The dissonance in the India-Pakistan discourse continued into the morning after, but both sides were careful not to allow their differing narratives to torpedo their chances of remaining engaged.
External affairs minister S.M. Krishna, who returned to New Delhi Friday after his three-day visit to Islamabad, described his talks with his Pakistan counterpart, Mr Shah Mehmood Qureshi, as useful in gaining a better appreciation of each other’s positions while Mr Qureshi maintained that the meeting did not end in a “deadlock”.
Divergences persisted on how to take the dialogue forward, with Pakistan insisting on talks “in tandem” on all issues and a calendar of future engagements. India, on the other hand, was for “graduated and incremental steps”, preferring a bottom-up approach over the top-down approach preferred by Pakistan. India also maintained that a timeline would neither be possible nor feasible given the complexities in the relationship.
Mr Qureshi, who had caused a flutter the night before when he sought to compare Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed’s hate-India speeches with home secretary G.K. Pillai’s remarks about Pakistan’s involvement in the Mumbai attacks, did not help matters by setting off a volley of avoidable references to the Indian delegation’s alleged inflexibility in the talks and taking potshots at Mr Krishna.
Mr Qureshi told reporters in Islamabad that the Indian delegation appeared to be unwilling to commit to a roadmap for future engagement because it felt it did not have the mandate to do so. He contended that India’s “selective” approach of discussing certain issues at the expense of the others did not conform to the spirit of Prime minister Manmohan Singh’s meeting with his Pakistan counterpart, Mr Yousuf Raza Gilani, in Bhutan in April.
“If we focus more only on those issues which India gives importance to and ignore those considered important by Pakistan, then I don’t think the talks can move forward,” Mr Qureshi said, adding that it would not make sense to discuss issues such as promotion of cultural and trade relations at the expense of the core issues for Pakistan, such as Kashmir, peace and security, and Siachen.
The Pakistan minister also appeared to question Mr Krishna’s authority when he said that while he did not step out of the talks to “attend any phone calls”, the Indian minister “received foreign policy directions from New Delhi repeatedly during our meeting”.
“I led Pakistan’s team and I didn’t need to make even a single phone call (to Pakistan leaders) during the day-long talks. Krishna is the principal for giving direction to foreign policy (but) why were directions being sent repeatedly from Delhi? Who is the top foreign policy adviser for India?” Mr Qureshi wondered aloud, which New Delhi promptly dismissed as a futile exercise at scoring brownie points.
Mr Krishna, who spoke to the media upon arrival in New Delhi, responded to Mr Qureshi’s remarks by saying he had confined himself to the mandate given to him pursuant to the Manmohan-Gilani meeting. He described Mr Qureshi’s remark about him making telephone calls as an “extraordinary” statement.
“I have not spoken to anybody. The mandate given to me was so precise, so clear, that it does not need any additional instructions from Delhi,” Mr Krishna countered. “Foreign ministers are always in touch with their base, with the political leadership and governmental leadership. There is nothing wrong even if something has happened on these lines,” he elaborated.
New Delhi believed Mr Qureshi’s remarks about home secretary G.K. Pillai was a “diversionary tactic” by Pakistan, which has so far failed to take action on its promises made to home minister P. Chidambaram during his visit to Islamabad. Top government sources said in New Delhi that certain “hawkish elements” in Pakistan wanted to wreck the talks between the home ministers and the home secretaries of the two countries.
The sources in Delhi said Mr Qureshi’s outburst was the handiwork of elements who were upset with the resumption of the India-Pakistan dialogue. They noted that Mr Chidambaram’s visit to Pakistan was a success as Pakistan’s interior minister, Mr Rehman Malik, had gone to the extent of conveying to Mr Chidambaram that New Delhi would not be disappointed when Islamabad replies to terror-related queries in the future.
Furthermore, home ministry sources said in Delhi that the contents of Mr Pillai’s remarks had already been conveyed to Pakistan. “For the rest of the information, India has told Pakistan to get in touch with the US department of justice and the FBI. Home secretary has only repeated what the Pakistani agencies and government are well aware of,” a source said.
Another source who was familiar with India’s engagement of Pakistan said the next steps in the dialogue process had been shared with the Pakistani side in the run-up to the talks and India went ahead with its proposals based on the responsiveness of Pakistan. They included the holding of talks between the commerce and home secretaries, promotion of people-to-people contacts, and trade. India had even indicated its willingness to discuss the issue of sharing of river waters and had mooted that the talks be raised to the level of secretaries, but the “complex chemistry at work” in Pakistan put paid to India’s hopes of making incremental progress in the talks.
The source said in Delhi that terrorism remained India’s core concern. Pakistan needed to bring the perpetrators of the Mumbai attacks to justice as the attacks were too serious a trauma for the one billion Indians to forget. On Pakistan’s claim of being as much a victim of terrorism as India is, the source said India was the injured party as it was suffering from terrorism unleashed from Pakistan. Everything about the Mumbai attacks pointed to Pakistan and the brains trust of the 26/11 attacks was based in that country, it was emphasised.
However, there remained a sliver of hope after the Pakistan government acknowledged that progress had been made in dialogues held between 2004 and 2008 and that both sides needed to build on it. Mr Qureshi reiterated Friday that the progress made in the previous rounds should not be wasted. “Those issues and segments for which modalities have been already decided between the two countries should not be reopened,” Mr Qureshi said in Islamabad.
Pakistan also held out the assurances that it would “very seriously” take steps on the leads provided in the wake of additional information gleaned from the interrogation of David Coleman Headley. Also, that it will take steps to hasten the trial of Lashkar-e-Tayyaba (LeT) commander Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi and six others who are being tried in a Pakistani court on charges of planning and facilitating the Mumbai attacks. Further, Pakistan had agreed to reach an amicable settlement of the Sir Creek issue and it had asked India to furnish its proposal, conveyed orally, in writing to the Pakistan government.