Nawaz-Modi meeting….what’s achieved ?
Dr Iqtidar Karamat Cheema
Pakistani media has reported that U.S. Vice President Joe Biden termed the recent meeting of Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif with his Indian counterpart in Ufa, Russia, an important step forward towards peaceful dialogue process.
  Ironically, the meeting coincided with the Indian army’s unprovoked firing at the Pakistani border. Only a few days before SCO summit Indian resolution in the United Nations calling for sanctions against Pakistan was vetoed by China. Few hours after the premiers’ meeting, India flooded Pakistan by releasing water in Pakistani Rivers without notice, resulting into death of 3 Pakistani citizens. These incident lead many of the Pakistanis to believe that Nawaz has once again tried to follow his unilateral idealistic fantasy of peace and cooperation with India.
  The body language and conduct of Mr. Modi during the meeting also exhibited his disaffection and cold attitude towards Nawaz. Mr. Modi who is very famous for unnecessarily hugging the world leaders and making tea for them, made Sharif walk through a long corridor towards him to shake hands.
  However, officials in Pakistan are hopeful that Modi will seize an opportunity to rebuild ties between India and Pakistan. Modi like his predecessor once again raised the issue of Mumbai attacks 2008 during the meeting. Indian government has consistently used Mumbai attacks as an excuse not to start any meaningful dialogue with Pakistan. Despite of Pakistan’s assurances to fully cooperate to uncover the offenders of this crime, the then Indian Foreign Minister and present Indian President, Pranab Mukherjee, announced on December 16, 2008 to put on hold composite dialogue with Pakistan until credible action was taken against those responsible for the Mumbai attacks.
   To utter dismay of many Pakistanis, Nawaz remained completely numb on the important issues i.e RAW’s involvement in exporting terrorism in Pakistan, Indian involvement in the carnage of Samjohta express which claimed the lives of 59 Pakistani citizens. In 2010, Indian government admitted that the extremist group Abhinav Bharat and its affiliate Indian Army‘s serving officer Lieutenant Colonel Shrikant Prasad Purohit, was responsible for the Samjohta express bloodbath.
  While completely ignoring the issue of Kashmir, Pakistani Prime Minister also forgot to ask his Indian counterpart about his recent statement in Dhaka, in which Modi formally acknowledged the Indian involvement in the 1971 war and confirmed India's negative role against sovereign neighboring states. On July 16, 2009; a reference to Indian involvement in Balochistan was also acknowledged through a joint statement after the meeting of then Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani and his Indian counterpart, Manmohan Singh in the Egyptian city of Sharm-el-Sheikh.
    In the recent past; behind-the-scenes the United States (U.S.) has played her role to bring India and Pakistan to the negotiating table. The U.S. was concerned that Pakistan-India tensions could derail its strategy to stabilise Afghanistan. American officials had been vigorously pressing for an easing of tensions and revival of dialogue between India and Pakistan so that Pakistan could focus more on fighting militancy on its western border.
    We must remember that in 2010 without clarifying the scope of the proposed discussions, Indian Foreign Secretary Nirupuma Rao invited her Pakistani counterpart for talks to New Delhi. Welcoming the move, Pakistan accepted the offer and a delegation went to New Delhi in February 2010. During the meeting, besides making certain other demands, India handed over three dossiers to Pakistan asking that thirty-three individuals, including two serving Pakistan army officers, as well as Indian fugitives allegedly involved in terror acts, be handed over to India. Repeated references to terrorism forced the Pakistani foreign secretary to remind India that Pakistan had witnessed “hundreds of Mumbais” and, therefore, was not ignorant of the dangers of terrorism.
During March 2010, India repeatedly expressed its desire to conduct a second round of foreign secretary-level talks in Islamabad. However, Pakistan made it clear that it was not interested in a mere photo-shoot and wanted result-oriented talks about all outstanding issues. Though the resumption of dialogue has largely been urged in both the countries, it should also be recognised that no breakthrough is expected.
  Due to decades of animosity, the idea of peace and bilateral cooperation between both the countries sometimes seems as an idealistic fantasy. But the idea is not entirely out of place as there had been patchy periods of peace. But such brief intervals, rarer as they were, created only the illusion of progress where there was no substance and had dangerous pacifying effect on public conscious. It is believed that when bubble of the false peace gusts, not only it shatters the atmosphere of feel-good, but also it floods all positive moves for peace.