- Has the ice been broken?
Not all that much can be read into the meeting between Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi and his Indian counterpart, Sushma Swaraj, at Bishkek on Wednesday, on the sidelines of the foreign ministers’ meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation. The meeting came after Ms Swaraj’s principal, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, had campaigned for re-election on a firmly anti-Pakistan stance. Those polls are not only over, but results are to be declared, and Mr Modi is likely to be re-elected. It should be noted that Ms Swaraj had avoided a meeting with Mr Qureshi at a previous multilateral meeting in Dubai while Mr Modi was building up his anti-Pakistan credentials for the election.
With India having gone as far down the path of sabre-rattling as it had done, the meeting happening at all was a sign that Mr Modi might be willing to go along with the peace process now that he was heading for re-election. He has two opportunities next month of meeting Prime Minister Imran Khan in a non-summit atmosphere. The first will be in the UK, where both leaders are going to see part of the Cricket World Cup. Then there will be the SCO Summit, for which the foreign ministers’ meeting was a preparation.
India has been successful to the extent that it has made the happening of contact the focus of diplomatic effort. This has been particularly marked during the tenure of the Modi government. However, India should realise from the facts, that its policy of shoving contentious issues under the carpet, has not solved them. For example, ignoring Kashmir, or to try to change its demography (as the BJP is pledged to do), has led to making the situation there even more explosive, so that the whole of India is destabilised, not just its Northwest. Mr Modi must use his fresh mandate to move forward, to realise either that India cannot become a great power because the era of great powers is over in this era of the multinational, nor if it is on bad terms with its neighbours. Pakistan is not the only neighbour it has tried to bully or browbeat. Mr Modi must realise that myths may be peddled to win elections, but governing requires facing facts.
