PakIndia: Unremitting tensions on the LoC

EDITORIAL: DAILY TIMES

Since the deaths of five Indian soldiers in an ambush on the Line of Control (LoC), the tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours have increased manifold. The disputed and much fought over Kashmir region is now, once again, in the grip of fear and threat. While minor skirmishes have been seen time and again along the LoC, the 10-year-old ceasefire has held by and large. But the series of incidents of exchange of firing in the area for the last nine days are alarming because they show no signs of abating. According to the Pakistani authorities, fresh cross-border shelling has resulted in further civilian casualties and tensions rising a notch further. The Indian government has gone so far as to say that it fears Pakistan’s intentions, which may be to focus the proxy militants’ attention on Kashmir once again after the US’s 2014 withdrawal from Afghanistan. While Pakistan vehemently denies this, the fact that precisely this chain of events occurred in 1989 after the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan does not escape those worried minds advocating peace and amity on both sides of the border. While a typical knee-jerk reaction can be seen by the authorities on both sides, the attitude of the media in India and Pakistan is not at all conducive towards any kind of lasting stability. The media-fed hysteria is mounting by the day, with jingoism and propaganda playing a huge part in not helping to defuse the volatility. Since August 6, the overall goodwill seen of late between the two countries has dissipated, giving way to fiery Indian protests against the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi, threats to PIA’s offices throughout India, stoppage of a Lahore-bound Dosti (Friendship) bus, and now Pakistan’s foreign office contemplating a withdrawal of its diplomats from New Delhi because of the possible threat to their safety. Hafiz Saeed of the Jamaat-ud-Dawa has reinforced Indian fears that the militants are just waiting to fight in Kashmir after 2014. It is time to end this spiralling descent into madness. It is for the Nawaz Sharif government to understand that those who aim to sabotage its efforts towards peace with India are the very elements it aids with funds. People like Hafiz Saeed must be put behind bars, war cries must be silenced, and military commanders, who have been keeping the peace on the LoC all these years, be allowed to control the situation through their hotlines and field meetings. We have been working at the negotiation process with India too hard and for too long after the 2008 Mumbai attacks to see it flounder because of undesirable elements whose vested interest lies in continued conflict, not peace, amity and progress.