Will Obamantra settle Kashmir?

Riyaz Masroor

Two important events in South Asia and the latest buzz between South Asia’s nuclear cousins – India and Pakistan – give out a glimmer of hope about some sort of settlement over Kashmir dispute. As for events, the defeat of world’s most organized insurgency in Sri Lanka and the weakening control of Taliban in parts of Pakistan have cleared the doubts, if any, that there could ever be a military solution to any ethno-political or religio-cultural conflict in post cold war world.
Then there are important statements. On 9 May 2009, Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari told Jim Lehrer of American PBS TV that his country did not perceive India a threat. "Well, I am already on record. I have never considered India a threat. I have always considered India a neighbor, which we want to improve our relationship with. We have had some cold times and we have had some hard times with them. We have gone to war thrice, but democracies are always trying to improve relationships”. Exactly a fortnight later on 23 May , Chief of India’s formidable Air Force, Air Marshal Fali Homi Major, told Rahul Singh of Hindustan Times that China posed a more real and potent threat to India than Pakistan. “The way he (China) is growing, he definitely has the capability…we know very little about the actual capabilities of China, there combat edge or how professional their military is…they are certainly a greater threat.” This statement could be easily read as a more technical response to Zardari’s gesture. After all when India considers China a major threat in the neighborhood it points to the realization that Pakistan is no longer a threat. Though bit oblique, Indian assertion that Pakistan too is not a threat has paved a fertile ground for further build up on the path of peace and reconciliation.
The following week saw yet another exchange of peace gesture between India and Pakistan. On 21 May 2009, Pakistan’s foreign office spokesman Abdul Basit hoped that the new Congress-led government in India would resume the bilateral peace process with Pakistan “sooner rather than latter.” In his weekly media briefing Basit also appealed to the world community that it should play a “role” in strengthening the “strategic stability” in South Asia. Few days latter, on 25 May India’s newly appointed foreign minister S M Krishna began his stint by extending a hand of friendship to Pakistan. Stating that the neighbors cannot be replaced, Krishna linked reconciliation with Pakistan to the sustainability of India’s economic growth. The foreign minister, in his first media interaction, said the new government’s highest priority was to strengthen ties with the neighbors and further consolidate strategic partnerships with the U.S., Russia, China, Japan and the European Union. The Minister vowed to nurture close ties with its traditional partners with the aim of furthering India’s “non-aligned” foreign policy and strengthening its “strategic autonomy.”
The post-Bush America is encountering a different world with even North Korea, besides China and Russia, reasserting their antagonism toward the American hegemony. Since Kashmir is located at the strategic crisscross of big powers in Asia, a sharper US focus on the dispute is quite understood. We need not repeat how Kashmir was mentioned by the worlds’ biggies including Obama and David Miliband at a time when the people in Kashmir had left behind a bloody phase of Azadi movement and were voting in throes. The continuity of Obama’s Kashmir-is-the-key policy about South Asia peace is all the more palpable.
Of significant note is that Zardari made the statement about India not being a threat to Pakistan from the American soil. It is believed, says a Press Trust of India report, both Obama and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in their meetings with Zardari had impressed upon him that Pakistan should no longer consider India as a primary threat and rather concentrate its energies on fighting terrorism inside the country.
So, the American hand in Indo-Pak peace process is no longer “invisible” but the possibility of this “hand” delivering any results will entirely depend on how both India and Pakistan will play their cards. That the Pakistan has all along been advocating a third-party intervention in Kashmir is a proven fact, which was reiterated by the country’s foreign office spokesman Abdul Basit on May 21. If, on the U.S. insistence, Pakistan is more willing to resume the peace process, it is not so much surprising. What should be understood in a proper context is whether India has at long last grown comfortable with Washington’s mediation, which the Indian policy makers like to call as “facilitation”. A mild activity on Tract II has already began; advocates of people-to-people contact are again talking; a peace delegation from India that also involves some Kashmiris is about to leave for Pakistan and there is a gradual media build up that the peace process will take off soon.
Reading the subtext of whatever is happening on Track II is very difficult. However, the intonations suggest that both countries, with variable seriousness, appear to have been convinced that Kashmir’s non-territorial settlement was within the parameters of possibility. That is more or less closer to former Pakistani President and army chief General Parvez Musharraf’s four-point formula. The big question that will hover over the ensuing peace exercise in South Asia is whether Pakistan could afford giving up claim on Kashmir and if India would afford to stop linking the peace process with terrorism. Undue expectation from Obama administration is really unadvisable. But the emerging situation suggests that Obamantra should work in favor of South Asia peace.

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