Opinion Zardari at UN

There is good news and bad news from Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari’s speech at the United Nations General Assembly this week. The former is about the commitment of Pakistan’s democratically elected leaders to pursue regional cooperation and reconciliation. The latter is about Zardari’s inability to push the Pakistan army and the ISI on ending their support to terror groups.

The good news first. Zardari underlined the importance of strengthening democracy in Pakistan and blamed the international community for embracing Pakistan’s military dictators in the past.

“These dictators and their regimes are responsible for suffocating and throttling Pakistan,Pakistan’s institutions,and Pakistani democracy,” Zardari said. While he did not refer to the Pakistan army directly,there is no doubt on who the target of his public criticism from an international podium was.

Zardari reminded the world that his “will be the first civilian government in Pakistan’s 66-year history to complete its full,five-year term”. Among the many accomplishments he claimed for his elected government was the effort to promote peace and harmony in the region.

“The growing regional pivot in Pakistan’s foreign policy is a reflection of our democratic policymaking. In engaging with our region,we are changing the future,” Zardari declared.

In a bid to dispel the widespread international criticism that Pakistan is undermining the efforts for peace in Afghanistan,Zardari insisted that a “sovereign,stable and secure Afghanistan” is in Pakistan’s interests.

Rather than emphasise the special role in the Afghan peace process that the Pakistan army often claims,Zardari said he supports Kabul’s attempts to reconcile with the Taliban.

Kashmir posture

Part of his new regional approach,Zardari suggested,was his effort to engage India. Zardari reminded the international audience of his frequent meetings with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh — five times in the last four years.

Even as he talked of the bridge-building exercise with India,Zardari touched on the theme of Kashmir. “We will continue to support the right of the people of Jammu and Kashmir to peacefully choose their destiny in accordance with the UN Security Council’s longstanding resolutions on this matter.”

Softening the blow somewhat,Zardari said that the resolution of this issue “can only be arrived in an environment of cooperation.” Zardari also underlined his effort to improve commercial ties with India. “By normalising trade relations we want to create a regional South Asian narrative,” Zardari said.

This is not the first time that the Zardari government has returned to the old rhetoric on Kashmir and the UN resolutions. After avoiding polemics on Kashmir in multilateral forums for a few years,Pakistan is inching back to the bad old days.

Zardari’s predecessor,General Pervez Musharraf had in fact negotiated with India on Kashmir without a reference to the UN resolutions during 2005-07. India-Pakistan Kashmir talks stalled after General Ashfaq Kayani became the army chief in 2007.

When he took charge of Pakistan in 2008,Zardari made bold to argue that the Kashmir issue should be put aside and suggested that the two sides must focus instead on trade and economic cooperation. He was quickly reprimanded by the army headquarters in Rawalpindi.

One wonders if Zardari’s renewed rhetoric on Kashmir and the UN resolutions is a result of pressure from the army and conservatives in the Pakistani establishment. Having broken the political taboo on trade,does Zardari feel compelled to compen-sate by reviving the dogma on Kashmir?

Terror talk

Zardari’s comments on Kashmir are perhaps less important than his helpless pleading at the UN on his government’s inability to do more on terror. The United States and the international community as well as Pakistan’s neighbours,India and Afghanistan,have been urging Islamabad to do more in combatting the sources of international terrorism on Pakistani soil.

No one in the world accuses Zardari of having control over his army and the ISI. Neither New Delhi nor Kabul is betting that Zardari can alter the army’s support to jihadi groups in Pakistan that are destabilising India and Afghanistan.

The burden of Zardari’s argument at the UN was that Pakistan is a victim of terrorism,has made great sacrifices in the war against terror and the world can’t ask it to do more. We can only assume that this part of Zardari’s song at the UN was scripted at the army headquarters in Rawalpindi.

The writer is a distinguished fellow at the Observer Research Foundation,Delhi and a contributing editor for ‘The Indian Express’