Daily Times

Following India’s blunt rejection of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s peacemaking overture, normal service between the countries has resumed with Pakistan quickly shedding the briefly flickering cooperative spirit and employing its Plan B. The military and diplomatic arms of Pakistan are now running in overdrive in trying to whip up public opinion in its favour while making attempts to embarrass India on a global level. Through its ambassador to the United Nations, Dr Maleeha Lodhi, Pakistan has submitted three dossiers to the UN secretary general’s office on India’s interference and support of terrorism in Pakistan. According to Sartaj Aziz, the PM’s Adviser on National Security and Foreign Affairs, the three dossiers cover India’s alleged involvement in bolstering anti-state activities in Balochistan, FATA and Karachi respectively. Aziz took the offensive to India after his Indian counterpart had accused Pakistan of supporting terrorism and Aziz stated that India is not interested in any dialogue process and looks for the flimsiest of pretexts to cancel any talks. He claimed that Pakistan originally intended to hand over the dossiers to Narendra Modi himself, but was forced into handing over the dossiers to the UN Secretary General when no meeting with Modi transpired. Aziz was backed by two of his fellow diplomats in New York. Ambassador Maleeha Lodhi reasserted Aziz’s statements, decried India’s response to the PM’s speech and called it indicative of India’s non-seriousness about achieving peace in the region. Meanwhile one of Pakistan’s delegates to the UN Bilal Ahmed also echoed the same points while flying the flag for the Kashmiri cause and called on India to withdraw its troops and let the Kashmiris decide their own fate in line with relevant Security Council resolutions. He also accused India’s insistence on a one-point agenda as impractical and a deliberate attempt to alienate Pakistan, which has had a long standing interest in Kashmir and was not likely to stop raising the issue at any level.

Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, Pakistan’s Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Raheel Sharif also contributed to this rhetorical offensive against India while addressing a think tank in London. The COAS stated that the spite between India and Pakistan was rooted in Kashmir being an unfinished agenda of Partition and called on the world community to intervene in the matter if it wanted to see regional peace in South Asia. He also accused India’s “intransigence, violations of the Line of Control and indirect strategy against Pakistan” for negatively affecting peace. The COAS is currently on a tour of Europe and has commented on various issues of political significance and the consistency of his comments with the statements of Pakistan’s envoys hints at the fact that the military is taking an active part in shaping Pakistan’s foreign policy.

The manner in which Pakistan’s conciliatory stance has disintegrated into a familiar refrain of an enthusiastic blame game has been predictable but is also riddled with hazards. By submitting these dossiers, Pakistan wants to convince the world and the audience at home that India is exclusively responsible for all of its problems, but while there may be some truth to the claim, making India the scapegoat for all our ailments is an exercise in denial and distraction. Convincing the public at home is easy, but sullying the name of India on a global stage requires Pakistan to have a better standing. Absolutely unblemished evidence needs to be present in those dossiers in order to achieve the desired outcome. But as things stand, it is all too easy for Pakistan to be discredited and charged with hypocrisy since Pakistan’s policy of supporting proxies in its neighbouring countries has a long documented history. As far as Kashmir, the focal point of Pakistan’s fresh onslaught, is concerned, it is wishful thinking to imagine world powers intervening to resolve the matter since the past experience of concerned third parties to mediate between India and Pakistan over this issue has been marred with irrationality on both sides. Furthermore, as per the Simla Accord, the issue of Kashmir is to be resolved bilaterally, and if either of the two parties is unwilling to make it a matter of global concern, Pakistan has very little chance of enforcing a reversal. The whole saga proves that the mistrust between the two countries is seemingly permanent and the chances of relations normalising are currently slim. Even if one party, in this case Pakistan, makes an attempt to bridge the divide, it does so without persistence and if things do not proceed as hoped, it is ready at a moment’s notice to resort to old antagonistic tactics that restart the vicious cycle. *