Investigation: Nuclear scandal - Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan

The Pakistani scientist who passed nuclear secrets to the world’s rogue states has been muzzled by his government. In a smuggled letter, AQ Khan reveals his side of the story

Dr A.Q. Khan with Simon Henderson in 1993

By Simon Henderson

From: Sunday Times, 20 Sep 2009

It could be a scene from a film. On a winter’s evening, around 8pm, in a quiet suburban street in Amsterdam, a group of cars draw up. Agents of the Dutch intelligence service, the AIVD, accompanied by uniformed police, ring the bell and knock on the door of one of the houses. The occupants, an elderly couple and their unmarried daughter, are slow to come to the door. The bell-ringing becomes more insistent, the knocks sharper. When the door opens, the agents request entry but are clearly not going to take no for an answer.

The year was 2004. The raid went unreported but was part of the worldwide sweep against associates of Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan, the Pakistani scientist and “father of the Islamic bomb”, who had just been accused of selling nuclear secrets to Libya, Iran and North Korea. The house belonged to one of his brothers, a retired Pakistani International Airlines manager, who lived there with his wife and daughter. The two secret agents asked the daughter for a letter she had recently received from abroad. Upstairs in her bedroom, she pulled it from a drawer. It was unopened. The agents grabbed it and told her to put on a coat and come with them.

The daughter, Kausar Khan, was taken to the local police station, although, contrary to usual practice, she was neither signed in nor signed out. The Dutch agents wanted to know why she had not opened the letter and whether she knew what was in it. She didn’t; she had merely been asked to look after it. Inside the envelope was a copy of a letter that Pakistan did not want to reach the West. The feared Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) had found the letter when they searched Dr AQ Khan’s home in Islamabad. He had also passed a copy on to his daughter Dina to take to her home in London, as rumours of Khan’s “proliferation” — jargon for the dissemination of nuclear secrets — swept the world. The Pakistani ISI were furious. “Now you have got your daughter involved,” they reportedly said. “So far we have left your family alone, but don’t expect any leniency now.”

Dr Khan collapsed in sobs. Under pressure, he agreed to telephone Dina in London and ordered her to destroy the documents. He used three languages: Urdu, English and Dutch. It was code for her to obey his instructions. Dina dutifully destroyed the letter. That left the copy that was confiscated by the Dutch intelligence service in Amsterdam. I know there is at least one other copy: mine.

Just four pages long, it is an extraordinary letter, the contents of which have never been revealed before. Dated December 10, 2003, and addressed to Henny, Khan’s Dutch wife, it is handwritten, in apparent haste. It starts simply: “Darling, if the government plays any mischief with me take a tough stand.” In numbered paragraphs, it outlines Pakistan’s nuclear co-operation with China, Iran and North Korea, and also mentions Libya. It ends: “They might try to get rid of me to cover up all the things they got done by me.”

When I acquired my copy of the secret letter in 2007, I was shocked. On the third page, Khan had written: “Get in touch with Simon Henderson… and give him all the details.” He had also listed my then London address, my telephone number, fax number, mobile-phone number and the e-mail address I used at the time. It has been my luck, or fate, call it what you will, to develop a relationship with AQ Khan.

Khan became an idolised figure in Pakistan from the 1980s onwards because of his success in building a uranium-enrichment plant at Kahuta, near Islamabad. In February 2004, three years after his retirement, he was accused of proliferating nuclear secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea, and made a televised confession.

General Pervez Musharraf, at the time the ruler of Pakistan, pardoned Khan for his “crimes” but kept him under house arrest and largely incommunicado in Islamabad until February this year, when a court ordered his release. He was declared a “free man”, but in practice nothing changed.

His freedom lasted a day or so before international protests, mainly from the United States, locked him back up again. A few months ago, he was refused permission to attend his granddaughter’s high-school graduation. “I continue to be a prisoner,” Khan complained.In Washington, a State Department spokesman said that Khan remained a “proliferation risk” but, after being shut away for five years, that seemed hard to imagine. So why was he silenced? Was it because of what he did, or because of what he knows about Pakistan’s active role in spreading nuclear technology to some of the world’s worst regimes?

Any relationship with a source is fraught with potential difficulties. One doesn’t want to be blind to the chance of being used. Government officials and politicians in any country are seldom interested in the simple truth. They all have their particular story to tell. In this context, I am frankly amazed that Khan has chosen me to be his interlocutor with the world.

I have been writing about Pakistan ever since I arrived there in June 1977, sent by the BBC to be a stringer because the local man was considered to be under the thumb of the then prime minister, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (the father of the assassinated Benazir), who had held disputed elections and was facing widespread street protests.

At the time I had never heard of AQ Khan, although, it turns out, he and his family had also lived months earlier at the same small hotel in Rawalpindi where I had lodged for a while. Pakistan was already vying to be a nuclear power and America was pressuring France to stop the sale of a reprocessing plant which would have enabled Pakistan to acquire plutonium, a nuclear explosive.

I returned to London in 1978 to join the Financial Times, and was replaced by a journalist who latched on to a bigger story: that Pakistan was building a centrifuge enrichment plant to make highly enriched uranium, the alternative route to an atomic bomb. A Dutch-trained previously unknown Pakistani scientist, Dr AQ Khan, was leading the project.My intrepid replacement went to visit Khan’s nuclear construction site at Kahuta. He also found out where Khan was living and went to his home. Khan’s security guards beat him up before he reached the front door.

The FT sent me back to Pakistan to help broker a deal whereby my replacement could leave without being prosecuted. At that point, I began my own investigations of Khan, which led to a frontpage story about his purchasing network in Britain. I doubt that either Khan or the Pakistan government was happy to see the exposé.

Even so, the first time I contacted Khan, he was civil to me. It was 1986 and he had just won, on a technicality, an appeal against a Netherlands court judgment that he had attempted to steal centrifuge secrets. Although my story was not a whitewash, it did quote him accurately, and Khan wrote to me with some more information about his case. I replied, and he reciprocated. It started a “penfriendship” that has continued for 23 years and has included two visits.

At the time, I thought Khan might make a good subject for a book. I amassed material, but never thought I had enough, and was not even sure if he was interesting enough for a biography. For his part, Khan was cautious. “When I write my autobiography, Mr Henderson, I shall ask you for your help.” It wasn’t the answer I wanted.

Frankly, in news terms, there wasn’t a great deal of interest in him, even in 1998, when Pakistan first tested its 1,500-kilometre-range Ghauri missile, a Khan-directed copy of the North Korean Nodong rocket, and went on to test two nuclear weapons. In 2001, when he turned 65, he retired. We kept in touch, but it was mostly Christmas cards.

Then, in late 2003, he became the story again. I was in London, on a bicycle ride by the River Thames, when my mobile phone rang. A voice said: “I am a friend of your friend in Pakistan.” I knew my “friend” must be Khan. The voice on the line said he had been asked to call.

My “friend’s” associates were being arrested — former colleagues at KRL, the Dr AQ Khan Research Laboratories, as the Kahuta centrifuge plant was known. I asked why. The voice said “Iran” — which was attempting to go nuclear. I asked what my friend wanted me to do with the information. The voice said I should try to publish it. It might help.I explained that I was happy to listen to what I was being told, but I needed some corroboration. I told him that my friend should call or e-mail me; he didn’t have to go through the details again. As far as I was concerned, he could just say “Merry Christmas”. I cycled home quickly and took a shower. Thirty minutes later, Khan rang from Pakistan and wished me merry Christmas.

The next few weeks were turbulent. A week or so after Khan’s call to me, Libya announced that it would abandon weapons of mass destruction. Shortly afterwards, in December 2003, The Wall Street Journal revealed that a German cargo ship called BBC China had been intercepted on its way to Libya with thousands of centrifuge components, and diverted to Italy. There was a Khan link there as well, but Khan declined my request for an interview. His “friend” called to say the time was not right and Khan was exhausted after long bouts of interrogation.

Khan was placed under house arrest on February 1, 2004, and since then he has rarely been able to leave his house. What do you do when under house arrest in Islamabad? You watch the BBC on satellite television. I knew he would. So, in 2006, when Panorama came to me saying they were making a film about Khan’s role in nuclear proliferation and would I be interviewed, the answer was simple: “Yes”. I told them that, from my knowledge of Pakistan and Khan, he could not have acted without the permission and collaboration of the government.

Khan watched the programme. After that, one thing quickly led to another. I came to know of the existence of the letter, and also learnt that its contents were known to Dutch intelligence, and also to anyone they might have passed details on to — including, in all likelihood, the British and Americans.Why were Dutch intelligence agents so keen to seize it? On the face of it, the letter’s contents are a damning indictment of a generation of Pakistan’s political and military leadership, who used Khan’s nuclear and missile skills to enhance Pakistan’s diplomacy.

It was not rocket science to work out a plausible explanation for the Dutch seizure. Bloggers will probably err on the side of more imaginative conspiracy theories, but the truth is probably simpler. After the September 11 attacks, the West in general, and the United States in particular, had to work with Pakistan to counter Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda in neighbouring Afghanistan. That meant that they had to work with President Musharraf, even though he was no democrat. As part of the bargain, Pakistan’s nuclear sins also needed to be placed to one side.

As sins go, they were big: Pakistan had been spreading nuclear technology for years. The first customer for one of its enrichment plants was China — which itself had supplied Pakistan with enough highly enriched uranium for two nuclear bombs in the summer of 1982.

There it was in the letter: “We put up a centrifuge plant at Hanzhong (250km southwest of Xian).” It went on: “The Chinese gave us drawings of the nuclear weapon, gave us 50kg of enriched uranium, gave us 10 tons of UF6 (natural) and 5 tons of UF6 (3%).” (UF6 is uranium hexafluoride, the gaseous feedstock for an enrichment plant.)

On Iran, the letter says: “Probably with the blessings of BB [Benazir Bhutto, who became prime minister in 1988] and [a now-retired general]… General Imtiaz [Benazir’s defence adviser, now dead] asked… me to give a set of drawings and some components to the Iranians…The names and addresses of suppliers were also given to the Iranians.”

On North Korea: “[A now-retired general] took $3million through me from the N. Koreans and asked me to give some drawings and machines.”

In late 2003, with Al-Qaeda far from vanquished in Afghanistan and Pakistan-linked centrifuge components heading towards Libya, President Musharraf was under tremendous pressure from Washington. In all likelihood, he was offered a way out: “Work with us and we will support you. Blame all the nuclear nonsense on AQ Khan.” Although Musharraf had lavished praise on Khan at a banquet in 2001, he didn’t like him personally. So the choice was simple. Khan was made a scapegoat.

Years earlier, Khan had been warned about the Pakistan army by Li Chew, the senior minister who ran China’s nuclear-weapons programme. Visiting Kahuta, Chew had said: “As long as they need the bomb, they will lick your balls. As soon as you have delivered the bomb, they will kick your balls.” In the letter to his wife, Khan rephrased things: “The bastards first used us and are now playing dirty games with us.”

George Tenet, the director of the CIA at the time of 9/11, has described Khan as “the merchant of death” and “as bad as Osama Bin Laden”. Khan has been accused of unauthorised nuclear proliferation, motivated by personal greed. On top of this, he has been depicted as overstating his contribution to Pakistan’s success in making nuclear weapons and missiles with which to threaten the whole of India.

These themes, which were repeated endlessly across the world, are now accepted as universal truths. But Khan was a government official and an adviser with ministerial status even after he retired in 2001. If his dissemination of nuclear secrets was authorised by the government, it could not be illegal and he would enjoy sovereign immunity for his actions. Pakistan is also not a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), so its nuclear trades, however reprehensible, were not against international law.

Khan is adamant that he never sold nuclear secrets for personal gain. So what about the millions of dollars he reportedly made? Nothing was confiscated from him and no reported investigation turned up hidden accounts. Having planted rumours about Khan’s greed, Pakistani officials were curiously indifferent to following them through. General Musharraf told a British newspaper at the time of Khan’s arrest in 2004 that “He can keep his money”. In another interview a few months later, he said: “We don’t know where his funds are.”

But was there any money? Much was made of a “hotel”, named after Khan’s wife, Henny, built by a local tour guide with the help of money from Khan and a group of friends in Timbuktu, west Africa. It is a modest structure at best, more of a guesthouse. A weekend home at Bani Gala, outside Islamabad, where Khan went to relax, is hardly the palace that some reports have made it.

In fact, there seemed to be no money. By summer 2007, Khan was finding it difficult to make ends meet on his pension of 12,200 rupees per month (at the time about $200). After pleading with General Khalid Kidwai, the officer supervising both Pakistan’s nuclear weapons and Dr Khan, the pension was increased to $2,500 per month and there was a one-off lump-sum payment of the equivalent of $50,000. I have copies of the agreement and cheques.

As for his role in the development of Pakistan’s nuclear and missile forces, I have little doubt that Khan won the race between his KRL organisation and the official Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission to develop both a nuclear bomb and a missile system, a rivalry deliberately constructed by the dictator General Zia ul-Haq in the 1980s and sustained by later governments.

But there is a simple way to clarify matters. Pakistan’s system of national civilian honours is topped by the Nishan-i-Imtiaz (Order of Excellence), abbreviated as NI. A second tier of honour is the Hilal-i-Imtiaz (Crescent of Excellence), or HI. Khan was awarded the NI twice, a distinction never achieved before or since. He was also earlier awarded the HI. It is stretching one’s imagination to think that Khan could hijack the country’s honour system and the judgment of successive presidents.

Although the West continues to condemn Khan, Pakistan’s own energy to do so is fading, particularly since the departure of Musharraf in 2008. Frustrated by his house arrest and legal limbo, Khan has repeatedly this year pressed for remedy by the courts.

Khan was supposedly freed from house arrest in February, but the terms of that freedom were detailed in a secret “annexure A” of the court judgment, the final version of which Khan only saw later. One of the lines in the original draft that he was asked to sign was: “That in case Mr Simon Henderson or anyone else proceeds with the publication of any information or material anywhere in the world, I affirm that it would not be based on any input from me and I disown it.”

That line was eventually deleted and replaced with a more general prohibition about unnamed “specific media personnel”. Despite the court judgment specifying that the contents of the annexure “shall not be issued to the press or made public in any manner”, a copy reached me in the West.

Khan went back to court last month to challenge the terms of the annexure that he never accepted. Justice Ejaz Ahmed, the presiding judge at the Lahore high court, lifted all the curbs on his movement. “Dr Khan can come and go anywhere he pleases and no one should prevent him from doing this,” he ruled. “There should be no limitations.” Two days later another Pakistani court reimposed the ban.

America is pressing hard for Khan’s continued confinement. Deprived by Pakistan of the opportunity to interrogate Khan, the US is concerned that he may revive his old networks. Echoing the official view, The New York Times called this month for restrictions to remain on Khan for his “heinous role as maestro of the world’s largest nuclear black market”.

If Khan is free to travel and speak openly, there is a danger that he will give his own account of events, opening up a can of worms and complicating relations with Washington. Now his letter has been revealed, he hopes his story will be told differently.

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insight: Getting AQ’s story out? —Ejaz Haider

I can imagine Henderson’s excitement over bringing to the world Khan’s account. But he should also be able to sift the grain from the chaff. And yes, the issue of who is using whom cannot be avoided even when the story is good and the subject enticing

Dr AQ Khan keeps popping up like an embarrassing high school sex tape. Welcome now to the John le Carré-style account by Simon Henderson of the Sunday Times.

At the centre of Henderson’s exposé is a letter purportedly written by Khan and picked up by Dutch intelligence from his daughter’s home in Amsterdam in the winter of 2004. The letter proves, we are informed, that Khan was not alone in his proliferation activities but was used by several Pakistani governments to run the nuclear Wal-Mart — or does it?

There are many angles to this story but let’s begin with accepting its two major, allied premises — i.e., that Khan worked for the Pakistani government and his “sins” are not his.

In the nuclear club no state is a virgin. And if everyone has slept with someone else, there is no need to single out Pakistan. Two, if Khan played the game, at a minimum, by Henderson’s own account, “Khan was awarded the NI twice, a distinction never achieved before or since”. Moreover, he became the “father” of Pakistan’s bomb, a soubriquet which is very largely misplaced as is Henderson’s claim that “I have little doubt that Khan won the race between his KRL organisation and the official Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission to develop both a nuclear bomb and a missile system”, but the elaboration of these two points requires a separate discussion.

Khan, if Henderson’s account is correct, should have chewed well on Li Chew’s warning about getting his “balls kicked” after he had delivered the bomb. Meanwhile, as far as China’s official reaction to Henderson’s story is concerned, foreign ministry spokesperson Jiang Yu has refuted claims made by Henderson that “China had engaged in nuclear proliferation by getting Pakistan to share technology and materials with North Korea and Iran”. But that doesn’t matter!

So, Khan misjudged. Too bad. Henderson should know, given his professional dealings with government functionaries and intelligence agencies, that it doesn’t take long for assets to become liabilities, especially when they jump their brief. This happens as much in Henderson’s country as anywhere else. As for where Khan’s money is, Henderson has done a better job of defending Khan than even the local journos he used to cultivate, some of whom even wrote about his generosity, not knowing then that the information could become the rope around Khan’s neck.

That said, here’s to some scepticism.

By Henderson’s own account he got a copy of the letter in 2007. This was supposed to be a “big” story. Why did Henderson wait all these years to put it out? Was he stopped by someone? British, Dutch or US authorities/intelligence singly or together? Or did Khan tell him the time was not right for it? If any of these conjectures are right, what does that say about Henderson and his credibility as an independent journalist?

And if that is not the case, then perhaps Henderson should have put in a paragraph in his story about why he didn’t think fit to part with this information then and what might have changed now for him to reveal it. Also, how does the fact that Khan wrote such a letter in and of itself prove that what he says is the true version of events? A person in his position and with his alleged activities could write anything to save his backside.

One thing is clear. Khan cultivated Henderson. Henderson’s “It has been my luck, or fate, call it what you will, to develop a relationship with AQ Khan”, is not as innocuous as it looks or sounds. Note Henderson at another place: “I know there is at least one other copy: mine.” This is better than Pelican Brief.

The “relationship” strand runs throughout Henderson’s account, including the bit about what the “feared” ISI (note the modifier) did when they came to know of the letter. This account, as also other documents and information, could not have come to Henderson from anyone but Khan himself. So, the question is, why would Khan say anything other than give his version of events — and if one version of events, the government’s, is not an objective account, how does Khan’s become objective? Or do we always prefer the underdog?

In fairness to Henderson, he does realise that “Any relationship with a source is fraught with potential difficulties. One doesn’t want to be blind to the chance of being used”. Or does he? If he does, why is he lapping up everything Khan gives him? Is it because he wants to be his interlocutor with the world or is it because he is so amazed that Khan has chosen him to play that role that he has put a moratorium on scepticism and other accounts?

There is either telepathy here or more than mere innocence. Read this by Henderson:

“Khan was placed under house arrest on February 1, 2004, and since then he has rarely been able to leave his house. What do you do when under house arrest in Islamabad? You watch the BBC on satellite television. I knew he would. So, in 2006, when Panorama came to me saying they were making a film about Khan’s role in nuclear proliferation and would I be interviewed, the answer was simple: ‘Yes’. I told them that, from my knowledge of Pakistan and Khan, he could not have acted without the permission and collaboration of the government... Khan watched the programme. After that, one thing quickly led to another.” Indeed!

This is of course someone that Henderson wasn’t too sure would “make a good subject for a book”. Bad judgement, it seems. Problem is, Khan would rather write his autobiography than have Henderson write his biography. Khan would need an editor, though so perhaps there is a role here for Henderson.

As for the veracity of what Khan has been telling Henderson, read this: “In 2001, when he turned 65, he retired.” Retired?! Khan is not a man who likes to retire; he was asked to leave. When former General-President Pervez Musharraf got the National Security Council in February 2000 to set up a National Command Authority and the government got round to centralising all nuclear-related activities, suspicion grew about what Khan was doing. While the proverbial had not hit the fan yet, there was enough to cut Khan loose from any function of KRL or other bodies.

But, because he was the nation’s “hero”, he was made a ceremonial advisor to the prime minister to keep him under watch and not ruffle any feathers.

What are we going to have next? A statement by Musharraf that he retired upon turning 67?!

I can imagine Henderson’s excitement over bringing to the world Khan’s account. But he should also be able to sift the grain from the chaff. And yes, the issue of who is using whom cannot be avoided even when the story is good and the subject enticing.

Finally, a word about the timing of Khan’s ghost: why does its appearance normally sync with some important pro-Pakistan development, in this case the passage of the USD7.5 billion Kerry-Lugar bill?

Simon Henderson’s story can be found at http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article6839044.ece

Ejaz Haider is op-ed editor of Daily Times, consulting editor of The Friday Times and host of Samaa TV’s programme “Siyasiyat”. He can be reached at sapper@dailytimes.com.pk

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Kashmiris and Tamils: Violence will get them nowhere

Violence will get them nowhere


By Kuldip Nayar

IN a way, what has happened to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in Sri Lanka is similar to what has happened to the Hurriyat in Kashmir. Both of them, ‘freedom fighters’, have ceased to be relevant in their respective places.

This does not mean that the alienation of the people they represent, either the Tamils or the Kashmiris has ended. But it does mean that the fight to project their stance has not met with success. In any case, the violence, which has no place in the settlement of political problems, is practically over, more in Kashmir than in Sri Lanka.

This is the only conclusion which can be drawn. Anything beyond that may be wishful thinking on the part of the LTTE and the Hurriyat on one hand and the governments in Sri Lanka and India on the other. What we see is a military victory. Moral victory is still distant. Tamil Nadu cannot force its will on Sri Lanka through bandhs and hartals.

I do not want to belittle the two struggles. The LTTE has fought for eelam (independence) and the Hurriyat for azadi (independence) for many years. Both have sacrificed thousands of their adherents. Yet, they did not realise in the midst of their fight for their ‘cause’ that the gun would never give them victory. They pitted themselves against states which had more guns.

Even the general opinion was against them. In the long run, the governments were bound to get the better of the ‘freedom fighters’. Neither the LTTE nor the Hurriyat has ever faced the fact that no nation would allow any part of its territory to break away, however emotional the call for self-determination or autonomy may be. Had the two asked for a status within their respective countries, the sky would have been the limit.

Some countries like China are unfortunate examples. The Dalai Lama, the spiritual head of Tibet, has said more than once that he was prepared to accept an autonomous state within China, leaving defence and foreign affairs to Beijing. India would give its right arm if the Kashmiris were to accept that.

Maybe the solution to Kashmir lies in a similar formula whereby people of the state enjoy power over all subjects except foreign affairs and defence. Islamabad could do likewise, transferring all power, except foreign affairs and defence to the elected government in Azad Kashmir. Both New Delhi and Islamabad can give the Kashmiris a sense of coherence and integrity by making the border between Kashmir and Azad Kashmir soft. This will make the borders irrelevant. Pakistan has already said that it would agree to an arrangement which the Kashmiris accept.

Jammu will still need to be tackled. If it is assured of its identity, it would rather stay with the Valley — a ‘relationship of decades’ — than jump into the welter of India where linguistic chauvinism is taking over the centuries’ old coherent tradition. Much depends on the people living in the Valley in terms of how far they are willing to accommodate Jammu.

In the same way, it depends on the Sinhalese how far they are willing to go to win over the northern part of Sri Lanka where the Tamils abound and where the LTTE has been most active. Absorption of Tamils or those who harbour the dream of Eelam depends on the government in Colombo. A federal structure instead of the unitary system the country follows or the devolution of power to the different parts may provide a way out. But then the authoritarianism of the ruling party will have to be curbed. The spirit of democracy must defeat the sense of ethnic superiority which has come to guide the winning side.

I was shouted down when I told a gathering of students at the Srinagar University that their movement would have made far more impact if it had been non-violent. Yasin Malik, the first militant, underlines the futility of violence when he says that he has turned Gandhian.

Similarly, when I met a few LTTE leaders some years ago, they were violent even in their tone. They are as much in the wrong as the Hurriyat leaders if they believe that a principle can only be stoutly defended by the language of violence or by condemning those who do not accept their point of view.

For both of them, there are no shades, only black and white — those who are not with them are against them. This is the old approach of the bigoted, not of tolerance and feeling that others might also have some share of the truth. This approach is wholly unscientific, unreasonable and uncivilised, whether it is applied to the realm of politics, religion or economic theory. All Saarc countries must realise this.

Whatever Colombo and New Delhi may think about their respective strategies, we have arrived at a stage where an attempt of forcible imposition of policy or an idea is ultimately bound to fail. In the present circumstances this may lead to further alienation.

I wish the two would realise this and treat the defeated with dignity and care. They have to win them over and make them feel that their stake in peace is no less than that of the government. If the LTTE and the Hurriyat continue to defy reason and live in the darkness of misdoings they would be living in a make-believe world.

Similarly, there can be no victory for Sri Lanka and India. In fact, the status quo is a defeat for everyone. We have seen in the past that it is not easy for even great powers to reintroduce colonial control over territories which have become independent. Both Colombo and New Delhi have to accept that the desire for identity is strong and cannot be suppressed.

The ground is ready for Sri Lanka to have a settlement with the Tamils who harbour a feeling of denial in their own country. In the same way, the government in Delhi has to sort out things with the Kashmiris who find that the autonomy they enjoyed in 1950 has been eroded over the years.

In fact, people in all the countries of South Asia want to rule themselves without governments’ interference. They are sick and tired of violence and would like to settle down to a stable, secure future. They want democracy, but they know that it is not an end unto itself. It is the means to attain peace and equal opportunities. What has not sunk in is that wrong means will not lead to right results.

The writer is a leading journalist based in Delhi. (Dawn)
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In the aftermath of Kashmir polls: Can India and Pakistan agree to confine itself to three subjects: defence, foreign affairs and communications?

In the aftermath of Kashmir polls

By Kuldip Nayar

STATE elections in Jammu and Kashmir may not have provided many answers but it has made one thing clear: the All-Parties Hurriyat Conference has been exaggerating its strength.

It was wrong in assessing the mood of the Valley because the voters rejected the Hurriyat’s call to boycott the polls. Nearly 61 per cent of the voters queued up before the polling booths in the severe winter to elect their representatives. As many as 354 candidates contested to return 87 members to the assembly. It was democracy versus the boycott call.

The problem with the Hurriyat is that it is frozen in time — when the Valley was agog with the demand for azadi. People have moved on because they have realised over the years, after losing thousands at the hands of the security forces, that the ground realities are far different from what the Hurriyat has been peddling.

This does not mean that the Valley’s alienation from India is over. It only means that the Kashmiris are questioning the Hurriyat’s way of seeking a settlement with New Delhi. They are sick and tired of violence and extremism and want peace and normalcy which they believe will give them back the tourists and free them from terrorists. Even those with guns did not disturb the polls lest they invoked the voters’ anger.

Without doubt, the Kashmiris want to have an identity of their own. The pattern of voting indicates that. Both the National Conference (NC) and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) have won practically all the seats in the Valley — the first getting 28 and the second 21 — underlining the aspirations of the Kashmiris to be different from the rest of India. The NC asked for autonomy plus and the PDP proposed self-rule and dual currency. Yet neither have talked of a status outside the Indian Union. It is, however, significant that the PDP increased its tally from 16 to 21 by taking a hawkish line. It looks as if it will continue to do that.

New Delhi would be deluding itself if it believes in the aftermath of the elections that it can arrive at a settlement without the separatists. They represent a dream which tickles the imagination even if it remains unfulfilled. However, there is a new opportunity for the governments at Srinagar and New Delhi to start afresh; to begin a dialogue with the separatists in order to hammer out a settlement which is acceptable to India, Kashmir and Pakistan.

The disconcerting fallout of the elections is reflected in the sharp division between the Kashmir and Jammu regions. The NC has won four seats in the Jammu region, and that too from Poonch where the Muslims have a majority. The party has also lost three per cent of the votes. The PDP has increased its support by 3.8 per cent but mostly from Poonch and Rajouri. Communal polarisation is also visible because the BJP which had only one seat has now returned 11. Its voting percentage has also increased in the Jammu region — from 12.4 to 21.8.

The Amarnath temple controversy over the piece of land allotted temporarily to the shrine management board came in handy for the BJP which was able to mix religion with politics and reap the harvest of agitated Hindu voters. The party also benefited from the negligence of the Jammu region as pointed out by various commissions. In comparison, the Valley’s main parties found less support from Hindus.

The Hurriyat too has no base in the Jammu region because it has preferred to give its movement an Islamic edge. The new government at Srinagar will have to give the Jammu region a sense of participation which it lacks. Otherwise, the sentiments for Jammu to be part of a neighbouring state in India may intensify.

The Congress, part of the ruling coalition after the last election, has suffered the most. It has lost 10.7 per cent of the electorate, 5.3 per cent in Jammu and 5.4 per cent in the Valley, although in terms of seats, its loss is only three. Its tally has been reduced from 20 to 17. The main reason for this is that it has been held responsible for the Amarnath land debacle, although it was the PDP minister who had approved the allotment when Ghulam Nabi Azad from the Congress was chief minister.

The NC and the Congress which have joined hands to form a coalition government represent the middle-of-the-road approach. Their problem will be to figure out how to deal with hardliners PDP and BJP. The PDP will try to distance Kashmir from the rest of India while the BJP would be for closer integration.

Election results show that the PDP, which has increased its vote percentage by 6.1, was helped by the Jamaat-i-Islami, headed by pro-Pakistan Syed Ali Shah Geelani. The NC and the Congress coalition have an absolute majority, 45 in the House. Yet, the history of relations between the two is not a happy one. The first government in the state was that of Sheikh Abdullah, the NC chief and grandfather of Omar Abdullah.

Jawaharlal Nehru was the prime minister of the Congress party. They were friends and comrades-in-arms in the struggle of independence against the British. This was an ideal combination. Yet they fell out and Sheikh Abdullah remained under detention for almost 12 years.

Once Nehru wrote to the Maharaja of Kashmir saying, “the only person who can deliver the goods in Kashmir is Abdullah.” But they went so far apart that Nehru wrote to him: “I greatly regret that you should have taken up a position which indicates that you do not value any friendly advice that we might give and, indeed, consider it as improper interference….”

Omar Abdullah, son of Farooq Abdullah, has an advantage because he knows the Gandhi family well. But personal relations may matter little if and when Srinagar pushes to implement the autonomy resolution which Farooq vainly tried to do when he was in power a few years ago. The central government’s authority, according to the Instrument of Accession Act, extends to three subjects: defence, foreign affairs and communications.

If New Delhi agrees to confine itself to three subjects, most of the separatists may go along. They have asked for azadi, but have yet to define it. Is New Delhi ready to roll back from the extra space it has occupied since the Instrument of Accession Act? Can Pakistan do likewise in Azad Kashmir, giving it all the subjects except defence, foreign affairs and communications? Elections in Jammu and Kashmir have provided yet another chance to sort out these questions.

The writer is a leading journalist based in Delhi.
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Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah said: "Hindus and Muslims would be the best of friends." Only if they could get rid of dishonest media & politicians

Peace is the only way out

By Kuldip Nayar

IT is a shame that only 13 out of 760 MPs were present recently to pay tribute to the watch and ward personnel shot dead on Dec 13 in the 2001 attack on the Indian parliament. I was then a member of the Rajya Sabha. The house had finished question hour and some members had called it a day. I was one of them.

But before I could leave, I heard shots and shouts to stay inside. We were roughly 500 members who took refuge in the central hall of parliament. Outside the hall were the tall statues of Jawaharlal Nehru and Maulana Abul Kalam Azad. I recalled how much the two had sacrificed, not only for the country’s independence but also for India’s ethos of democracy and pluralism. The terrorists wanted to harm those values.

There was hardly any MP who did not suspect Pakistan’s hand. Subsequently, the attack was linked to the Lashkar-i-Taiba. Again, the attack on Mumbai where nearly 200 people were killed was linked to the Lashkar and its offshoot Jamaatud Dawa.

Previously, India’s reaction was to station troops on the borders for almost one year. This time, the anger has been deeper and wider. Yet the government has shown restraint. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s only request to his Pakistani counterpart was to send the ISI chief. The Pakistani government agreed to do so, but was apparently unable to convince the army. We know the limit to which elected rulers in Pakistan can go. On the other hand, they have domestic opinion to placate. But why is Islamabad reluctant to take action against terrorists who have been identified as having lived in Pakistan. Whatever it has done so far against the terrorists, it is not on India’s request but on Washington’s. And whatever is done will be under international pressure.

In India, with the exception of a few warmongers, there is a realisation that there is no option other than peace. Defence Minister A.K. Antony has publicly stated that there will be no war. Some television channels which queered the pitch in India have been ticked off. The Rajya Sabha committee has issued guidelines to indicate what should not be covered, i.e. “the repeated display in the media of human corpses in case of … incidents of bomb blasts, arson, etc., which causes a negative psychological impact on the viewers. News channels in many foreign countries do not telecast the footage of dead bodies.”

In the media itself, there is serious discussion whether all it did was within the limits of objective journalism. I hope the same examination takes place in Pakistan. Some time later, editors of television channels and newspapers of the two countries can sit across the table and debate the matter threadbare.

The first story that the terrorist arrested belonged to Faridkot in Okara district of Pakistan’s Punjab was broken by Britain’s Observer. Dawn took the investigation further.

Subsequently, some Pakistani channels beamed interviews with Faridkot villagers. Why couldn’t this have been done before the Observer story? New Delhi has identified some of the dead terrorists and published their pictures. The Pakistan media should have pursued the story.

It is also time for the politicians of the two countries to undertake an introspection regarding their conduct. Even if they do not talk about war, their speeches and body language are far from friendly. They run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. Why are they stoking the fires of hatred when people on both sides are charged? Whether there is a campaign in Pakistan not to watch Indian movies is not known. But the halls showing Indian films are practically empty according to reports. On this side, the minister for sports and youth affairs says that the cricket series with Pakistan cannot take place after what happened in Mumbai. Thus the recrimination between the two countries goes on.

France and Germany fought for hundreds of years. Today they are the best of friends. Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah gave me this example when I asked him before Partition whether Hindus and Muslims would jump at each other’s throat once the British left. He said we would be the best of friends.

I have no doubt that one day this will happen. The assassinated Benazir Bhutto told me in London a few months before returning to Pakistan that she would have “a borderless subcontinent”. President Zardari has tried to go in the same direction, but has been rapped on the knuckles. Manmohan Singh has said many a time that destiny has thrown India and Pakistan together and they cannot but be good neighbours.

I admire the courage and commitment of people, even if a small group of them, in lighting candles in Karachi or taking out a procession in Lahore in memory of those who died in the Mumbai attack. This is the time when India needs understanding. This is also the time when faith in good relations between India and Pakistan is being tested.

Pakistan should understand India’s anger. Those who attacked Mumbai might be Al Qaeda or the Taliban who are playing havoc in Pakistan as well. But there are organisations which are helping, training and arming them. Why have such extremists remained beyond the pale of law? Even when some of them were ‘detained’ after the attack on India’s parliament, they were practically free to preach and spread poison.

Nobody has accused the Pakistan government for the attack on Mumbai. But Pakistan has not been able to insulate its territory which the terrorists continue to use as a launching pad as well as their refuge.

Unfortunately, some of the speeches in the Rajya Sabha were exactly on the lines of statements made in the US Congress after 9/11. President Bush attacked Iraq and Afghanistan and played havoc with America’s liberal values and traditions. It has taken all these years for the nation to assert itself through the election of Senator Barack Obama to the office of president. Civil societies in both countries should take note of this.

The writer is a leading journalist based in Delhi. (Dawn, 19 Dec 2008)
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The BJP's election plank will be Mumbai. This is understandable of a party which thrives on divisions and disruption - By Kuldip Nayar

Road that leads nowhere

By Kuldip Nayar

IT is difficult to say whether the assembly elections in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Chhattisgarh, Delhi and Mizoram are the semi-finals.

The voters were agitated and angry over the terror attack on Mumbai on Nov 26 and it is difficult to say how they would have voted in normal times. There are still four to five months left for the final — the Lok Sabha polls. Much will depend on the people’s mood which is getting nastier by the day.

The BJP has, however, made it clear that its election plank will be Mumbai. This is understandable of a party which thrives on divisions and disruptions. Yet what is not understandable is the absence of L.K. Advani from the all-party meeting called by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to discuss Mumbai and the aftermath. (Manmohan Singh and Advani did not travel in the same plane to Mumbai). The BJP’s second-rung leaders present at the meeting only criticised the government to their heart’s content. There was nothing wrong in pointing out the lapses in the system and there were many.

Advani could have presented them at the meeting. His presence would have sent a message to the terrorists and the world that whenever it came to India, the country was united and one. What happened in Mumbai has challenged the ethos of pluralism and the idea of India. Election is a means, not an end in itself. The end is governance through which the country’s ideals are protected.

Still the BJP has not given up its parochial agenda. When the fire of terrorism was raging, Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi was stomping in northern India, articulating national chauvinism. The party published joint advertisements in Mumbai newspapers blaming the government for surrendering to terror. Here was the time to raise the morale of the people, putting them back on their feet for a united response.

Advani and other BJP leaders should recall how former president Clinton offered his services to President Bush following the destruction of the Twin Towers in New York.

Surprisingly, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the BJP’s mentor, has urged for unity in the country. The BJP still has not realised that India’s faith in pluralism is not a matter of policy but a commitment. The nation’s temperament is secular. The BJP saw how the semi-final that it had won before the last Lok Sabha election got converted into a victory for the Congress, relatively less communal.

But there is no justification for Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s warning that the military option was open. India has sent a list of some 20 people who have reportedly taken refuge in Pakistan after committing acts of sabotage in India. Certain names are the same which were sent in 1993. The point to underline is not the repetition of names but Mukherjee’s ultimatum within 24 hours of dispatching the list. Islamabad should have been given ample time to consider the names.

Talking of military option in the same breath does not speak well for our respect for the sovereignty of Pakistan, even if India has the right to bomb training camps inside Pakistan. Former prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee was also pressed on that point during the war in Kargil. But he refused to allow the bombing because he feared that hostilities could escalate. US president-elect Barack Obama has not sanctioned the bombing of training camps. The media is twisting his words. In any case, the military option is not one that New Delhi should consider.

Cutting off diplomatic relations with Pakistan, stopping railway and air connections or similar measures are harsh but more than adequate to show anger by a nation which feels outraged. However intransigent Pakistan may be there is no option other than peace to bring it around. Civil society on the other side is not yet asserting itself but it will do so in due course of time. Even a limited war will give a handle to those forces which want perpetual hostility against India.

The biggest casualty will be India-Pakistan relations. They have deteriorated to such an extent in the last few days that even the eventuality of a full-scale war is not being ruled out. Both possess nuclear weapons and they would be destroyed whether one uses the device first and the other later. Voices of reason in both countries are few and they are hardly heard when anger gets a hold of them.

Maybe things could have been sorted out on the Mumbai happening if there had been confidence between the two. When Manmohan Singh requested President Asif Ali Zardari to send his Inter Services Intelligence chief to New Delhi, the prime minister assumed that he had developed such an equation with Zardari that he would agree to it. He did and the Pakistan Prime Minister’s Office announced that the ISI chief would be travelling to India.

It is another matter that some forces, called the third chamber in Pakistan, came in the way and nipped the effort in the bud. Had the ISI chief come, it would have established the joint mechanism to fight against terrorism that the two countries have been talking about for several months. Since there is no confidence between the two, Pakistan does not take into account even the confession made by the terrorist apprehended at the scene in Mumbai.

Whether he was trained in Muzaffarabad or came by boat from Karachi, it was for Pakistan to find out. By this time it should have searched the length and breadth of Karachi to satisfy India which feels angry. The new organisation in place of the Lashkar-i-Taiba and Jaish-i-Mohammad should have been banned and its activists arrested. Islamabad should have invited a team from New Delhi to check for itself how far Pakistan had gone to act. It would have given New Delhi proof of Islamabad assuaging India’s feelings.

Both countries should fight the scourge together.

It is a pity that people-to-people contact builds up goodwill inch by inch. But Mumbai-like incidents destroys this in a jiffy. Anti-friendship elements are too strong to allow the common man to live in a secure and peaceful environment.

Within India the disillusionment with politicians is understandable but not with politics. Better persons should be elected. Anger should not lead us to lose faith in democracy. In fact this is the system where we can change the rulers. In our effort to curb terrorism we should not take any step which may restrict individual freedom. America’s Patriot Act in the wake of 9/11 has done a lot of damage to that society. The test of a nation’s faith in democracy comes when it is challenged by undemocratic forces.

The writer is a leading journalist based in Delhi. (Dawn, 5 Dec 2008)
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Fighting terror in South Asia - By Kuldip Nayar

“THERE is no terror, Cassius, in your threats,” Julius Caesar tells him. Pakistan could have told India the same thing at the meeting of the joint anti-terror mechanism: recent bomb blasts at Malegaon and Modasa were not the doing of ‘Muslims from across the border’.

Nor did the Pakistani delegation point out that India had its own Hindu terrorists, led by a woman and trained by some ex-army men belonging to an old Sainik school. The meeting, fourth in the series, was ‘positive’, although quiet.

The earlier ones generally ended up with New Delhi demanding the custody of criminals who had taken shelter in Pakistan and Islamabad asking for more evidence. New Delhi has given ‘more evidence’ of the ‘involvement of the ISI’ in the attack on India’s embassy in Kabul. Yet, the purpose was not to put Pakistan on the mat because it was conceded at that very meeting that there could have been ‘some other elements’ involved in the incident. The matter was left at that pleasant note. It was a new beginning of sorts.

On the day the representatives of India and Pakistan met in Delhi the prime ministers of the two countries discussed terrorism in Beijing. Both reiterated that they were committed to work together to clamp down on terrorist forces. “Terror is a common enemy of both India and Pakistan,” said Manmohan Singh and Yusuf Raza Gilani concurred with him. The equation between the two holds promise for the future.

What creates doubts is that a similar exercise was done more than a year ago. But that wasn’t translated into a joint anti-terror mechanism. The Musharraf-led army dragged its feet. However, Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani has put terrorism at the top of his agenda. This may mean the end of infiltrators into India. But if the policy has changed the reasons are not difficult to comprehend.

One, the terrorists have become a menace to Pakistan itself. But the most important development is the change in the attitude of the rulers. President Asif Ali Zardari is at the helm of affairs. His approach to Pakistan’s problems with India is different from that of the earlier regimes. He wants to befriend India.

I saw this happening from close quarters when I heard the national security advisers of the two countries. At a small dinner given by the Pakistan high commissioner in Delhi, they said certain things which were unbelievable. India’s National Security Adviser M.K. Nayaranan admitted that he was a hawk but had come around to believe what Manmohan Singh told him: “India and Pakistan were destined to be together.” I do not know what transpired between the two during official meetings but Pakistan’s National Security Adviser Mahmud Ali Durrani told me that the talks were more successful than he ever expected.

It looks as if the clouds of hostility that loomed over India and Pakistan are thinning. Both Manmohan Singh and Zardari reached some understanding on how to fight terrorism in the two countries when they met at New York. Both Narayanan and Durrani were asked to prepare the ground which they did at Delhi. The joint mechanism will be built on it in the days to come. It is obvious that the different agencies operating in the two countries will have to fall in line, stopping what they are doing within and without. In the next few days, the Pakistani training camps which are a sore point with India may be dismantled.

All these measures are laudable. But they are only the means, not the end by themselves. The end is to normalise relations between the two countries. This is not possible until both curb radicals, Hindus and Muslims, in their own territory and stop efforts at mixing religion with politics.

India, a secular polity, is under pressure. Hindutva is gaining ground. Despite their anti-national activities, New Delhi is reluctant to take action against the Sangh Parivar which has spread all over, opening Hindu Jagran Manch offices in every state. The members recruited are getting training and weapons. With its eyes on the forthcoming assembly elections and later to the Lok Sabha, the Congress is found too timid, too faltering.

It is already a bit too late because the politics of hate is spreading as has been seen in Bihar and Maharashtra where the lumpen are fighting on the streets. Hindu terrorists want an ethnic purity in the areas where they live. A new avatar of the Shiv Sena, Raj Thackeray, has created his counterparts in Bihar. One of their leaders came to Mumbai this week and killed four persons while looking for Raj Thackeray to wreak vengeance.

This trend is reminiscent of MQM’s violence in Karachi and it is tearing apart the society in both countries and creating fear in the minds of ordinary people. How will the joint mechanism check those who have communalised terrorism in India and politicised it in Pakistan? Both are contaminating the liberal and democratic atmosphere as the Tamil extremists (the LTTE) are doing in Sri Lanka and the Harkatul Jihad-i-Islami (HJI) in Bangladesh.

The entire South Asia requires a common mechanism to fight against the growth of disruptive tendencies. India had kept them in check with some courage and determination. But lately it looks as if politics has taken over because of the impending elections. India cannot fail South Asia when liberal, democratic values are beginning to matter in the region.

For that reason, Islamabad cannot afford to talk to the Taliban in the NWFP and Fata. This would look like buying peace. It makes no sense to New Delhi if the Taliban are won over for the time being. They will resume pushing their archaic thinking after having consolidated themselves.

It is a pity that Nawaz Sharif, who is all for a strong viable Pakistan, favours a settlement with the Taliban. He should have drawn a lesson from what has happened to Asfandyar Wali Khan. Wali, along with his family, has taken refuge in London because the Taliban tried to kill him and threatened to eliminate the entire family. They are against any liberal thought. Nawaz Sharif’s Muslim League should stand by the Pakistan People’s Party to eliminate the Taliban who have a dream to rule both Pakistan and Afghanistan. The region’s dream is different.

The writer is a leading journalist based in Delhi
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Zardari wants to improve relations with India, terrorists and their supporters are enraged...

Breaking the old mould

By Kuldip Nayar (Daily Dawn)

ASIF Ali Zardari was never taken seriously in India. People either knew him as Benazir Bhutto’s husband or Mr Ten Per Cent. But his pronouncements after assuming charge of the Pakistan People’s Party began drawing attention in India.

He was applauded when he said, six months ago, that ties between the two countries should not be held “hostage” to the Kashmir issue. This was what New Delhi had been saying all along.

Since Zardari’s point of view did not fit into Islamabad’s policy which ‘mindset bureaucrats’, crusty politicians and the army top brass devised and pursued, he was denounced. Islamabad interpreted his statement differently and reiterated the same old policy. Even Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, whom I met in Islamabad subsequently, rationalised that Zardari did not mean what was being presumed.

Zardari, now Pakistan’s president, has expressed similar thought in a more explicit way. He seems to have stirred up a hornets’ nest of opposition on the Kashmir issue. In an interview to a US daily, he said that “Kashmiri militants are the terrorists.” I do not understand the furore over the remark. He has not given away Kashmir, nor has he withdrawn the claim on the state. All that he has done is to describe today’s militants as terrorists who, by no stretch of the imagination, are ‘freedom fighters’, the title that Gen Pervez Musharraf gave them.

If this definition is accepted, the entire argument of fighting against the Taliban falls flat. They too are up in arms to ‘free’ people from the modern way of thinking and living because it, according to them, defiles ‘Islamic behaviour’. (The Taliban have burnt down 125 girls’ schools in the territory under them). Who are the militants except those who were first trained and armed by Gen Ziaul Haq to bleed India and then sustained by Gen Pervez Musharraf till 9/11 when the entire scene changed drastically?

True, when the 1987 state elections in Kashmir were rigged, many from among the youth crossed into Pakistan and obtained arms after getting training in their use. The first phase of the insurgency was not sullied either by religious fervour or by senseless killings. But that phase ended soon and the fundamentalists took over. Terrorists operating under different names of the Lashkar-i-Taiba continue to indulge in violence and encounters. They kill the innocent. Should they be called freedom fighters or mujahideen as the fundamentalists claim? Terrorism cannot be fought if its perpetrators are hailed when they infiltrate Kashmir and condemned when they operate in Pakistan. Zardari sees the point. Others, prisoners of old policies, don’t.

I am a bit disappointed by the criticism coming from the Muslim League led by Nawaz Sharif. He knows better because he saw through the game when he flew to Washington to retrieve the honour of his armed forces after the debacle at Kargil. They are the same terrorists who indulged in bomb blasts in Lahore, Bhakkar or elsewhere. They are the ones who burnt the Marriott in Islamabad. If Nawaz Sharif were to analyse the situation dispassionately, he would come to the same conclusion as Zardari has. Political considerations should not cloud Nawaz Sharif’s judgment.

Kashmir is an issue which has to be settled. There is no running away from it. But should even limited ties between the two countries depend on the solution of Kashmir? Both sides have wasted 60 long years and have fought three wars. They are nowhere nearer the Kashmir solution than they were in 1948. Had we reversed the order and facilitated trade and travel first, we would have generated enough goodwill to take up thorny problems like Kashmir.

Whenever I have visited Pakistan, I have found the climate improving. There is no tension. Pakistanis are awakening to New Delhi’s difficulties in keeping its polity pluralistic as well as democratic. India is ashamed of many happenings, particularly those which have made a mockery of our secular credentials.

Still the majority of people are trying to restore the ‘balance’ which India has come to represent over the years. The task has become more difficult because a band of Taliban has come up among the Hindus. Since we are nearing the general election, the BJP is at its old game of dividing the society. The party, burning with the ambition to return to power, is using all methods to incite the Hindus that constitute the majority.

Equation with Islamabad is an essential ingredient to protect the ethos of secularism. This is where I find Zardari different from the general run of politicians in Pakistan. He is preparing his country to face certain realities. He has no hesitation in saying that India is not a threat to his country. He has recognised India’s economic prowess. He rightly imagines Pakistani cement factories being constructed to provide for India’s huge infrastructure needs, Pakistan textile mills meeting Indian demand for blue jeans, Pakistani ports being used to relieve the congestion. What is wrong with that?

Mercifully, the clarification which Pakistan’s Information Minister Sherry Rehman issued regarding Zardari’s interview is confined to Kashmir. The most important part regarding economic cooperation between the two countries seems to have general support in Pakistan. It goes without saying that vested interests do not see anything beyond the Kashmir issue. And they are plugging the same old line. I concede that Kashmir is the core issue. But certain steps like trade, travel and sharing technology will pave the ground to tackle the issue more effectively.

Even on Kashmir, Sherry Rehman has said that Zardari never called the Hurriyat leaders terrorists. He did not comment on them. Why bring in something he never said? He wants Pakistan to be at par with India. But at the same time Zardari is not scared of India’s influence abroad.

One thing striking about Zardari is that he is courageous enough to tread the ground on which politicians of the old mould fear to walk. Leaders of different parties in Pakistan have a viewpoint on India that is not divergent from one another’s. Kashmir is a symptom, not the disease. The disease is the feeling which the country’s size and economy evokes. It has more to do with fear than with religious bias.

No doubt, New Delhi is closely watching what Zardari does or says. His meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in New York went extremely well. It seems the latter was impressed by the former’s frankness. Pakistan is passing through difficult times. New Delhi has to do something concrete to express its solidarity with Islamabad, more so with the nascent democracy. It is in India’s own interest.

The writer is a leading journalist based in Delhi.
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War on terror & India’s stake

By Kuldip Nayar

THE burning of Islamabad’s Marriott hotel that Indian channels showed at length is still etched in the memory of horrified people. They are worried about Pakistan. Even the hawks do not conceal their anxiety.

The intelligentsia’s concern is that the nascent democratic government in Islamabad might not be able to cope with the likes of the Al Qaeda and Taliban and might have to depend on the military which would want its price.

People do not know how far the Al Qaeda-Taliban combine has penetrated Pakistan. But the belief is that the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) and, to a large extent, the NWFP province, is under the control of the Taliban. Were they to ‘capture’ more territory, what would be its effect on India is the greatest worry. President Asif Ali Zardari’s remark that “the Taliban have an upper hand” is all the more unnerving. America agrees with him.

A Pakistani television commentator has challenged Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani to travel from Kohat to Bannu. The commentator’s contention is that the Pakistan government had already “withdrawn” from this area. If this is true, there is some truth in the repeated allegation that former President Pervez Musharraf, even while in uniform, was never serious about curbing Al Qaeda and the Taliban. He found it an effective way to milch America. That he connived at the intervention of the US troops on Pakistani soil is an open secret.

In contrast, Zardari’s statement or that of army chief Gen Kayani that Pakistan’s sovereignty would not be allowed to be trifled with has come as a welcome surprise. Islamabad is defending its territory and there are signs of it when its guns drove away American helicopters the other day. Pakistan is careful not to engage the superpower but whatever Islamabad is doing to keep its dignity intact needs to be commended.

I do not think that the Al Qaeda-Taliban combine is seeking territory in Pakistan. They want the northern areas which would help them to recapture Afghanistan which was under their rule until they were pushed out by nationalist Afghan forces with the help of America.

In fact, the US is responsible for the birth of the Taliban. During the Cold War when Washington wanted to bleed Moscow to death, America trained and armed fundamentalists to oust the irreligious Soviet Union from Afghanistan. America won the Cold War when the Soviet Union collapsed under the weight of what happened to it in Afghanistan. Those fundamentalists are today’s Taliban and they have the weapons which were liberally provided by America.

Indian civil society does realise that Al Qaeda’s progress in Pakistan is a danger. Already the presence of Al Qaeda has been reported in Kerala, India’s southern-most state, and in Kashmir, the northern-most part. An intelligence agency has linked the recent bomb blasts in the country to the outfit.

What is not probably appreciated amply is that Pakistan’s war against the Taliban is India’s war too. If ever Pakistan goes under, India’s first line of defence would collapse. The Taliban would have secured the launching pad to attack India’s values of democracy and liberalism which do not fit into their scheme of things. These are the same Taliban who destroyed the Buddha statues at Bamiyan despite the appeal of the entire civilised world.

Terrorism is the means, and a ‘Talibanistan’ is the end. New Delhi and Islamabad should jointly fight against the menace. The two had decided at one time to set up a joint mechanism to fight terror. There is still nothing on the ground. Some joint action should have been visible after the blasts in Delhi and Islamabad. Mutual suspicions are so strong that they cannot override them even when the enemy is at work from within. One hopes that the New York meeting between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President Zardari will change the scenario as both are keen on normalising relations.

Making peace with the militants or having a ceasefire, as proposed by certain influential quarters in Pakistan, may stall the Taliban but not defeat them. Terrorism is a cancer as Zardari has diagnosed correctly, and it must be eliminated. The villain of the piece is Musharraf who said he was fighting against the Taliban when he was conniving at their penetration. He should be put on the mat for having aggravated the situation. His plan to have them in Afghanistan to gain ‘strategic depth’ for Pakistan started the whole thing.

There is a lesson for New Delhi which is a sad picture of inaction and ineptness when assessed in terms of action taken against communal forces. Law and order has always been a state subject. Still the centre’s response has been lukewarm. It sent to Orissa, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and Kerala a piece of advice on the lines of Article 355 which enjoins upon the Union to protect states against external aggression and internal disturbance. Had New Delhi’s order gone under Article 355 itself, the Bajrang Dal, a SIMI among Hindus, would not have openly butchered Christians and burnt churches. Surprisingly, there is no ban on the Bajrang Dal. New Delhi has done well to reject the demand of the Bharatiya Janata Party for bringing back the Prevention of Terrorist Activities Act which authorised the state to detain people for months without trial. It was used against the Naxalites and Muslims mercilessly. In this atmosphere, the Muslims would have been the target.

Terrorism, no doubt, leaves death and destruction in its wake. But the most fearsome fallout is that the confidence of the people is shaken. Governments can see, after every event, the gaps in their intelligence and other apparatus and promise to do better. But the impact of the incidents may well be irreparable because certain communities feel alienated.

This is what has happened after the encounter at Zakir Bagh in Delhi where two terrorists and one police inspector were killed. The debate over the veracity of the ‘encounter’ is still raging. The locality believes it was stage-managed. Why such a feeling arises is because of the credibility gap between the people and the authorities.

The matter is much more serious: Muslims and Christians have lost faith in the fairness of the state. This will be hard to restore if the secular forces do not assert themselves and retrieve Muslims, Christians and, more so, the Hindus from the bias and prejudice in which many are stuck.

Meanwhile, a survey conducted by a television network in four big cities — Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai — has shown that 67 per cent of the people feel insecure. They are haunted by the fear that they do not know what would happen to them if they were to step out of their homes. This is, indeed, a sad reflection on the central and state governments.

The writer is a leading journalist based in Delhi. (Dawn)
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