The eleventh summit of the South Asian Association of Regional Co-operation (SAARC) will be remembered for two things-the first is that despite the tension created by the Pakistani terrorists in India and Pakistan, it was after all held. Secondly, the biting sarcasm of Atal Behari Vajpayee that must have stung stuntman Pervez Musharraf in response to his handshake with shri Vajpayee at the end of his speech.
With not much substantial work before the heads of the states and Governments at the summit, the question that was uppermost in the minds of everyone was whether the summit would at all be held. India would have been entirely justified in not attending it, given the perfidious behaviour of Pakistan all along, culminating in the December 13 attack on Parliament House in New Delhi. However, if India had abstained, the entire summit would have fallen through because India being the largest of the seven SAARC nations, her absence would have made the summit at Katmandu's a meaningless exercise. India rightly decided to attend it and not let history be repeated as in the case of the earlier summit proposed in 1999.
By taking the decision to attend the summit, India decided to take on Pakistan squarely it was anticipated that Musharraf would be up to some game, particularly a public relations exercise of the type one saw at Agra in July last year. Secondly, and more important from India's point of view, not attending the summit would have meant letting down Nepal, the host. Despite all the pitfalls in recent times, Indo-Nepal relations stand at an entirely different footing and India has stood by her closest neighbour by deciding to attend the summit. The Government and the people of Nepal are certainly grateful to India for this gesture.
For Nepal, it was also a question of not only prestige, but to demonstrate to the world at large that despite the threat by the Maoist rebels, the Government of Nepal was able, without any security lapse, to hold the summit even when the strong base of the Maoists lies within the capital complex, particularly in the Lalitpur township adjacent to Kathmandu.
Coming back to President/ Chief of the Army/Chief Executive Officer of Pakistan, there is reasonable ground to believe that his delayed arrival at Kathmandu from China was deliberate. By the time he was leaving Beijing, where he had gone for another of his periodic "Connotations" prior to the summit, he must have been told that a Pakistan Embassy official at Kathmandu had been arrested by the Nepalese police on charge of possessing fake currency notes of India and the United States. The incident had so enraged the Pakistani leader that he was not prepared to come to Kathmandu, it is said, from Chengdu, the western town, where his aircraft had landed because of heavy fog en route. Diplomatic strings were pulled and he ultimately came to Kathmandu three hours late, resulting in the postponement of the summit by one day, from January 4 to 5. Not even an expression of regret came forth from Musharraf after he had dealt an insult to the other six leaders by coming late.
After delivering his address, which did not contain even once the word terrorism as pointed out by Shri Vajpayee, the Pakistani President, instead of returning to his seat, came in front of the seats and ignoring all others, went to Shri Vajpayee and offered his hand. Shri Vajpayee was somewhat surprised, but he quickly rose in his scat and shook the Presidents hand.
Most media persons, who were waiting for some dramatics at the summit, were elated at this incident. They had got their "story" for which they were waiting for two or three days. Many among them thought that Musharraf had repeated, an Agra at Kathmandu.
But Musharraf proved to be too clever by half. Shri Vajpayee immediately perceived that the General was once again up to some mischief, and within a very short time, had an additional paragraph prepared for his address and delivered it with considerable punch. The world at large -live telecast had made this possible too appreciated the real snub that Musharraf got from the Indian Prime Minister. The media too got what they had wanted, in ample measure if one may so.
Here is what Shri Vajpayee said with respect to the handshake:
"I am glad that President Musharraf extended a hand of friendship to me. I have shaken his hand in your presence: Now President Musharraf must follow its gesture by not permitting any activity in Pakistan or any territory under its control today which enables terrorists to perpetuate mindless violence in India. I say this because of our past experience. I went to Lahore with a hand of friendship. We were rewarded by aggression in Kargil and the hijacking of the Indian Airlines aircraft from Kathmandu. I invited President Musharraf to Agra. We were rewarded with the terrorist attack on the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly and last month on the Parliament of India. But we would be betraying the expectations of our peoples if we did not chart out the course towards satisfying the unfulfilled promises of our common South Asian destiny."
Another development that must not have escaped notice of keen observers is that Pakistan blamed Nepal for the arrest of its embassy staff "in collaboration with India". This is for the first time since the late sixties when the Pakistan Embassy was opened in Nepal that such a strong statement against the host country was made by the Embassy, betraying the change of stance of the part of Nepal towards Pakistan.
India won firm commitment against terrorism from Bhutan and Sri Lanka and of course Nepal, which itself is now feeling the heat of terrorism indulged in by Maoists. Maldives too lends support to India, more so because some years ago, the-regime there was sought to be toppled by terrorists, who were ultimately put down by India at the request of the Maldividian Government.
Only Bangladesh still has to commit unequivocally against all forms of terrorism, probably because a Begum Khaleda Zia's government is strongly linked with the extremist Islamic parties there. One hopes that she recalls the fact that her husband was killed by some people, said to be terrorists. The fundamentalists among her supporters cannot be relied upon to behave in a civilised manner, because of what we have seen in USA recently and have been witnessing every day for the last decade in Jammu and Kashmir and elsewhere.
The SAARC summit, therefore, is a landmark achievement for India and it was a wise decision on the part of the Indian leadership to attend it. (It also became apparent that India was not being intransigent on issue like terrorism and is open to discussions with Pakistan only if that country stops cross-border terrorism.)
It is evident that Pakistan took no steps to meet India's concerns expressed after the December 13 attack on Parliament. As stated by the External Affairs Minister, India conveyed to Pakistan the need to impose a ban on Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) and confiscate their properties. Pakistan took no action until the US pressurised the General to act. It is clear that Musharraf has a different agenda now. All his earlier attempts to internationalise the Kashmir issue have failed. For any ruler in Pakistan, it is imperative to keep the Kashmir issue alive in order to remain in power. The ISI army-clergy combine in Pakistan will dismiss the new self appointed CEO in hours if he gives up the Kashmir issue although an overwhelming majority of the people want that country to pursue a path of peace and friendship with India, And going by the changed world scenario after the September 11 attack on the US, the world's super-cop is in no mood to entertain Pakistan's terrorism export business.
Nevertheless, it is unfortunate that the US State Department is yet to learn the basics of the modem-day terrorism as unleashed on a civil society by Pakistan and her friends.
Pakistan today is the hub of all the evils that confront the world. Pakistan would never be able to nab the dreaded terrorists who are sheltered in Islamabad, Karachi and other hide-outs. Pakistan's Foreign Minister Abdul Sattar's offer to look at extradition of criminals within the ambit of SAARC convention is another ploy to hoodwink the international community. Islamabad is yet to enact the necessary legislation to regularise even the earlier SAARC convention requirements. There is no formal arrangement between the CBI and Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency (FIA). In fact Pakistan has not arrested even one criminal against whom Interpol Red Corner notice has been issued.
In order to circumvent these legal compulsions, Islamabad's CEO supporting terrorist and fanatical group operating openly on its soil against India, calling themselves "freedom fighters". After what the US State Department's Congressional Research Office (CRO) has provided, there is hardly any evidence required to prove Pakistan's involvement in providing vital warfare equipments, training and financial support to these terrorists.
The US which has initiated a global war on terrorism must realise that the terrorists who operate from Pakistani soil against India are the same ones who have destroyed the WTO twin towers in New York. This is evident from the links between Pakistan intelligence, ISI papers, the Taliban-al-Qaeda network and the clinching evidence recovered from terrorists killed or caught in Kashmir: Numerous Taliban soldiers arrested or killed in Afghanistan by the US army, including John Walker Lindh have fought in Kashmir. They are different heads of the same hydra-headed monster produced by the religious fanaticism spawned in Pakistan and used by the Taliban.
It will be difficult rather impossible for General Musharraf, himself a product of the dreaded ISI, to eliminate the Frankenstein monster in Pakistan.
More than anyone else, he himself
is best aware of this bitter truth. And that should explain his pretensions
of cracking down on terrorism on the one hand and aiding and abating terrorist
outfits at home at the same time. Like Pakistani rulers, Musharraf is also
riding a tiger.