Obama’s pitch: Fix Kashmir for UN Security Council seat
WASHINGTON: Go for a Kashmir solution and help bring stability to the region for a ticket to UN Security Council membership and fulfilling your big power aspirations. That’s the broad message President Barack Obama will be bringing to New Delhi during his upcoming November visit to India, preparation for which are in full swing in Washington DC.
The Kashmir settlement-for-seat at high table idea (euphemism for UNSC membership) is being discussed animatedly in the highest levels of the US administration, according to a various sources. President Obama himself has decided to revive the process of a US push in this direction, albeit discreetly, because of New Delhi’s sensitivities.
Key administration officials are confirming that the UNSC issue will be on Obama’s agenda when he visits New Delhi. The US President is expected to announce an incremental American support to India’s candidature during his address to the joint session of India’s parliament, depending on New Delhi’s receptiveness to resolving the Kashmir tangle.
“[UNSC reforms] is something that is under discussion as we prepare for the President’s important visit,” US Assistant Secretary of State Robert Blake confirmed on Monday during a read-out of the meeting between Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her Indian counterpart S. M. Krishna, saying the two had agreed the “President’s visit will be a defining moment in the history of our bilateral relations.”
The clearest insight into Obama’s thinking on the matter comes from Bob Woodward‘s latest book “Obama’s War” in which top US policy makers are shown mulling on defusing the Kashmir situation as part of an exit strategy for US from the AfPak theater.
“Why can’t we have straightforward talks with India on why a stable Pakistan is crucial?” Obama is reported as musing at one meeting. “India is moving toward a higher place in its global posture. A stable Pakistan would help.” Implicit in the rumination is the idea that settling Kashmir would mollify Pakistan, where, US officials say, hardliners are using the unresolved issue as an excuse to breed an army of terrorists aimed at bleeding India.
But that is easier said than done, according to Bruce Riedel, author of the Obama administration’s Af-Pak strategy, who has canvassed the centrality of the Kashmir issue to peace and stability in the region. The spoiler to any settlement is the hardline Pakistani military and its jihadist proxies for whom attrition and confrontation with India is an article of faith.
In fact, the solution Washington has in mind (also proposed by Riedel) is likely more palatable to New Delhi than to Islamabad. It’s on the same lines of what Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Pakistan’s deposed military leader Pervez Musharraf broadly agreed on before the latter was turfed out of office: The Line of Control would become the international border, but it would be a soft, permeable border, allowing Kashmiris on both sides to move back and forth. The rest – safeguards, procedures etc – is a matter of detail.
“President Obama’s strategy for dealing with Afghanistan and Pakistan always needed a Kashmir component to succeed; that need is becoming more urgent and obvious now. His trip to India in November will be a key to addressing it,” Riedel said in a commentary this week.
“India cannot become a global power with a prosperous economy if its neighbor is a constant source of terror armed with the bomb. A sick Pakistan is not a good neighbor,” he added, echoing Obama’s words (Woodward’s book also suggests he influenced Obama’s thinking).
Virtually setting the agenda for Obama’s India visit, Riedel says Obama’s challenge is to quietly help Islamabad and New Delhi work behind the scenes to get back to the deal Musharraf and Singh negotiated. “He will have a chance to work this subtly when he visits India in November,” he writes.
But Riedel and other US policy makers portrayed in Woodward’s book also recognize that the biggest hurdle to a settlement is a hardline Pakistani military. While the civilian leadership in Pakistan would like to embrace the deal “it is unclear if the army chief, General Kayani, is on board.” Woodward’s book shows that most top US officials, save Admiral Mike Mullen, believe Kayani to be a closet jihadi and a two-faced “liar” intent on perpetuating war with India. “I’ll be the first to admit it, I’m India-centric,” Kayani is quoted as telling US officials in one exchange.
Although three top cabinet principals from India — S.M.Krishna, A.K.Antony, and Pranab Mukherjee — are in the US this week and next, exchanges on the UNSC and Kashmir are said to be taking place directly between President Obama and Prime Minister Singh through trusted interlocutors such as National Security Advisor Shiv Shankar Menon, who is also in Washington DC this week.
While All Party Hurriyat Conference Senior leader Syed Ali Geelani termed the US President Barack Obama’s statement linking Indian UN Security Council (UNSC) membership with Kashmir settlement as an important break through. He welcomed the US President statement of pitching Kashmir settlement-for-seat; however he made it clear that Kashmiris will not accept settlement of the decades-old dispute contrary to the wishes and aspirations of Kashmiris. Geelani expressed these views while talking to News Agency from Srinagar on Wednesday. He said that he read the daily The Time of India story wherein the US President conditioned India UN Security Council seat with Kashmir dispute’s settlement.
“Go for a Kashmir solution and help bring stability to the region for a ticket to UN Security Council membership and fulfilling your big power aspirations. That’s the broad message President Barack Obama will be bringing to New Delhi during his upcoming November visit to India, preparation for which are in full swing in Washington DC.”
Geelani to a question said that it is important break through that other states of the world also realized the importance of the long-standing dispute, however he said that the important point is that it must be resolved according to the aspirations and whishes of Kashmiris.
Kashmir is not a border dispute between two states so to resolve accordingly, but it is vital to resume tripartite dialogue for the settlement of the long-pending Kashmir dispute, he added. He said that Indian civil society also supporting their freedom struggle that was the reason on September 30 in six Indian states strikes would be observed to express solidarity with the Kashmiri people. Geelani said that even one India celebrated civil society activist went on to say that Kashmir never remained part of India.
Answering another question, he said that no one could deny importance of dialogue, but unfortunately India was not senior in settlement of Kashmir dispute that was the reason when he presented five points formula before the Indian delegation, they accepted four out of them as they were not ready to accept Kashmir disputed status.
To a question he replied that taking part in dialogue is meaningless unless India did not change its stubbornness. Answering another question, he said that India, Pakistan and China are not willing to accept Kashmir as an independent entity, adding that Kashmiris were subjected to the Indian atrocity that was why they had no option except to join Pakistan. He made it clear that Kashmiris are determined and they would lead the freedom struggle to its logical ends at all cost.-SANA
Popularity: 1% [?]
Loading ...
[...] recent New York Times’ story and the assertions made about Pakistan in Bob Woodwords latest book “Obama’s Wars” and stressed the need of positive messaging from the US about Pakistan rather than planted negative [...]