The history of
Indo-Pakistani relations has been replete with false starts, with many seemingly
forward-propelling steps ultimately proving to be otherwise. It would, therefore, be
premature to attempt any definitive assessment of the long-term impact on bilateral
relations and regional peace of the Lahore Declaration signed by the Indian Prime
Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, and the Pakistani Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif, at
the conclusion of their talks at Lahore on February 21,1999. Wisdom demands that one keeps
one’s fingers crossed.
This need not,
however, come in the way of a tentative analysis of the points of agreement outlined in
the joint statement of the two Prime Ministers, the Lahore Declaration and the Memorandum
of Understanding signed at the conclusion of the visit, the first two by the two Prime
Ministers and the third by their Foreign Secretaries.
The joint statement
is essentially a resume of the visit, but para 3 cites agreements on periodic meetings of
the two Foreign Ministers “to discuss all issues of mutual concern, including
nuclear-related issues”, bilateral consultations on WTO-related issues to co-ordinate
their respective positions, determination of “areas of co-operation in
information technology, in particular for tackling the problems of Y2K”, bilateral
consultations on the liberalisation of the visa and travel regimes and the appointment of
a two-member ministerial committee to consider humanitarian issues such as missing
fishermen, persons missing in action during previous Indo-Pakistani conflicts etc.
The statement also records the Indian Prime Minister’s invitation to Nawaz Sharif for
a return visit to India on mutually convenient dates.
The agreement on
periodic meetings of the Foreign Ministers is meant to address the criticism voiced in
both the countries that while the two Foreign Ministers have no objection to discussing
nuclear-related issues with Strobe Talbott, there has been no direct dialogue between the
two at the political level and that in the absence of a political dimension to the post-
Pokhran and post-Chagai composite dialogue, a dialogue at the bureaucratic level alone as
hitherto would be inadequate,
It would be
interesting to see whether the periodic meetings of the two Foreign Ministers, when they
start, would dilute the importance of the respective dialogue of the two sides with
Talbott and, if so, to what extent. Such an outcome would be welcomed by large sections of
the public opinion in the two countries.
The agreement on
bilateral consultations on WTO-related issues skirts conveniently (for Pakistan)
India’s expectation since 1996 that Pakistan would extend the Most-Favoured-Nation
status to India, as India has already done to Pakistan, and give a forward momentum to
bilateral trade without linking it to a solution of the Kashmir issue. It also
belies the expectations of many analysts that the Lahore meeting might result in a
finalisation of the proposed agreement on the purchase of Pakistan’s surplus
electricity by India.
Another belied
expectation relates to the re-opening of the Indian Consulate in Karachi and Indian
agreement for the opening of a Pakistani Consulate in Mumbai. The Benazir Bhutto
Government ordered the closure of the Indian Consulate in Karachi towards the end of 1994
after accusing it of maintaining contacts with the Mohajir Qaumi Movement (MQM—since
re-named as the Muttahida Qaumi Movement). The pre-1996 Congress (I) Government had
already agreed in principle to the opening of a Pakistani Consulate in Mumbai, but had not
accepted Pakistani demand for locating it in a building which belonged to Mohammed Ali
Jinnah.
The Mohajirs
of Sindh constitute the largest number of Pakistanis visiting India every year for family
reunion and have been facing considerable difficulties since the closure of the Indian
Consulate in Karachi. In the absence of an agreement on the functioning of
these two Consulates, any exercise for the liberalisation of the visa and travel regimes
would remain just cosmetic .
Next to the
agreement on periodic meetings of the two Foreign Ministers, the most significant
agreement in the joint statement relates to possible co-operation in dealing with the Y2K
problem. Pakistan does not have the same expertise as India in hard and
software-related issues and tackling the Y2K-related problems has not received the same
attention in Pakistan as it has in India.
While the extent of
computerisation in Pakistan is much less than that in India, India has reasons to be
worried over the possible existence of undetected and untackled Y2K problems in
Pakistan’s nuclear establishments and in the missiles which it had clandestinely
procured from China and North Korea.
While even China
has sought the assistance of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of Vienna for
inspecting its only indigenously-designed power station for possible Y2K problems,
Pakistan has not done so. There is a question mark over Pakistan’s capability
for detecting and tackling Y2K-related problems. At the same time, it has been reluctant
to seek external help lest external inspections expose its clandestine capability for the
production of fissile material for military purposes.
Pakistan has
reportedly bought 12 ready-to-deploy Nodong II missiles from North Korea and their Y2K
compatibility should be a matter of concern not only to India, but also to Pakistan itself
and other regional powers and even to the USA with the presence of its troops in the Gulf
region .
While the question
of Pakistan seeking Indian assistance for tackling this problem can be ruled out, even if
it is able to pick India’s brain during mutual discussions on this subject, that
would be beneficial.
The Lahore
Declaration is a sophisticated attempt by the two countries to take note of each
other’s position on Kashmir and nuclear-related issues in a mutually-acceptable
language which would not provoke a controversy at home. Thus, Kashmir is given
primacy as one of the outstanding issues between the two countries, thereby satisfying
Pakistan, but while skirting Pakistani depiction of it as the “core issue”,
which has to be resolved first before other issues can be.
There is implicit
recording of India’s position that any confidence-building with regard to
Kashmir has to start with the discontinuance of Pakistan’s proxy war in the
statements in the Lahore Declaration that the two countries “shall refrain from
intervention and interference in each other’s internal affairs” and
“reaffirm their condemnation of terrorism in all its forms and manifestation and
their determination to combat this menace.”
This also addresses
Pakistani allegations of an Indian involvement in Karachi, which has been rocked by
violence since 1994.
Equally, there is
implicit recording of the Pakistani contention that confidence-building in Kashmir has to
start with an improvement of the human rights situation there and a reduction of the
Indian troops deployed there in the reaffirmation of the determination of the two
countries “ to promote and protect all human rights and fundamental
freedoms.”
However, these
reaffirmations relating to terrorism, non-interference and promotion of human rights have
been phrased generally, without linking them to any particular issue such as
Kashmir.
A constant theme of
Pakistan has been its concerns over India’s conventional superiority and the
consequent need for any strategic restraint regime to cover nuclear as well as
conventional weapons and for any conventional confidence-building measures to provide for
the thinning out of the Indian troops in Kashmir. Without accepting the validity of this
contention, India has, at the same time, let it be reflected in the agreement in the
Lahore Declaration to “discuss concepts and doctrines with a view to
elaborating measures for confidence-building in the nuclear and conventional fields, aimed
at prevention of conflict.”
Thus, the value of
the Lahore Declaration lies not in any concrete steps already agreed upon for improving
bilateral relations, but in reaffirming the open mind of the two political leaderships
with regard to the respective contentions on the Kashmir and strategic restraint issues in
order to facilitate the continued search for concrete agreements.
While the Lahore
Declaration, for understandable reasons, is more general than specific, the MOU is the
other way round. It lays down mutually- agreed benchmarks to regulate future negotiations
for ensuring the prevention of any irrational decision-making in nuclear matters and
accidental use of weapons and missiles due to misperceptions and for promoting mutual
confidence and trust with regard to each other’s intentions in nuclear-related
issues.
Here, the attempt
by India has been to accommodate Pakistani views and concerns without overlooking its own
compulsions for a credible, minimum nuclear deterrence vis-à-vis China. Similarly, the
attempt by Pakistan has been to go half-way in responding to Indian suggestions put on the
table during the past talks at the bureaucrats’ level without losing sight of
its conventional inferiority vis-à-vis India and without diluting what it looks
upon as the compensating strength acquired by it through its nuclear capability.
Thus, there is no
reference to the respective perceptions of what constitutes a credible, minimum deterrence
and to India’s proposal for a no-first-use-of-nuclear-weapon agreement, which Nawaz
Sharif may not be able to sell to his military-civil bureaucracy establishment.
The agreement on
prior notification of ballistic missile tests, if implemented strictly, should be an
important step forward in confidence-building. India’s past tests have generally been
over the sea and it has been giving the required warnings to users of the sea to avoid
possible accidents.
To avoid the need
for such notifications, Pakistan had carried out all its past tests for military purposes,
including the demonstration flight of the Ghauri missile, over its land territory,
at tremendous risk to its civilian population.
While the MOU has
reiterated the moratorium of the two countries on any more nuclear tests, it is silent on
the US demand for a similar moratorium on missile tests and on the production of
weapons-grade fissile material pending the conclusion of a fissile material cut-off treaty
(FMCT).
The two Prime
Ministers have understandably been cautious in not letting the euphoria of the moment
blind their sense of realism and have confined themselves to identifying starting measures
which they would be able to sell to domestic opinion and which, if implemented without any
difficulty, would impart to the composite bilateral dialogue a self-generating momentum.
In India, the
initiative of the Prime Minister for breaking the ice in the bilateral relations and for
removing the constraints which had till now blocked movement has had much wider public and
political support than what the initiative of Nawaz Sharif has been able to garner
in Pakistan.
Would Nawaz Sharif
be able to keep his side of the bargain, without letting his initiative be undermined by
religious extremist and other traditional anti-India elements and their supporters in the
army and the administration , whose obduracy and capacity for maintaining the proxy war
against India despite political disapproval of their actions, are well known?
It would be
difficult to give a categorical answer to this question. One has to keep one’s
fingers crossed.
B.RAMAN
23-2-99
( The writer is Additional Secretary (Retd), Cabinet
Secretariat, Govt. of India, and presently Director, Institute For Topical Studies,
Chennai. E-mail address: corde@vsnl.com )
