mutual trust between the two prime ministers. In the last 15 months, nine rounds of Indo-Pak talks, including four meetings between Sharif and his former Indian counterpart I.K. Gujral, failed to throw up any positive outcome. The divide is sharper now, with threatening statements from New Delhi soon after the Pokhran tests resulting in a red alert in Islamabad which initially had no plans of going outright nuclear.

Even on the issue of Kashmir, a new obstacle has been put in the way of a bilateral dialogue. Pakistan is triumphant that as the result of the two states going nuclear, the dispute has started to figure high on the international agenda. Sharif, after receiving a letter from Vajpayee, said: "We should adopt a pragmatic approach to address the Kashmir issue and India should realise that threatening statements will have a negative impact on the efforts to resolve all the outstanding issues between India and Pakistan. Bilateral talks have so far not produced any result and I have informed the UN secretary-general about it."

But Vajpayee has made it very clear that he would never agree to third party mediation. "With our common experience of colonialism we should be cautious of such attempts to internationalise problems in the region," he said. However at this point, Islamabad feels that it has a strong case. Experts here point out that it was simply third party mediation that changed the course of the 40-year-old conflict between the Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland. As too the breakthrough between the Palestinians and the Israelis with the Oslo Accord. "Mediation is not internationalisation of an issue, as Mr Vajpayee considers it, it is to find a via media between two conflicting claims. It is not, therefore, something to be scorned," opined The Nation newspaper in an editorial.

It is not only Washington that is placing Kashmir on top of the agenda. In an expected move, the United Kingdom has also echoed these sentiments. British foreign secretary Robin Cook, always very vocal on Kashmir, has once again pointed out that the issue was on top of his government's agenda and it had to be resolved by India and Pakistan in accordance with the wishes of the Kashmiri people. Cook was reportedly expressing these sentiments to a three-member parliamentary delegation in the House of Commons: Gerald Kaufman, Roger Godsiff and Lorna Fitzsimons.

Cook also reiterated that both India and Pakistan should immediately sign the CTBT and NPT unconditionally. "The nuclear arms race has not added to to the security situation in South Asia. Instead, it has become all the more vulnerable after the nuclear tests," he said.

ANOTHER development being taken note of in Islamabad is that an "all-party" Kashmiri delegation made up mainly of pro-Pakistan groups met British minister of state for foreign and commonwealth office Derek Fatchett. This is the first time that such a meeting has officially taken place in the foreign office.

But on the post-nuclear stage in the subcontinent, it is an open secret that today the West has very little leverage on both the states in resolving the Kashmir imbroglio. If the carrot has disappeared, both states have made it clear that they are ready for the stick, come what may.

Pakistanis believe that things will move ahead only when there is a realisation in New Delhi that today it has a government, still on a high after the nuclear tests, in a position to take hard, unpleasant decisions. In the past there were very weak governments in New Delhi, it is felt, which were easily told to backtrack from agreements on Kashmir.

So what factors will motivate the two leaders to move towards a more futuristic agenda? Will the economic sanctions, the impact of which is bound to be felt in both countries soon, compel the two prime ministers to start focusing on an economic agenda, something which was high priority for Sharif despite stiff opposition at home? Opinion is divided even amongst the cabinet members here. If one day minister for water and power Raja Nadir Pervez states in Parliament that the government is considering selling electricity to India, minister for commerce Isaq Dar says there can be no trade with India till there is a solution to Kashmir.

Another leader likely to be watched closely is Bangladeshi prime minister Sheikh Hasina, who is clearly worried that the impact of the sanctions may spill over into her country. Last month she had offered to mediate between the two neighbours, a suggestion which received a cold response in New Delhi. A point Sheikh Hasina refrained from during her subsequent trip to the Indian and Pakistani capitals. But that did not stop rumours, never officially denied, in Islamabad that she hoped to facilitate a meeting between senior Indian and Pakistani officials in Dhaka before the SAARC summit.

If there was one factor which could motivate the two prime ministers to do some serious soul-searching, it is Bill Clinton. In fact, his visit to the subcontinent later this year may see at least attempts being made by the two sides to seek fresh avenues to get over a 50-year-old problem. But perhaps such optimism is misplaced after the nuclear fissions.