Daily Times

Washington’s decision to sign a Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement (BECA) with New Delhi is of course more about containing the rise of China than wishing India the best in the region. Yet since the exercise does involve India as the number-one regional partner in the South Asian theatre, and India’s hostility towards Pakistan is very well known to the US, it is only natural for what has clearly become a necessity for America to cause a fair bit of friction with Pakistan. For not only is Pakistan not good friends with India, especially at the moment and at least till the Modi administration remains in office, it is on the other hand very good friends with China. This relationship has been special since it was established way back in the 1970s and then become ‘taller than mountains, deeper than oceans, etc’ since the onset of CPEC.

Nobody needs any reminding that Pakistan has also historically been very dependent on America and even though so far it has conducted its foreign policy very responsibly and maintained a very delicate balance between the two powers, even as they fall out very publically, it is anybody’s guess which way Islamabad will tilt should push come to shove. Prime Minister Imran Khan did make it very clear recently that Pakistan’s future is now tied with China’s. Indeed, such is the social, physical and economic transformation that Pakistan is about to undergo as part of CPEC that it is in the country’s, and the people’s, best interests to grow along with the Chinese. Besides, it can only benefit Pakistan, far more than the Chinese actually, if we can learn from their experiences and repeat some of their successes over here as well, particularly their success in lifting hundreds of millions of people out of absolute poverty and putting them on the road to prosperity.

India, meanwhile, is in a very provocative mood and will milk this landmark agreement to the maximum. Washington should follow this phase of aggressive anti-China diplomacy with assurances that a fattened India would not be allowed to throw its weight around the region, especially in matters that concern Pakistan. But the election there will put any such follow up measures till the new administration, Republican or Democrat, takes charge. Islamabad has very rightly made sure that Pakistan’s concerns about the matter reach Washington. This region is on the boil and it is unfortunate that the world’s biggest powers are not helping matters. *