Shanghai Spirit to mend India-Pakistan ties

Beijing hosted the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Security Council Secretaries meeting on May 21-22 to fine-tune the language for the fight against terrorism, drug trafficking and transnational crimes. The agreed script may find an important place in the declaration expected to be adopted by the SCO summit to be held in Qingdao, Shandong province, on June 9-10. The SCO Security Council meeting, however, was only one of more than 120 events that China has hosted in run up to the 18th SCO summit, and each of them has had complexities.

Addressing the SCO Security Council secretaries on May 22, for instance, President Xi Jinping underlined how the entry of India and Pakistan into the SCO has increased its potential for cooperation. The key word was "potential" in both benefiting from, but more so, helping improve India-Pakistan ties. How this "potential" is beginning to be harnessed was visible from the bilateral meeting, on the sidelines, between India's Deputy National Security Adviser Rajinder Khanna and Pakistan's National Security Adviser Nasser Khan Janjua, although official India-Pakistan talks have remained suspended for several years because of terrorism.

Indeed, as Xi was addressing the SCO Security Council secretaries in Beijing, New Delhi and Islamabad were still jostling about whether India would send its delegation next morning for Pakistan's first ever SCO anti-terrorism meeting on May 23-25. As its first SCO event after becoming a full member, Pakistan was hosting the Uzbekistan-based Regional Anti-Terrorism Structures dialogue with law officers of SCO member states "to discuss terrorist threats facing the region and ways and means to enhance counter-terrorism cooperation between SCO member states".

The SCO-RATS dialogue in Pakistan was the first acid test for the SCO helping improve India-Pakistan relations on sensitive issues such as terrorism.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has had a policy of "talks and terrorism cannot go together"; as a result official India-Pakistan talks have remained suspended. In recent months, however, a slight drift has been evident with "informal" Indian delegations visiting Islamabad. Official language has also changed to say that "talks and terrorism cannot go together" yet "talks on terrorism" can be entertained.

So last month when Pakistani Chief of Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa called for a "comprehensive and meaningful dialogue", India's ongoing debates on its army holding a ceasefire during the month of Ramadan saw Indian Defense Minister Nirmala Sitharaman saying that India takes "comment on wanting peace" by Pakistan officials "seriously".

New Delhi did dispatch its official delegation to the SCORATS dialogue in Islamabad, explaining that it was a multilateral meeting and bilateral talks remain suspended. Perhaps nothing explains these diplomatic gymnastics better than the SCO's Shanghai Spirit of mutual trust and respect for diversity and consultations for common development. These calisthenics have brought India and Pakistan to the negotiating table to discuss terrorism which continues to haunt their mutual imaginations and interactions. Not just bilateral parleys, India's concerns about terrorism have prompted it to boycott the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation, rendering it dysfunctional for more than three years.

The SCO's Shanghai Spirit is not just helping break the deadlock between India and Pakistan, but also facilitating their official interactions at some multilateral forums. In fact, this year will see the two countries' militaries participating in the SCO joint military drills.

Besides, because of the protectionist measures of the United States, China is taking the lead at the global level in protecting free trade, and open, inclusive and equitable globalization. India has repeatedly asserted how it stands with China in this crusade. Last month's Xi-Modi meeting in Wuhan, Hubei province, launched the new genre of "informal" summit diplomacy, focusing on building personal camaraderie and chemistry to synergize strong and outside-the-box initiatives. Last Monday saw Modi replicating the "informal" summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin. And more such summits are expected to follow, including perhaps a meeting with Pakistani Prime Minster Shahid Khaqan Abbasi. If that were to happen, Modi's five elements of thought, connection, cooperation, vow and dreams, outlined at Wuhan as the defining elements of his vision for China-India relations may also be extended to untie the knots in India-Pakistan ties.

The author is a professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, and senior fellow at the Charhar Institute, Beijing.