BackIndia, Pakistan revive peace process with NSA-level talks in Bangkok
The discussions between India's Ajit Doval and Nasir Janjua of Pakistan included the issue of cross-border terrorism and the Kashmir dispute
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New Delhi: In a dramatic development, India and Pakistan led by their national security advisers (NSAs) agreed to end hostilities and revive their peace process in a secret meeting in Bangkok on Sunday.
The meeting between the NSAs, attended by the foreign secretaries of the two countries, follows the “pull aside" meeting of prime ministers Narendra Modi of India and Pakistan’s Nawaz Sharif in Paris last Monday on the sidelines of the climate change summit. The Modi-Sharif talks had focussed on how to break the logjam in bilateral engagement, a person familiar with the development said.
The four-hour-long discussions in Bangkok covered “peace and security, terrorism, Jammu and Kashmir, and other issues including tranquillity along the LoC (Line of Control, the de facto border in Kashmir)", said a joint statement put out by the foreign ministries of India and Pakistan.
In other words, the dialogue covered issues of key interest to both countries: terrorism for India and the Kashmir dispute for Pakistan.
The discussions between NSAs Ajit Doval of India and Nasir Janjua of Pakistan “were held in a candid, cordial and constructive atmosphere", the statement said, adding “it was agreed to carry forward the constructive engagement".
“This indicates that the dialogue between India and Pakistan (stalled for almost two years) has started and both sides will be looking at the next steps," said Lalit Mansingh, former foreign secretary of India.
The next step, Mansingh said, could be a visit by foreign minister Sushma Swaraj to Islamabad this week for the Heart of Asia conference on Afghanistan.
Sunday’s meeting could also clear the decks for the resumption of cricket matches between India and Pakistan later this month in Sri Lanka.
On the choice of the meeting venue, Mansingh noted that the Thailand capital has in the past hosted many rounds of track-two informal discussions between retired Indian and Pakistani diplomats and generals. “It is a discreet venue, not too far from the Indian subcontinent," he added.
According to the Indian delegation, the talks Sunday “built" on the understanding reached in the Russian city of Ufa, where in a meeting on 10 July, Modi and Sharif had agreed to engage through three-tier talks to explore ways to resume their peace process stalled since 2013.
The two NSAs were to discuss terrorism while the chiefs of the border guards of the two countries, as well as senior military officers, were to talk on securing a 2003 ceasefire agreement.
But within days of the Ufa agreement, Pakistan insisted on including the Kashmir dispute in the dialogue agenda, after the Pakistan delegation returned home to criticism for leaving out the Kashmir dispute from the Ufa joint statement.
With Pakistan’s then interlocutor Sartaj Aziz insisting on amplifying the agenda of the NSA meeting in New Delhi to include the Kashmir dispute besides terrorism that New Delhi considered beyond the ambit of the talks, the dialogue was cancelled. The cancellation took place exactly a year after India called off a visit by then Indian foreign secretary Sujatha Singh to Islamabad after Pakistan’s high commissioner to India Abdul Basit held talks with Kashmiri separatists in New Delhi.
One of the red lines drawn by Modi soon after assuming office was that the dialogue between India and Pakistan on all disputes wouldn’t involve any third country or party.
According to the Indian side, the order of discussion of issues —terrorism and Kashmir—illustrates that the terrorist activities in Kashmir were a priority. It also illustrated that flexibility was shown by both countries.
Analysts, however, were of the opinion that India had shown more flexibility than Pakistan.
“It shows that we are giving up our stand that we will only talk terrorism and nothing else," said Mansingh.
The resumption of engagement at this juncture shows that Modi is operating on “two conflicting ideas," said Mansingh.
One is that India wants to take a tough line on terrorism. “The second is that the prime minister wants to prove to the world that he is more pragmatic than dogmatic. But it is sending a confusing signal to the Indian public."
Former foreign secretary Kanwal Sibal said that Sunday’s joint statement represented a “big departure from the Ufa agreement". “There is no explanation from the government as yet on what prompted the change (in India’s stance)," he said.
India’s engagement with Pakistan comes at a time when Indian newspapers have reported warnings by intelligence agencies of suicide attacks by the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Toiba terrorist group—blamed for the 2008 terrorist attack on Mumbai. “When many countries around the world are taking a tough line against terrorism, India seems to have softened its line," said Mansingh.
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