Beware of India's
Peace and Friendship Treaties
By Dr Shireen M. Mazari
One certainly has to hand it to
the Indians -- no one can beat them when it comes
to deviousness. The latest reflection of this is
the so-called "peace and friendship treaty"
offer to Pakistan. The malafide intent behind this
offer is only too transparent, on two main counts.
The first, of course, is that this is yet another
attempt by India to avoid moving on the core conflictual
issue -- Kashmir.
While Pakistan's leadership has been floating one
proactive proposal after another in an effort to
move out of the political stalemate on Kashmir,
the Indian government continues to show a resolute
obduracy on this front. Pakistan's proposals relating
to interim measures such as demilitarization and
self-governance, as well as a methodology of regional
plebiscites has received no positive response from
the Indian side. Yet there is increasing movement
between the people of Kashmir and Indian obduracy
is becoming increasingly untenable.
So what does India choose to do? To try and move
the peace process in such a fashion that it somehow
bypasses the Kashmir issue. Despite the absurdity
of this approach, India will try anything that will
allow it to retain the status quo on Kashmir. But
does the Indian Prime Minister take us all for fools
who cannot understand that peace can only come when
conflicts have been resolved? His suggestion that
Kashmir should not prevent the two sides from signing
a peace, friendship and security treaty certainly
seems to suggest such an assumption, otherwise rationality
would point to peace following conflict resolution.
In any event, Mr. Singh also keeps talking of borders
not being redrawn, but India itself has redrawn
its border several times as it has gobbled up Goa
and Sikkim along with Hyderabad and Junagadh, and
it has attempted to do the same with Kashmir. But
even more important, in the case of Kashmir it is
not an issue of redrawing of borders, but of drawing
up the borders because the LoC is merely a ceasefire
line. In fact, this ceasefire line that both Pakistan
and India agreed to at Simla has been destroyed
by India with its permanent incursions into the
Qamar and Chor Bat La sectors. In any event, as
long as major political issues remain unresolved,
they cannot be bypassed in any peace or security-related
treaty between Pakistan and India.
As for the issues of Siachin, Sir Creek and Baglihar,
India has made no moves to accommodate Pakistan's
objections on the Baglihar Dam nor has it shown
a willingness to move towards demarcation of the
border at Sir Creek. As for Siachin, India has moved
away from the earlier almost-agreed pact on Siachin
withdrawal, by now demanding that the place from
where the Indians withdraw be demarcated. Effectively,
that means accepting that territory as Indian which
cannot be acceptable to by Pakistan. So where is
the Indian flexibility or desire to seek substantive
conflict resolution? Or is India merely interested
in inflicting its own preferred "solutions"
on to Pakistan?
Some commentators feel that this friendship treaty
offer has come in the wake of US pressure to undermine
Pakistan's very rational objections to the Indo-US
nuclear deal. That may have been part of the rationale
for the Indian government, but India has a record
of offering these treaties, as the old Soviet Union
did, to its neighboring states where the intent
is control rather than friendship based on mutual
respect for sovereign equality. As the Soviet Union
had used the friendship treaties to intervene and
dictate to its satellites, so India has been using
such treaties to dominate its neighborhood. This
is the second count of mala fide intent, as a brief
recollection of the history of India's friendship
treaties will show.
One should never forget history and we need to recall
how India gained control over Bhutan's external
affairs. Bounded on three sides by India, Bhutan
has always been a key part of India's strategic
planning. As early as 1949, India signed a Treaty
of Friendship with Bhutan, which remains in force
in perpetuity. This Treaty, comprising ten articles,
assures Bhutan of India's "non-interference"
in its internal affairs in return for Bhutan agreeing
"to be guided by the advice of the Government
of India in regard to its external relations"
(Article 2). So effectively, India has control over
Bhutanese foreign policy.
In 1950, India signed a Treaty of Peace and Friendship
with Nepal with accompanying letters that defined
security relations between the two countries, and
an agreement governing both bilateral trade and
trade transiting Indian soil. This Treaty and letters
stated that "neither government shall tolerate
any threat to the security of the other by a foreign
aggressor." Since then, Nepal has found itself
hamstrung in developing its relations with third
countries, especially China. When it sought to buy
a few defensive anti-aircraft guns from China, India
blocked the transit trade of this landlocked country.
When Nepal sought to have itself recognized internationally
as a zone of peace, and received support from Pakistan
and China, India felt this was a repudiation of
the special relationship and a possible threat to
India's security and, therefore, the proposal could
not be endorsed!
India also signed an Accord with Sri Lanka in 1987
(Indo-Sri Lankan Accord) before sending in a so-called
peacekeeping force into Sri Lanka! In 1972, India
signed a Friendship Treaty with Bangladesh also
and since then one has seen increasing Indian intervention
in the latter's affairs, especially along the border
areas with India. This has heightened tensions periodically
between the two countries, often leading to exchanges
along the border.
So Indian treaties of friendship and peace do little
to resolve outstanding conflicts and are primarily
intended to allow for greater Indian interventions
in the affairs of its neighbors. Would Pakistan
actually find this acceptable? Even though, presently,
the Pakistani state seems to be going through an
inexplicable psychological defeatism, which allows
even Afghanistan to kill its citizens and then adopt
an accusatory posture, it is inconceivable that
the Pakistani state would simply compromise its
sovereignty by accepting India's model of Treaties
of Friendship, given the model's rather suspect
history.
It is time for Pakistan to be more assertive in
terms of its national interests and the security
of its citizens and its territory. This requires
a greater assertiveness within our immediate neighborhood,
where a frustrated and weak Afghan government is
killing innocent Pakistanis in acts which can only
be described as deliberate, premeditated murder;
and where a US-bolstered India is seeking to bring
Pakistan into its hegemonic embrace.
India needs to realize that Pakistan, whatever its
weaknesses, is a regional power with its own regional
interests. What it is seeking from India is conflict
resolution -- first and foremost. It is as simple
as that and Indian shenanigans that seek to detract
from this objective should be rejected outright.
(The writer is director general of the Institute
of Strategic Studies in Islamabad. Courtesy The
News)
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