Reviving talks between India and Pakistan

In hope, not expectation

Neither government looks strong enough to get far with peace talks
Feb 17th 2011 | DELHI | from the print edition
TOOTHLESS and turbaned, the porters who loiter at Wagah, on the Indian side of the
only border crossing by road with Pakistan, are a frustrated lot. Aside from the odd
diplomat or journalist, few need a bag carried. Only the very occasional lorry laden
with vegetables trundles over the frontier. Walk into Pakistan, and the mood is
equally sullen. Money-changers, slumped in chairs in the immigration hall, ask
listlessly if any tourist bus is waiting to cross. As the power cuts out, officials drift
outside to play cricket in the dust.

Ties between India and Pakistan are in poor shape. India’s economy booms, yet
hardly anything is traded with next door. A mere handful of direct flights each week
connect the world’s second and sixth most populous countries; and even these
planes are only half-full. The long and disputed border still bristles with military men
and hardware.

In theory, things might soon improve. Representatives at a regional meeting in

Bhutan this month said that foreign ministers will restart much-delayed bilateral
talks, probably in July. In March the two most senior home officials will meet in Delhi
to discuss terrorism. A “composite dialogue” on a range of problems from the
disputed control of Kashmir to cross-border terrorism and trade will restart. India
called off the dialogue after terrorists from Pakistan killed 166 people in a rampage
in Mumbai, in November 2008.

Related topics
• Jammu and Kashmir
• Terrorism
• 2008 Mumbai Attacks
• Diplomacy
• World politics
Optimists can tick off reasons to hope for progress. Since a terrorist blast a year ago
in Pune, India has suffered no big attack. India chose not to blame Pakistan last year
when unrest flared in Indian-run Kashmir. It said, too, in January that it would pull
some of its many soldiers from the territory. India has also dropped its condition that
bilateral talks could only proceed if Pakistan authorities put the alleged masterminds
of the Mumbai attack in court—which they are unlikely to do.

In turn, Pakistan’s civilian leaders acknowledge India’s growing economic and

diplomatic heft. They note how outsiders, notably America, are courting the
emerging power. Pakistan’s relative strength is bound to decline, so engaging now
rather than waiting makes sense. It may even help that the new White House envoy
to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Marc Grossman, is a low-profile former diplomat. The
United States is unlikely to repeat the clunking efforts by his late, press-hungry
predecessor, Richard Holbrooke, to tie resolution of the war in Afghanistan to the
conflict in Kashmir.

India has good reasons to seek peace. It is alarmed by the growing influence of
radical Islamists in Pakistan, and the weakening influence of liberals. Any prospect
that its nuclear-armed neighbour might lurch towards becoming a failed state would
pose an enormous threat to India. The Indian prime minister, Manmohan Singh, has
a record of seeking peace. He met his Pakistani counterpart, Yusuf Raza Gilani, at a
summit in Egypt only a few months after the Mumbai attack. Opponents called him
soft for issuing a joint statement which noted how both countries suffer from
terrorism, and for airing Pakistan’s anxiety over separatism in Balochistan, where
India is accused of giving militants explosives, weapons and cash.

Two years earlier, back-channel negotiations over Kashmir reportedly brought the
governments close to an agreement which would have granted Kashmiris greater
autonomy within India, created closer ties with Pakistan-run Kashmir, and made the
line of control the international border. These came to nothing, as General Pervez
Musharraf was swept from power in Pakistan. Yet Khurshid Kasuri, Pakistan’s foreign
minister under the general and a party to the working document, says that the
process could quickly be revived.

Still, deep problems remain unresolved. Pakistan’s government is weak and generally
derided. It is unclear even who would be foreign minister in July. The post is
currently vacant. Civilian leaders have frequently said they are ready to hold talks
with India, but foreign policy is in reality the preserve of the army, and the chief of
staff, Ashfaq Kayani, sees India as a mortal threat and a rival in Afghanistan.

With Pakistani military men seeing India’s hand behind terrorist attacks in the
country, nothing suggests that General Kayani is ready to seek peace. And rather
than look for areas of shared interest, such as trade that could boost Pakistan’s
moribund economy, officials in Islamabad are quick to raise new areas of potential
conflict with their neighbours, notably over the use of water from the Indus river.

Meanwhile, Mr Singh, for all his good intentions, is in a weak position to launch a
new foreign-policy drive. Battered by the opposition over graft scandals in
government and the high price of food, he is on his last political legs, argues Brahma
Chellaney, of the Centre for Policy Research in Delhi. On February 16th Mr Singh
spoke on national television to deny that he would soon resign. The day before, his
government, after months of resisting, was forced to accept a big public inquiry into
corruption. The government hardly looks strong enough to overcome the objections
to rapprochement by the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, whose leaders will use
any occasion to pounce on him over weakness towards Pakistan.