THE terror attack in Lahore on the visiting Sri Lankan cricket team and the horrific events in Bangladesh have once again put the international focus on the Indian subcontinent. India blamed the Pakistan government for being lax in its efforts to dismantle the terrorism infrastructure in that country. Indian officials blamed the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), which was responsible for the November 26-29 Mumbai attacks, for the Lahore incident even as the government patted itself on the back for deciding to call off the Indian cricket teams scheduled tour of Pakistan.
The United States has more reasons to be concerned over the situation that is unravelling in Pakistan. South Asia was anyway on the top of the foreign policy agenda of the Barack Obama administration. His newly appointed special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, visited Kabul, Islamabad and New Delhi in mid-February.
Holbrooke has a formidable reputation as a tough negotiator. He brokered the Bosnian peace accord between the warring Bosnian Muslims, Serbs and Croats in the mid-1990s.
During his stopover in New Delhi, Holbrooke virtually put India alongside the U.S. and Pakistan at the forefront in the war against the Taliban. He stated that for the first time in 60 years, India, Pakistan and the U.S. faced a common enemy the Taliban. The statement followed news that the Pakistan government had signed a ceasefire agreement with the local Taliban in the Swat region and had agreed to implement Sharia laws there. Holbrooke told the media in New Delhi that the events in Swat and the surrounding areas justified his argument that the three countries now faced a common enemy.
The Indian government was quick to react to the new development. External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee sharply criticised the ceasefire deal and even described the Taliban as a terrorist organisation and a danger to humanity and civilisation.
The U.S. State Department, in contrast, was more restrained in its reaction. There are reports in the media that the U.S. government is holding secret negotiations with sections of the Taliban even as the Obama administration has ordered a military surge in Afghanistan.
The State Department spokesman, in fact, acknowledged that there was a provision for the inclusion of Sharia law in the Pakistani Constitution. Sharia is already in practice in some tribal areas of Pakistan and is also the law of the land in many Arab states. The Islamic law is within the constitutional framework of Pakistan, the State Department spokesman averred. He added that it was not an issue for those outside Pakistan to comment on at this juncture.
While in New Delhi, Holbrooke met Pranab Mukherjee and other senior officials. Indian officials said before the visit that the issue of terrorism emanating from Pakistan would be discussed. During his interaction with the media, Holbrooke did mention that the U.S. was better placed than India to exert pressure on Pakistan on terrorism-related issues.
Washington, like the rest of the international community, is worried by the sabre-rattling indulged in by New Delhi in the wake of the Mumbai attacks. The fear is that it would no longer show military restraint if there were another terror attack on Indian soil.
Reports by knowledgeable Pakistani commentators have warned about Al Qaeda-affiliated cells in India going into action once the U.S. intensifies its military offensive on the Taliban in Afghanistan. Al Qaeda websites have said that 2009 would witness decisive battles. The Lahore incident, many South Asia watchers fear, could signal the beginning of a terrorist onslaught in Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. Pranab Mukherjee told the media after the Lahore incident that unless Pakistan dismantled the terrorism infrastructure on its territory, more such incidents would take place.
From the cautious welcome Holbrooke received in New Delhi, it seems that the Indian government has not got over its suspicions on President Obamas brief to Holbrooke. During his campaign for the presidency, Obama had drawn linkages between Afghanistan and Kashmir and suggested that a solution to both these problems would help root out the scourge of terrorism from the region. Admiral Michael Mullen, the Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in a recent interview that the Afghan war strategy had to include India if Pakistan was to be brought fully on board.
Shyam Saran, the Indian Prime Ministers special envoy, revealed in late February that New Delhi had issued a demarche to the U.S. administration on the matter. Speaking at a seminar in New Delhi, Saran said the Indian government had lobbied hard in Washington to exclude the linking of the Kashmir issue to the Afghanistan-Pakistan problem. He stressed that India had succeeded in conveying its misgivings about the Obama administrations initial plan to include Kashmir as part of Holbrookes diplomatic brief. Saran also claimed that the development reflected New Delhis clout in the corridors of power in Washington.
Holbrookes visit came just after Pakistan admitted on February 12 that many of those responsible for the Mumbai terror attacks did indeed hail from Pakistan. However, the Pakistan government also demanded that India name those who helped the terrorists carry out their attacks. Pakistan Interior Minister Rahman Mallik said the boat carrying the terrorists was refuelled on Indian territory.
In Islamabad, officials told the visiting special envoy that the Pakistan Army would be able to focus more effectively on the Afghan border if the Kashmir dispute was solved amicably. Islamabad has formally requested a resumption of the dialogue process.
Senior Indian officials and the External Affairs Minister reminded the Obama administration that Kashmir remained a bilateral issue between New Delhi and Islamabad.
The Asia Society, one of the premier U.S. think tanks, in its January report, stated that Kashmir could not be ignored if the U.S. government hoped to restore peace in the region. [N]o consideration of South Asias regional stability can be contemplated without understanding the complexities of Kashmir no American approach to the region can be whole without a careful eye and appreciation of developments in Kashmir and their impact, the report said. When the report was published, Holbrooke was the chairman of the Asia Society.
New Delhis priority, however, is to ensure that Washington keeps up its pressure on Islamabad on terror-related issues while keeping the Kashmir issue on the back burner. Pranab Mukherjee, in a recent interview, said there was no need to look at the issue of terrorism through the prism of Jammu and Kashmir.
A recent report in The Washington Post claimed that the Central Intelligence Agency had facilitated backchannel exchanges between India and Pakistan after the Mumbai attacks. According to the report, officials from both countries shared sensitive information on the attack, with the CIA playing the role of an arbiter. The report also stated that Indian and Pakistani officials separately shared their findings with the CIA and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). American officials, according to the report, claim credit for making the Pakistani side deal as forthrightly as possible with the fallout from Mumbai.
Now it is the turn of the Bangladesh government to seek U.S. help. The government of Sheikh Hasina has asked the FBI to join the investigations into the mutiny by soldiers of the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) in the last week of February. FBI chief Robert Mueller was in India in the first week of March. Mueller was all praise for the Indian governments cooperation in combating terrorism.
India, while welcoming the Pakistani admissions on the Mumbai terror attack, has tried to keep the pressure on Pakistan by demanding that it act effectively against the licence that terrorist groups enjoy on Pakistani territory. Pranab Mukherjee described as a positive development Pakistans announcement that it was holding six people in connection with the Mumbai attack and said New Delhi would examine Islamabads request for information the Indian side had on the attack. Pranab Mukherjee said the dialogue process would, however, remain in a pause mode until Pakistan took credible and verifiable action against those responsible for the attack.
Pranab Mukherjee also restated the Indian governments position that Pakistan had become an epicentre of terror. Indian officials, while praising the U.S. for all the help rendered in pressuring Pakistan, want more action from it. They are unhappy with the increased U.S. military aid and funding Pakistan is getting as the war against the Taliban intensifies.
A new U.S. Senate report called for urgent financial and military help for Pakistan to prevent its meltdown. If we fail, we face a truly frightening prospect: terrorist sanctuary, economic meltdown, and spiralling radicalism, all in a nation with 170 million inhabitants and a full arsenal of nuclear weapons, said John Kerry, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Indias position was bolstered by the statement of the U.S. Director of National Intelligence, Dennis Blair, in the second week of February that Pakistan held the key to defusing tensions with India. Blair told the U.S. Congress that bilateral relations between the two South Asian neighbours could unravel unless Islamabad takes sustained, concrete, meaningful steps to allay Indian concerns about Islamabads support for anti-Indian militant groups. He added that Pakistan based groups run the risk of provoking an Indian attack. Washington is evidently turning the pressure on Islamabad to address New Delhis concerns.
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