Business Recorder Editorial Feb 22, 2019

Pakistan’s sensible position

In a televised national address on February 19, 2019, Prime Minister Imran Khan responded to the war hysteria being whipped up by India in the wake of the Pulwama suicide attack that killed 44 personnel of the Central Reserve Police Force by offering both an olive branch and a stern warning to our eastern neighbour. The Prime Minister proffered a dialogue, including the issue of terrorism that India has been insisting for years since the Mumbai attacks in 2008 should be central to any revival of the stalled bilateral talks. At the same time, he warned India that any attack on Pakistan would certainly be retaliated. However, while the warning was clearly a response to the hostile atmosphere in India against Pakistan, it was not the main thrust of the Prime Minister’s message. That consisted of an invitation to India to return to the negotiating table to discuss terrorism, which is a regional problem and with which Pakistan is by now tragically familiar having been on its receiving end for years, as well as all other contentious issues. Prime Minister Imran Khan reiterated that the Naya (New) Pakistan ushered in by the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) hoped that India would stop reducing Pakistan to its ‘whipping boy’ every time something untoward happened in India and that better sense would prevail in the interests of peace. The Prime Minister also extended an offer of cooperation to investigate the Pulwama incident if India was prepared to share any actionable intelligence to determine whether indeed Pakistani soil had been used to launch the attack. Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi has weighed in with sympathy for the victims and their families while advising Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi not to use the incident for political advantage in India’s upcoming elections. While the envoys of both countries have been recalled for consultations amidst the ratcheting up of tensions, reports from India speak of the harassment of Pakistani diplomats and their families in New Delhi and Kashmiris and Muslims throughout India. Bikaner has ordered Pakistani visitors to leave within 48 hours and trade between the two countries has virtually ground to a halt after India withdrew Most Favoured Nation status granted to Pakistan and increased duties on Pakistani products. Meanwhile India has responded to Prime Minister Imran Khan’s offer of dialogue with a summary rejection on the grounds that ‘proofs’ and ‘evidence’ were also given earlier, including the stalled for 10 years trial of the Mumbai attackers and the Pathankot base attack, but no credible, visible action was taken. It has also criticised Prime Minister Imran Khan for neither condemning the Pulwama attack nor condoling with its victims’ families.

Pakistan has not been deterred by the negative response of New Delhi and has approached the United Nations, scores of countries’ envoys, and even reportedly sent a special message from Prime Minister Imran Khan to Modi via Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman who visited India straight after his trip to Pakistan. Of these, the United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres in response to Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi’s missive and our Ambassador Maleeha Lodhi’s discussions, offered his good offices if both countries agree. While the Indian narrative surrounding the Pulwama attack may have elements of political and electoral considerations driving it, it is eminently sensible of Pakistan not to succumb to any similar knee-jerk reaction and consciously or inadvertently stoke the embers of confrontation. Wisdom dictates recognition by India that war between the two South Asian nuclear-armed neighbours is unthinkable and only dialogue and mutual cooperation can help scotch the many-headed hydra of regional terrorism.