The Hindu : Opinion / News Analysis : The Armitage mission

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Monday, Jul 05, 2004

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The Armitage mission

By C. Raja Mohan

NEW DELHI, JULY 4. The visit by the United States Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage, to India next week will probably be the last high-level visit from the Bush administration before election fever begins to grip Washington.

Although Mr. Armitage's visit is part of a wider regional tour, it provides a valuable opportunity to review and wrap up some of the unfinished agenda between India and the U.S. under the Bush administration.

The focus of improved Indo-U.S. relations in the last few years has centred around the initiative "Next Steps in Strategic Partnership" (NSSP) that was announced by the U.S. President, George W. Bush, and the then Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, in January.

New Delhi and Washington had been discussing this since Mr. Vajpayee and Mr. Bush first met in November 2001. Under the Bush administration, the American nuclear agenda in India moved away from the policy of the Clinton administration which sought to "cap, roll back and eventually eliminate" India's nuclear weapons programme.

The Bush administration, instead, promised to explore ways to promote high technology cooperation with India while strengthening the broader objectives of the global non-proliferation regime.

Under the NSSP, India and the U.S. were to take a series of reciprocal steps to promote non-proliferation and ease the transfer of advanced technologies to India. But its implementation has run against bureaucratic obstacles on both sides.

The visit here last month by the U.S. Under Secretary of Commerce, Ken Juster, sought to clarify matters. The Armitage visit should provide the occasion to clinch at least the first phases of the NSSP and provide a stable foundation for further high technology cooperation between New Delhi and Washington irrespective of the results of the U.S. Presidential elections in November.

* * *

Mr. Armitage, who also travels to Pakistan, will have an opportunity to discuss the regional situation, including the latest developments in the India-Pakistan dialogue. The Bush administration should be pleased with the broad range of confidence-building measures that India proposed in the recent talks with Pakistan.

Besides the agreements on additional nuclear CBMs, India laid on the table a whole package of ideas on conventional military stability, as well as another seeking to promote cooperation across the Line of Control in Jammu and Kashmir.

Mr. Armitage who is expected to arrive here early next week has been one of the administration's point men for India throughout the tenure of the Bush administration. His first visit to India was in May 2001 to brief the Government on Mr. Bush's initiative on missile defence.

He was also involved in the efforts to defuse the India-Pakistan military confrontation in June 2002 by extracting a promise from the Pakistan President, Pervez Musharraf, that there will be a permanent end to cross-border infiltration. Mr. Armitage has also taken active interest in the peace process in Sri Lanka.

* * *

India has good reasons to pore over the debates at the Organisation of Islamic Conference that met at the ministerial level in Istanbul last month. It is not the annual resolution on Jammu and Kashmir that the OIC routinely passes at the behest of Pakistan that draws India's interest.

New Delhi is welcoming the change of attitude among some OIC member states, which have been quietly urging Pakistan to tone down the resolutions against India. Foreign Ministers from Sudan, Saudi Arabia and Algeria among others argued this time that the OIC should not complicate the India-Pakistan peace process by an offensive approach on Kashmir. Instead, their argument went, the OIC should help reinforce the positive developments in India-Pakistan relations.

Some countries, especially Sudan and Qatar, had been pressing for an observer status for India in the OIC. The last time such an initiative was taken a couple of years ago; it turned out to be premature. With India now supporting Pakistan's entry into the Commonwealth and the ASEAN Regional Forum, one would hope that Islamabad would change its approach to India's participation in the OIC.

* * *

An unproductive debate continues in the media on the significance of the mention of the U.N. in the joint statement issued last week by the Indian and Pakistani foreign secretaries. Anyone with a sense of realpolitik would dismiss the notion that the mere mention of the U.N. Charter in a joint statement would lead to an internationalisation of the Kashmir question.

The Shimla Agreement (in India) and the U.N. resolutions on Kashmir (in Pakistan) have acquired political connotations in the subcontinent far beyond their original meaning. The references to these in both countries are meant for public posturing; they have no real operational meaning.

India-Pakistan relations have evolved considerably since the Shimla Agreement was signed 32 years ago. Nuclear weapons have transformed the strategic context of the bilateral relations. Equally important, India's core concern with Pakistan today relates to cross-border terrorism.

The Indian diplomatic and military establishment was always deeply divided on whether India got the best it could out of Pakistan at Shimla in 1972. But that is a professional debate about India's diplomatic history. It is of no special policy consequence today in dealing with Islamabad.

The fact remains that no Indian Government will ever submit itself to the U.N. on Kashmir. India might be a great champion of multilateralism on other issues, but on Kashmir, the U.N. will remain a taboo for India.

India has no problem in referring to the Charter of the U.N., of which it is a member. Its real objection is to the U.N. resolutions on Kashmir. India will stick to bilateralism with Pakistan, because it has the national strength to resist internationalisation — not because of a mere joint statement.

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