The seemingly perpetual tensions between most of its members have always hobbled Saarc and its ability to make both diplomatic and economic progress. India, the largest country in the association, has had various issues with all the other Saarc members at some point and, of course, the Kashmir issue has always been a thorn in its side. The Saarc interior ministers’ conference in Islamabad fell victim to these same problems. Even before the summit had started, signs were ominous when the Bangladesh home minister, whose country has poor relations with Pakistan right now over the dubious trials and executions of politicians for their alleged role in the 1971 conflict, pulled out of the conference. The conference itself will only be remembered for the spat between Indian Home Minister Rajnath Singh and our Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan. Singh denounced Pakistan’s alleged patronage of terrorism and said there should be no distinction drawn between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ terrorism. This obviously drew the ire of Nisar who interrupted Singh to point out that the problem in Kashmir is not one of terrorism but of India’s brutal occupation and the denial of the rights of Kashmiris. Both men then skipped a Saarc lunch and Sindh walked out of the conference and headed home before attending the final session of the day. This was as if he had arrived here only to create a scene.
Once safely back home, Singh appeared before parliament and once again shamelessly denounced the resistance of the occupation in Kashmir as terrorism. He claimed his speech was blacked out by the Pakistani media and received unanimous support for his denunciation of Pakistan. This is a tactic India has used many times before. To deflect attention away from its treatment of Kashmiris, it brings in the bogeymen of Pakistan and terrorism. The whole world has seen India’s latest crackdown and its use of rubber pellets against even children and yet, other than Pakistan, most countries turn a blind eye to this unjustified violence. The rest of the Saarc summit turned out to be a damp squib as the Kashmir and terrorism issues drowned out everything else. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s address to the summit focused on matters such as energy and greater economic cooperation while Nisar talked about drug smuggling and other law-enforcement issues. There should be scope for Saarc to work together on such matters even while it is politically divided but, as Singh’s walkout showed, that is not about to happen so long as India has the arrogance to feels that it should not be questioned about its terrorism in Kashmir.
https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/140468-The-Singh-scene
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