This was a very genuine advice given to the Prime Minister a year ago. It is even more pertinent today
The very idea of having unconditional talks with India in the prevailing astrosphere of extreme mutual mistrust is preposterous. Talks for the sake of talks has been going on for more than half a century. Infact there were times when talks used to have a declared objective— the objective of resolving the Kashmir dispute. The Indian stand used to be that no such dispute existed; and if it did exist, it was that Pakistan had occupied a chunk of Kashmir which it had to vacate. And Pakistan’s stand was (is and should be) that the people of Kashmir were entitled to the right of self-determination as per the resolutions of the U.N Security Council to which both the countries were signatories.
Even if we trace back the history of talks to 1962 when Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was pitched against Sardar Swaran Singh, there was just one-word agenda—Kashmir.
How can talks now be unconditional after so much bloodshed and so much unfolding of history?
Do Washington and Moscow remember any talks which were without an agenda –and could be classified as unconditional?
If there are going to be talks between India and Pakistan, these can’t but be on Kashmir. If India adds Bombay shootings to the agenda, Pakistan can equalize by adding India’s proxy war on Pakistan through Baloch separatists.
It is time Mian Nawaz Sharif goes though a “Spine Transplant”. Nations which have weaklings, bean-counters or merchants as their leaders cannot expect a fair deal from God.
