Examination of Witnesses (Questions 168
- 179)
WEDNESDAY 31 JANUARY 2007
MR MICHAEL
GRIFFIN, DR
MATTHEW NELSON
AND DR
GARETH PRICE
Q168 Chairman: To begin this afternoon's
sitting, I apologise to our witnesses for keeping them waiting
outside for a few minutes, and I welcome them to the Committee.
Will hon. Members and members of the public switch off their mobile
phones?
As you know, we are carrying out a big inquiry
into South Asia. Members of the Committee were in India, Pakistan
and Afghanistan at the end of November and have heard evidence
from several people since then. Will the three witnesses please
introduce themselves?
Gareth Price: I run the Asia programme
at Chatham House and focus primarily on South Asia.
Matthew Nelson: I teach at the
politics department of the School of Oriental and African Studies.
I focus primarily on Pakistan.
Michael Griffin: I am a writer
and commentator on affairs in Afghanistan since the rise of the
Taliban.
Q169 Chairman: Thank you. We begin
with some questions about relationships between India and Pakistan
and the dispute over Kashmir. We have already taken some evidence
on this and held some long discussions. When we met President
Musharraf, this was one of the issues that we talked about.
Professor Bose, who gave evidence to us a few
weeks ago, suggested that the substantive positions on what a
solution to the Kashmir dispute would look like are very far apart.
Have any proposals on Kashmir been put forward that might eventually
prove acceptable to both India and Pakistan and to the people
of Kashmir?
Matthew Nelson: There are many
proposals floating around, but I do not think that the magic proposal
is there quite yet. There is not one that India and Pakistan are
jumping to approve right away. Certainly, some have discussed
making the line of control a permanent border, but that suggestion
is not yet as attractive perhaps to Pakistan as to India. In the
last year or so, General Musharraf has made a number of proposals
that are quite innovative. For example, he has suggested the possibility
of forms of joint administration and so on. I think that these
are an effort on the part of Pakistan to open up the discussion.
However, the discussion is still—certainly
from India's perspective—bilateral. Pakistan has always
suggested that a multilateral discussion would be more desirable,
but so far the Kashmiris have not necessarily been included as
an equal voice with the Pakistanis and the Indians. That has happened
for a number of reasons. The first question is who would the Kashmiri
spokesperson be? Looking inside Kashmir is an important exercise,
because there are a number of different Kashmiri voices. Looking
for a proposal acceptable to all parties would probably include
a discussion with Kashmiris.
Gareth Price: Yes, there are lots
of proposals, but the danger of focusing on proposals is in thinking
that there is a magic solution out there. A large part of the
issue with Kashmir is the process, and there is a positive process
going on. The process might be slow, but it is there—there
is a ceasefire on the line of control, and confidence-building
measures are happening slowly but surely. The proposals will come
out of that process of building confidence, however slow. There
is no magic solution on which to focus.
Q170 Chairman: Is the personality
of President Musharraf particularly important to this process?
There is supposed to be an election this year, although there
are questions about when it will be and so on. Is it possible
that a different leadership in Pakistan would mean that we would
go back to where we were a few years ago in terms of tensions
and no ceasefire?
Gareth Price: Thus far, the confidence-building
measures introduced are slow and, yes, they could all be reversed.
Do not have the idea that we are on a steady path to peace—it
is far from unfeasible that the situation on Kashmir could deteriorate.
Having said that, your question was on Musharraf.
People in India said the same thing about Vajpayee. They said
that Vajpayee of the BJP was leading the peace process in India—like
Nixon going to China—and that maybe the BJP was the pre-eminent
party to resolve the Kashmir dispute. Now, Manmohan Singh has
come to power, but the process has continued in a similar vein.
Both sides are pretty much committed to peace, but that is not
to say that a set of instances, such as the bombings in Mumbai,
could not lead to a temporary reversal of the process.
Q171 Chairman: Are there any back
channels operating at the moment?
Matthew Nelson: Again, my sense
is that there might be back channels involving either interlocutors
in Washington, or in various other places, but they might produce
an agreement that is difficult to make public and bring forward.
Certainly, when it comes to Musharraf's role in the process, my
sense is that he is quite influential, but he is not the only
possible spokesperson from Pakistan. I think that even a civilian
regime in Pakistan could have many exciting things to say about
Kashmir. Musharraf's relationship with civilian voices should
be constantly watched and looked for.
Q172 Chairman: Is it possible that
an agreement could be reached over part of the dispute, such as
the Siachen glacier, before a total agreement over other areas?
Matthew Nelson: My personal feeling
is that the Siachen glacier is not necessarily the linchpin to
a larger agreement. So even if there is a reduction of hostilities
on the glacier, that would not necessarily lead us on to a slippery
slope towards a permanent solution of the problem, as it were—no
pun intended!
Q173 Mr Moss: To what extent is the
army in Pakistan an obstacle to peace?
Matthew Nelson: I do not necessarily
see the army in Pakistan as an obstacle to peace. It has clear
interests in Pakistan and in the region generally, one of which
is peace, although not at the cost of the army's status in Pakistan.
Preserving the army's regional and domestic influence is a very
important priority for it. It wants to find ways of moving towards
peace without sacrificing itself—not necessarily preserving
itself in power, but certainly preserving its influence in some
way.
Gareth Price: Part of the logic
of that question has been implied in the past—the military
needs an ongoing dispute with India to justify its own position
in Pakistani society. As Matthew says, I am not particularly convinced
by that. Certainly at the moment, the military is playing a huge
role in Pakistan—not in Kashmir, but in Baluchistan and
the tribal areas. On the argument that the army needs the legitimacy
of a conflict, at the moment, with the other disputes in Pakistan,
the army is more supportive of a generic peace process over Kashmir.
Q174 Chairman: What is the UK role
in assisting a solution?
Matthew Nelson: The UK, of course,
has a relationship with the region. I think that a proactive role
in putting forward proposals might not be the most appropriate
approach at this juncture. The UK can certainly facilitate and
encourage dialogue and the parties to continue the peace process,
but inserting its own proposals might not be desirable.
Q175 Chairman: Is that view shared
by both sides, or more by the Indians than the Pakistanis?
Matthew Nelson: I shall venture
a guess: both parties might feel that proposals that are too clearly
defined coming from the UK might not be helpful. Certainly, Pakistan
would be more interested than India in UK involvement in multilateral
negotiations. However, the UK might put forward a proposal that
is regarded as too favourable to India, even in the context of
multilateral conversations, at which point, Pakistan, naturally,
would not be as excited about such proposals, as it might be about
others.
Q176 Mr Purchase: On a slightly tangential
point, I can understand why there would be resentment at the former
colonial power having anything to do with trying to find a solution
to a problem that it had helped to create. Is there any other
country that could assist in this vexed problem of Kashmir?
Gareth Price: In the past, you
would probably have said no, given India's contention that this
is a bilateral dispute and its hostility towards multilateral
intervention. That has changed over the past five to 10 years,
as India has grown more self-confident. One of the biggest things
that we have seen recently is India's acceptance of the UN involvement
in Nepal. So India is growing more accommodating towards multilateral
intervention. At the moment, I do not think that that growing
accommodation would extend towards Kashmir, whether it was intervention
by the UN or another country. That is something that is changing
on India's side, but we are not quite there yet, I think.
Q177 Ms Stuart: Before I ask you
about the insurgents in Kashmir, following on from the conversations
that you have had with my two colleagues, to what extent does
the expatriate population living in the UK play a role in opinion
forming for those who are prepared to reach compromises on the
ground back in Kashmir?
Gareth Price: Obviously, a large
part of the Pakistani community in the UK is from Mirpur, which
is part of Kashmir. As often happens with people who have come
from another country, quite a lot of them are, to some extent,
almost more nationalistic than people within Kashmir.
Q178 Ms Stuart: That is what I am
getting at. Does that have an influence on the ground, or is it
just peripheral?
Gareth Price: At the moment, it
is just a fact that exists. There are links, obviously, in terms
of remittances. Among the Mirpuri community, there are attempts
to redefine themselves as Kashmiri rather than Pakistani, partly
for linguistic reasons, and that process is going on. There has
also been talk of having an additional option in censuses, between
British Indian, Pakistani and Kashmiri. Obviously that all relates
to the question of Kashmir itself. As for the connection between
those people in the UK and the people in Kashmir, clearly there
are familial links, but I would not like to comment on the difference
that those links make on the ground. At the moment, I think that
it is just a question of stories happening in an isolated manner.
Matthew Nelson: It is also useful
to keep in mind the relationship between different Kashmiris within
the UK. For example, Kashmiris in the UK—say, those from
Mirpur, or from the valley—may have different ideas about
what the solution could be. So, even talking about a Kashmiri
identity in the UK becomes complicated and difficult. Keeping
some of those differences in mind is always helpful.
Q179 Ms Stuart: Turning to the insurgents
within Kashmir, some of the evidence that we have heard suggested
that the nature of the insurgency has changed over the years.
What is your assessment of the number of insurgents who would
go for outright Kashmiri independence?
Matthew Nelson: Certainly, the
situation would differ again between, say, Azad Kashmir in Pakistan
and Kashmir in India. In Pakistan, one gets the general sense
that calls for outright independence are relatively few and far
between, but that could simply be because those who would call
for outright independence in Azad Kashmir feel threatened or concerned
about doing so. In that sense, one could say that there are those
interested in the ideal of independence in both Pakistani Kashmir
and Indian Kashmir, but matters become much more complicated when
questions are posed about what that might mean. For example, people
in Azad Kashmir who appear to favour independence have been asked
what they might mean by that. At that point, the notion of a separate
Kashmir raises questions about, for example, crossing a border
between Muzaffarabad and Islamabad and they will say, "Oh,
I do not mean independence in that sense, because how would I
go to work in Rawalpindi, or how would I visit my sister in Islamabad?
Would I need a visa for that?" So, in that sense, the relationship
between the ideal of independence, as a rhetorical and political
story, and the practicalities of a movement for independence and
what that would mean in negotiations in Kashmir are somewhat different
things.
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