How to save the talks

"The Foreign Office seems to cultivate a reluctance to subordinate diplomatic tactics to the national interest and an insatiable appetite for nuances and conditions which can blur the clearest vision." - Former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher in her autobiography "The Downing Street Years."

The 'Iron Lady', one of the most distinguished British prime ministers, who remained at the helm of affairs for almost twelve years at a stretch and who was either an active player or a close witness to some of the momentous events of the later half of the twentieth century - Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Falkland's war, the beginning of the cracks in the Soviet Union, the rise of Gorbachev to power, the introduction of Prestroika, and the restoration of British pride after the Suez fiasco - certainly knows what she is talking about.

Her comments are all the more amazing because the British diplomats belong to a bureaucracy which is respected and envied all over the world for its efficiency, integrity and professionalism.

Now when diplomacy is picking up steam after the Islamabad joint statement, the inevitable question comes to the mind: can we entrust the Pakistan-India talks, on whose outcome the peace and prosperity of South Asia may depend, to the foreign office bureaucrats of the two countries? The answer is certainly in the negative for a variety of reasons.

First, negotiations on highly sensitive political issues is not the bureaucrats' run of the mill and, if history can be a reliable guide, they are bound to tumble into a pitfall sooner or later - in the case of India and Pakistan, sooner rather than later.

Another problem with foreign service officials is that they find it beyond them to jettison the baggage of history and break the barrier of distrust that has characterized bilateral relations between India and Pakistan for over half a century.

Syed Shahid Husain, himself a senior Pakistani bureaucrat, who led one of the several delegations to India to discuss water-related issues, has, in a recent column in this newspaper, referred to the warped sense of priorities of Pakistan foreign office officials. A dialogue is after all more than two monologues and a skilful negotiator will not let the words interfere with getting as much agreement as possible and as much acceptance as possible to obtain the ends he wants.

Even if we overlook a famous saying that the perfect bureaucrat is the man who manages to make no decision and escapes all responsibility, the real problem with foreign office bureaucrats in India and Pakistan has been that they tend to defend the status quo even long past the time when the quo has lost the status. That is why Mr. Salman Haider, a distinguished former Indian foreign secretary, who led the first and only successful talks with Pakistan under the "composite dialogue" formula in 1997, has given a timely warning about the forthcoming India-Pakistan talks: there are many questions to resolve even before serious exchanges commence and foreign office officials in both countries can be "timid and obstructive" and will need to be closely directed if the talks are not to bog down prematurely.

Pakistan and India have announced that they will hold talks on the commencement of the process of the composite dialogue from February 16 to 18 in Islamabad. The process will begin by meetings at director-general/joint secretary level leading to a meeting between the foreign secretaries of the two countries on February 18. The main purpose of these contacts will be to prepare the agenda for future talks.

It is important to note that the word used in the Islamabad joint statement as well as the announcement made by the foreign office spokesman is "commence" and not "resume". Does it mean that the progress already made by the two delegations under the June 1997 composite dialogue framework and endorsed in Lahore will be thrown in the dustbin and the whole process will start again?

Under the agreement reached between the Indian foreign secretary Salman Haider and Pakistan foreign secretary Shamshad Ahmed in 1997, the two countries had agreed on a comprehensive mechanism consisting of working groups at appropriate levels to discuss eight specific subjects including Jammu and Kashmir. This was no doubt a major breakthrough as the two countries had, for the first time, not only detailed all their bilateral issues in black and white but also agreed to address them.

Some progress was also made on issues other than Kashmir at the Agra summer. It will, therefore, be a pity if tentative agreements already reached between the two countries on such issues as the Wullar Barrage and the demarcation of the boundary at the Sir Creek are thrown overboard and we are back to square one.

Returning to the matter under discussion, the fact remains that whatever success the foreign secretaries of the two countries have been able to achieve so far relates only to such matters as agenda, procedure and modalities of the talks. Any success on matters of substance, the real challenging and sterner task, has eluded them so far.

It is true that there can be no real improvement in bilateral relations without addressing the issues that divide the two neighbours. However, when the dialogue on these issues begins, it will highlight the different expectations and objectives of the two sides.

India, being the status quo state, is interested in maintaining it, while Pakistan is interested in altering the status quo and realignment of territory. Given these basic differences, the half a century old Kashmir issue is not going to be solved overnight. The dialogue is going to be protracted, difficult, exacting and, sometimes, even pathless. For such a dialogue, ham-fisted and flat-footed conduct of negotiations will spell disaster.

The foreign office bureaucrats of India and Pakistan should confine their talks to addressing preliminary issues like agenda and modalities. Discussion of sensitive issues like Kashmir and security should be tackled at a non-bureaucratic higher level, preferably by the foreign ministers of the two countries. Other issues of the composite dialogue may be addressed by working groups at appropriate levels, as envisaged by the 1997 agreement. In case the foreign minister are not available because of their other preoccupations, an appropriate middle way should be found to lead the talks.

As already argued at some length, substantive negotiations on issues like Kashmir cannot be managed at the bureaucratic level. It will be relevant to refer to the Sino-Indian boundary dispute which was addressed at secretary/foreign secretary level for about two decades without making an inch of headway.

During his last June visit to China, Indian Prime Minister Vajpayee and his Chinese counterpart agreed to upgrade the negotiation to a political level and special representatives were appointed by both sides to take up the negotiation from the bureaucrats and figure out a formula to resolve the more than forty year old boundary dispute.

If Islamabad and New Delhi are really earnest about resolving the more than half a century old Kashmir dispute, they have no option but to raise the level of negotiation to the political level and appoint special representatives to take up the challenge and find a workable solution of the Kashmir issue. The writer is a former ambassador of Pakistan.

A new mood in Pakistan

I am amazed at the optimism of the Pakistanis. Even after the military enjoying the highest authority for some four decades, they continue to pine for a civilian rule and free elections. During all these years I have not witnessed any movement, not even the making of an uprising, to evoke such a hope in the country. The military governs firmly and enforces obedience.

Still people talk about democracy all the time as if the end of the army rule is round the corner. However, there must be a bit of defiance in their psyche. Their elected representatives, who were screened by the military before the polls, have made President Pervez Musharraf promise to quit his position as the chief of the army staff by the end of this year.

This does not mean that the military is ready or willing to go back to the barracks. It has developed a vested interest in power and has roots reaching even the countryside. Yet, the fact that Musharraf will abandon the uniform speaks volumes about the limited National Assembly and the Senate the country has.

Ungrateful religious parties whom Musharraf gave support during elections to push out the political parties were in the forefront of the demand. Never before did they win more than five to six seats. But today their combination of six parties, the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA), is the largest group in the National Assembly. The MMA also rules half of Pakistan, the North West Frontier Province and Balochistan.

Musharraf probably rues the day when he allowed the religious parties to fill the vacuum that displacement of former prime ministers, Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif, created. The MMA is openly combining politics with religion. It is supporting religious seminaries and at the same time giving the Al Qaeda all the assistance to needle Kabul.

The religious parties are doing still something worse: they are spreading fundamentalism within the country. A substantial portion of the youth has been contaminated, particularly the children of the elite.

Many in the upper middle class have discovered to their horror that either a son, nephew or the son-in-law in their family has become a jihadi. The Punjab chief minister's son is proud to be a 'maulvi' with a long beard.

Such a scenario has made Musharraf's position untenable. America's pressure to curb fundamentalism is not the only reason for his discomfiture. His own life is in danger and the last two attempts to kill him have shaken Musharraf. He has found that the religious ragtag he once encouraged is after him because he has changed his track.

But what could he have done after the 9/11 attacks? He was given 24 hours to choose between the Taliban's Afghanistan and America. As then foreign minister Abdus Sattar in the Musharraf cabinet told me, they had no alternative and they communicated their full support to Washington in less than 24 hours. But Musharraf's dilemma is that he has to give space to politicians if he wants to confront the 'deeni' (religious) forces.

Benazir Bhutto may be willing to accept some part of military rule or Musharraf in some shape. But Nawaz Sharif is uncompromising on the subject. He wants the military to go back - lock, stock and barrel. Musharraf cannot allow even Benazir to return until he has established a Turkish pattern of polity - a permanent role of the armed forces in the governance. His political options are limited.

In the circumstances, conciliation with India was the best choice before him. Harassed by zealots, he had to agree to make Kashmir as one of the items for a composite talk to break the logjam and not insist on having a solution on Kashmir first before moving further. His words of welcome for talks between the Hurriyat and New Delhi fitted into the change. He realized that the breakaway group which Islamabad supported was not in the good books of New Delhi.

Foreign Minister Khurshid Kasuri on whom Musharraf depended immensely gave a better formulation while talking to me in his office at Islamabad for one and a half hours. He said that the joint statement had generated hopes in Pakistan, India and Kashmir about the commencement of a dialogue process. He equated Kashmir with India and Pakistan as if it was a separate country. Even when he listed the outstanding issues he kept Jammu and Kashmir as the first item.

This may do for the time being. But New Delhi would have to move quickly on Kashmir. In the perception of the Pakistanis the concessions which India makes on the problem would determine how sincere it was in its efforts to make up. At whatever levels the talks between the two countries begin - Kasuri prefers the political level - Kashmir will have to be discussed in depth and soon, even though New Delhi's first item is reportedly Sir Creek, something left from the Kutch award.

The ruling BJP's own compulsions as well as elections may not allow the Atal Behari Vajpayee government to go beyond dotting the i's and crossing the t's. But I found the Pakistani intelligentsia resenting even the lapse of time between now and the assumption of power by the next government. It is, however, taken for granted that Vajpayee would be the prime minister after the polls. He is not only popular in Pakistan but also trusted, unlike the BJP which is considered anti-Muslim.

Musharraf can manage the mercurial mood - Pakistan's trait - for some time. But he would feel let down if nothing "visible" emerged on Kashmir after a few weeks of the formation of the government at New Delhi. He too has a responsibility that cross-border terrorism is not resumed after the snow melts on the Kashmir hills. But if he is able to stop infiltration, he will be on a stronger wicket to demand from India that it makes good the words in the joint statement: "to the satisfaction of the two countries." Musharraf's job is, however, arduous when India's chief of army staff says that some 85 militant camps are still in existence in Pakistan.

Musharraf can achieve much by harnessing the goodwill which the joint statement and the people-to-people contacts have generated in Pakistan. His priority should be to relax visas restrictions and do away with reporting to the police. In fact, India should take the lead and initiate these steps unilaterally. But this can only be possible if the Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani's home ministry does not insist on screening visa applications.

When Kasuri uses the words "imposed conditions to discontinue," he probably has in view the impediments in the way of free travel and trade. He fears that the dialogue "can run into a deadlock and impasse" because of "our mutual acrimony" which I believe can disappear with free contact.

Kasuri warns against any "breakdown" in the talks because he dreads that the failure would begin "the blame game syndrome once again." His fears are not totally unfounded. Some top members of the Pakistani establishment told me that the joint statement was like so many declarations and agreements in the past. They came to naught and so would the joint statement. What they miss is the change in the mood of people who want to befriend India and begin a new chapter of amity and peace. The writer is a freelance columnist based in New Delhi.

Nuclear apartheid

Just before New Year, President George Bush and Britain's PM Tony Blair staged a brilliant and breathtakingly cynical political coup. After eight months of secret negotiations with Washington and London, Libya's strongman, the flamboyant and eccentric Col. Muammar Qadhafi grandly proclaimed his nation was abandoning its weapons of mass destruction(wmds).

Bush, his neo-conservative supporters, and the US media crowed that Qadhafi's surrender confirmed the wisdom of invading Afghanistan and Iraq. The evil had been cowed by Anglo-American military might into giving up his arsenal of deadly wmds. Other 'rogue' states would hasten to follow Libya's lead.

But on closer inspection, there was much less to this drama than met the eye. Qadhafi, in fact, had no weapons of mass destruction, contrary to the claims of the Bush administration.

According to UN inspectors and European intelligence sources, Libya had only small amounts of World War I technology mustard gas, a primitive battlefield weapon. It had no biological or nuclear weapons. Libya had no means of delivering wmds beyond some rusting Scud-B missiles with only 180 miles range.

Libya possessed an assortment of nuclear junk: a small research reactor, some lab equipment, and a few inoperative, third-hand centrifuges reportedly bought from Pakistan or Malaysia. There was no sign, at least so far, of any capability to make or deliver weapons of mass destruction.

When I was in Libya interviewing Col. Qadhafi, I found there was not a single elevator repairman in the entire country. Bakers had to be imported from Egypt to make bread. Seventy per cent of Libya's military equipment was broken down. In short, tiny, backward Libya, with a population of only five million, had no military capability. However, in the 1980s, Libya certainly did fund all sorts of violent revolutionary groups and was implicated in the bombings of French and US airliners.

After 17 years of punishing sanctions against Libya, Qadhafi sought to improve relations with the West by paying heavy reparations for the airliners, and handing over for trial two agents involved in the 1988 PAN-AM bombing.

Now, by pretending to eliminate wmds he does not actually possess, the colonel has given a huge political bonus to Bush and Blair, a way for them to evade censure for shamelessly lying their nations into the Iraq War. They will reward Qadhafi by halting efforts to overthrow him, slowly lifting sanctions, and allowing US and British oil firms to resume exploiting Libya's high-grade oil. That's politics.

CIA helped Qadhafi into power in 1969. In the 1980s, the US, Britain and France each tried to assassinate him. Now, it seems the flamboyant colonel with nine lives is slated to be re-born as a good Arab and US ally.

Right after the Libyan charade, Washington opened a major new campaign to deprive Pakistan of its nuclear arsenal. The US media trumpeted leaked government reports alleging Pakistan had secretly supplied Iran, North Korea, and Libya with nuclear technology. These reports blurred the lines between exports of civilian and military nuclear technology.

Washington accused Pakistan of being a major nuclear proliferator. Pakistan nervously admitted some of its nuclear scientists may have privately aided neighbour Iran, which has sought nuclear weapons for the past 28 years.-Copyright Eric S. Margolis 2004