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Indien & Pakistan - Vil det lykkes at indgå aftaler?Keeping Armageddon at bayMaruf Khwaja, 22. juni 2005 The historic rapprochement between India and Pakistan will not endure if fundamentalists on both sides have their way, argues Maruf Khwaja. When the leader of India’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and one of the
country’s leading proponents of Hindu nationalist ideology, Lal
Krishna Advani, visits Pakistan and even places a wreath at the tomb of
Pakistan’s founder,
it is time to ask whether the apparent rapprochement between the two countries
is firm reality or wicked illusion. On Kashmir, on nuclear weapons, on open
borders, on strategic rivalry, are Pakistan and India truly turning over a new
leaf? When disputes drag on for decades and touch the brink of Armageddon, any
conciliatory shift in entrenched positions can generate more optimism than the
change warrants. This has happened before with India and Pakistan and can happen
again. That is one reason why we must look at the renewed dialogue – on
Kashmir, especially – with the utmost circumspection. Historically both
governments have proved vulnerable to reactionary “tsunami” waves and have
been led by rather than leading popular opinion. It is too early to say if the apparent changes in the mindset of rulers on
both sides will filter down to the volatile masses. Still, the governments’
willingness to de-link Kashmir from other issues of common interest have created
a welcome climate of hope and optimism. No one could have imagined even a year ago ordinary Kashmiris
being able to cross the “line
of control” (LoC) under the noses of hitherto embattled armies. A
comparison with the east-west thaw that eventually ended the cold
war might perhaps be too far-fetched. But the changes in approach and
attitude have the potential to create new moulds of peaceful coexistence that
might just lead to an honourable settlement. The clues are there. No Pakistani
leader before Pervez Musharraf, referring to his partner Manmohan Singh, had
ever publicly expressed “determination” to settle the Kashmir issue
“within our tenure of office”. (Whether Musharraf’s tenure will survive
sudden termination by fundamentalists who constantly menace it is another
matter). And no Indian
leader before Manmohan Singh would have dared to open the border even for
the movement of docile Kashmiris. For that we can thank the progressive spirit
in Indian politics rekindled by Congress’s return
to power in May 2004. But, amazingly, the most dramatic gesture of goodwill was made by the
archdeacon of rampant Hindu
extremism, leader of the mob that razed Ayodhya
in 1992, sworn enemy (in Pakistani eyes) of anything and anyone vaguely
Muslim, and erstwhile leader of Hindutva, the movement dedicated to achieving Akhand
Bharat (Greater India). Lal Krishna Advani not only entered the lion’s
den (Jinnah’s mausoleum
in Karachi), but garlanded his grave and showered on his long-departed soul
encomiums that effectively recanted all the abuse he had previously heaped on
the founder of Pakistan. Who runs Pakistan? The first tangible sign of a thaw in relations between the two states came in
February 2005 with agreement
on a groundbreaking bus
service between Muzaffarabad and Srinagar, connecting Pakistan-controlled
and India-controlled Kashmir.
There followed an unprecedented dialogue between Kashmiri leaders on both sides.
The significance was both psychological and political: Indians saw that the
Pakistanis could talk to Kashmiri militants without egging them on to terrorist
acts, and both sides seemed to be starting to acknowledge that the terror weapon
– whether used by the Indian army or Kashmiri
militants – had failed. Yet, for all this, it is unclear if either side has shifted ground on matters
of primary concern. The wider history of the dispute shows that no matter how
sincere they might appear, governments in India and Pakistan – whether
democratic or dictatorial – have appeased and thus both remained hostage to
their respective extremists. Thus, Manmohan Singh may have marginalised the Hindu right for the moment,
but it must be remembered that the Congress victory wasn’t a sweeping one.
Moreover, Advani’s less hardline stance on Pakistan compared with his
predecessor Atal Behari Vajpayee may be guided by Realpolitik not
principle: the BJP cannot win back power without first winning the centre ground
in Indian politics. Peace to Advani is a tactic not a strategy. But the most unstable element in the new India-Pakistan peace equation is
Pervez Musharraf himself. For the moment, the president is being propped up by
the Pakistani
army and bureaucratic elite, but he is also increasingly under siege by the
Islamists who now run two of Pakistan’s four provinces and are making
governance in the other two extremely difficult. Many Pakistanis now regard the
“real” ruler of Pakistan as the “ghaib (absent) imam” – the
man that tens of thousands of American soldiers, even more Pakistani ones, the
cream of the CIA and the British SAS cannot find. Beneath the surface, the fief
of Osama
bin Laden seems to run from above the Durand Line to well below Pathan City
on the Pakistani smugglers’ coast. The resemblance of Pakistan to the chaos
in Iraq is growing. True, the toll of organised murder and mayhem is not yet
on the Iraqi scale. But the farsightedness of Musharraf’s predecessor and
Washington’s second favourite Pakistani general (Zia ul-Haq) is bringing it
closer. Islamist radicals of different stripes are able to strike at will, and
officials who take an “un-Islamic” line are left in no doubt about what
awaits them when the khalifat
(kingdom of Allah) is finally established in every corner of Pakistan. Meanwhile, the law and its minions no longer guarantee sanctity of life and
limb, especially those of women and religious minorities. Islamic justice has
all but replaced the centuries old penal code under which rapists used to be
tried – and hanged. One gang-rape victim, Mukhtaran
Mai, has eventually been able to tell her story to the world, but many of
her sisters are forced to suffer the same indignity in silence. Shi’a
Islamic shrines are regularly targeted, and Christians advertise their faith at
the risk of their lives. Even television editors are pressed to blank out any
scene that shows a popular Pakistani Christian test cricketer crossing himself
every time he scores a century. The voices
of Pakistani progressives are clearly heard in the international and local print
media, but inside Pakistan they are in retreat. Mullahs on the make are
emboldened by the meteoric rise of fundamentalist Islam to influence government
policy and the social environment (the renaming of streets honouring
“infidels” and not so pious Muslims is one example). Pakistani governments, at both federal and provincial levels, are in disarray.
American pressure to shut down tens of thousands of Islamic madrasa
(religious schools) had led Musharraf to embark on a flurry of educational
reforms covering the private sector. A mass movement of mullahs and warnings by
fundamentalists within the army led him to retreat, then to switch his reformist
attention to public-sector schools. At that point, fundamentalists in his own
parliamentary party opposed him, and that reform too was scuppered. The mullahs, like mongrels chasing after a frightened postman, have chased
Pervez Musharraf up a tall tree. They can’t climb after him but he can’t
come down. He may try to divert their yapping attention by directing what
persecuting power his government possesses on hapless stalwarts of the Bhutto
family’s Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) – ironically, the only one
capable of taking on the fundamentalists; or by tolerating attacks on helpless
women participating in a marathon. When Asma
Jahangir, head of Pakistan’s human right commission, can be assaulted
in Lahore’s main street, how healthy can Pakistan be? A stone-age recipe Some observers of Pakistani politics argue that Indian leaders would not
waste time negotiating difficult deals over Kashmir with a Pakistani president
who was toothless and impotent. A more realistic view is based on Indians’
understanding that real power in Pakistan lies with the army, and that any deal
with its figurehead Pervez Musharraf will have the army’s imprimatur. In return, so the argument runs, Pakistan’s army will continue to back
Musharraf for as long as he is supported by American trust and money. This is
likely to continue, for Washington desperately needs
Musharraf and his army alike. The Afghan
crisis is unresolved. The Taliban remain a potent threat.
The situation in Iraq is not getting any better. And Saudi Arabia, the root of
America’s oil interests, remains unstable. But if an arc of regional crisis is Musharraf’s fragile guarantee of power,
it leaves two questions whose answers illuminate the Pakistani dilemma:
So bus diplomacy, Kashmir talks, and Advani’s visit to Jinnah’s mausoleum
should be welcomed. But the history of Pakistan-India relations is a warning not
to get too optimistic too soon. And through it all, don’t forget the “ghaib
imam” laughing in the mountains.
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