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Once the post-Pulwama glory for Pakistan and humiliation for India fade, serious concerns emerge for Pakistan and the region. India is now all set to work very aggressively on other fronts against Pakistan. Economic and diplomatic being the most prominent ones. Economic aggression may have implications for Pakistan's nuclear programme.

New Delhi, since the 1990s blocked all peace initiatives from Pakistan's side on various pretexts. Pakistan and India have been in dialogue process seven times since 1966, the singing of the Tashkent Agreement. The other rounds of peace talks were the Simla Agreement in 1972, the Lahore Declaration in 1999, the Agra Summit in 2001, Composite Dialogues in 2003 and 2012 and Comprehensive Dialogue in 2015. There is a complete breakdown of talks since Modi came to power and since then almost all efforts by Pakistan geared towards diplomacy and dialogue with India have been stonewalled.

Active violations of LoC, largely since 2013, constitute a tool to pose a challenge to Pakistan's sovereignty and territorial integrity, which has brought the region to the brink of war. Statistics show that India violated the LoC 382 times in 2016, 1,150 times in 2017 and 1,400 times in 2018. 2019 has been marked with severe tensions and a number of LoC violations in the wake of the Pulwama incident. Moreover, the current Modi-led government is in a denial mode, blaming the deteriorating situation in Occupied Jammu & Kashmir on Pakistan.

The first causality of war is always truth. The three major wars between the two countries, border skirmishes and cross-border terrorism have serious implications on people-to-people relations of the two protagonists of the region. This has been the case post-Pulwama also. The crisis was far more dangerous than what meets the eye. The liberal use of fighter pilots from both sides was frightening. The people on both sides are being told that the other is lying. Moreover, post the initial hype, questions are being asked on both sides; more in India, than in Pakistan.

Fortunately, Pakistan has done really well in handling the post-Pulwama situation and has won the perception war. It has set up an example of using peace gestures post-enemy-violence and also has established its military supremacy, which is remarkable. The 'new normal' that India was trying to establish, attached to its so-called 'punitive deterrence', may not happen after all.

Fifty-five countries condemned the Pulwama incident on the diplomatic front, only the US blamed Pakistan. However, other countries including China asked both Pakistan and India to exercise restraint, not one saying India acted irresponsibly the post-Pulwama attack. Turkey was the only country that came out and supported Pakistan.

On the economic front, economic isolation and strangulation has been a part of Indian strategy towards Pakistan for some time now. The thrust is very clear that India wants and has always desired subjugation of Pakistan. India also wants to impose systematic unipolarity, trying to defeat Pakistan's foreign policy objective of maintaining balance of power in the region; hence an aggressive opposition to the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) in particular and the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in general.

India's role in the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) can also be observed in this context. FATF is the most important immediate issue for Pakistan; the demands are difficult to meet and may result in the kind of difficulties, India envisions for Pakistan. India is one of the most prominent members of FATF, additionally, a co-chair of the Asia-Pacific Group on Money Laundering is a serving bureaucrat of India, which shifts violence against Pakistan from active warfare to aggressive lawfare.

The 2019 World Bank report categorically says the economic turnaround is possible only if we engage with both China and India, our real challenge is internal security and economic turnaround.

Pakistan is fighting a three-front war - eastern, western and internal - and all three have India as a factor. The military defeat and humiliation, India faced the post-Pulwama has incentives for India to pursue the western front and the fifth generation war tactics inside Pakistan. Many on very responsible positions in India have expressed an explicit desire to do so. Balochistan, Karachi, KPK and Chinese targets in general are obvious choices amongst others. The ground reality is not pretty, however Pakistan must continue to pursue the eventual option of dialogue, diplomacy, peace and connectivity.

An important capital is Beijing. CPEC and the larger BRI may be stalled because of the deteriorating security situations in South Asia. India has once again chosen to boycott the April 2019 Belt and Road Forum, which it boycotted in 2017 as well in opposition to CPEC. The global power realignment has repercussions for South Asia where the new cold war is unfolding and Washington's and Beijing's interests are at stake because of the deteriorating relationship between Pakistan and India.

The international community must be cultivated and successfully persuaded to revisit its role of firefighting only, between Pakistan and India when violence escalates between the two nuclear armed neighbors and on the second most dangerous border on the face of earth. The thrust perhaps should be towards the actual resolution of the conflict in South Asia. Donald Trump's appreciation of Prime Minister Imran Khan's efforts for peace in Afghanistan is not enough. Perhaps US should more proactively work to resolve the Kashmir issue which holds the peace of South Asia hostage. Moreover, pitching nuclear armed states against one another is not a recipe for peace.

Pakistan has continued to keep the options of dialogue, diplomacy, peace and connectivity on the table and is once again looking for re-engagement and dialogue with India. The ball is in the Indian court and it is incumbent upon the international community to look at a more sustainable model for peace in South Asia instead of just fire-fighting.

(The writer is an Associate Professor of Social Sciences and Liberal Arts, at the Institute of Business Administration (IBA) Karachi. She may be contacted at [email protected])

Copyright Business Recorder, 2019


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