No thaw in sight at SCO summit for India and Pakistan relations

Imran Khalid

The prospect of diplomatic engagement between India and Pakistan remains faint, despite the upcoming Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit being hosted in Islamabad on Oct. 15-16. Hopes, if any, for a thaw between the two nations had already been dimmed by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s decision to stay away from this gathering. Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar will attend instead.

Further deepening the gloom, Jaishankar firmly dismissed any possibility of resuming bilateral talks at the summit. “I am not going there to discuss India-Pakistan relations,” he said Saturday. Instead, he positioned his trip as part of India’s commitment to the multilateral event.

This refusal by India to engage underscores the complexity of regional tensions and the growing challenges in finding common ground. It underscores how cross-border relations have taken a frostier turn since India’s general election earlier this year. Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif extended a congratulatory message to Modi upon his reelection, only to receive a curt response. Modi’s reply, cloaked in the language of security, expressed adherence to the security and safety of Indian citizens — a veiled reminder of the tense relations between the two nations.

Adding more fuel to the fire, Pakistan was excluded from the list of regional leaders invited to Modi’s swearing-in ceremony. This exclusion stood in stark contrast to 2014, when Sharif attended Modi’s first inauguration, hinting at the potential for warmer relations.

In 2015, a rare glimmer of hope surfaced when Modi made an unexpected visit to Pakistan, and the possibility of improved relations between the nuclear-armed neighbors seemed within reach. Yet, by 2019, that inkling of optimism was thoroughly extinguished when Modi’s government stripped Kashmir of its constitutional autonomy, reducing it to a federally administered territory. The region’s limited autonomy, already fragile, was obliterated, and Modi’s actions signaled his intent to fully integrate the disputed territory into India.

The consequences were enormous. Pakistan downgraded its diplomatic relations with India and suspended bilateral trade. The gesture was not just an assertion of territorial control but a blatant statement of defiance to both Kashmir and Pakistan. Kashmir has long been a contested symbol of unfinished business from the partition of British India. Both India and Pakistan claim the region in its entirety, yet they’ve only managed to rule over parts of it since independence. The line dividing Kashmir is a scar that has never fully healed, and Modi’s drastic maneuver in 2019 only deepened the wound.

 Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif addresses the 79th United Nations General Assembly at U.N. headquarters in New York on Sept. 27.   © Reuters

In July, Modi again hardened his stance toward Pakistan. Speaking on the anniversary of the Kargil conflict (a three-month war between the countries in 1999), Modi accused Pakistan of clinging to relevance through “terrorism and proxy war,” branding the country’s leaders as the “masters of terror.” It was a scathing indictment.

This was followed by a pointed critique of Pakistan by Jaishankar on Sept. 28 at the U.N. General Assembly, where he accused it of making a “conscious choice” to be left behind in the global order. Jaishankar invoked the notion of karma, suggesting Pakistan’s struggles are self-inflicted: “While some nations are held back by circumstances beyond their control, others choose their fate, often with catastrophic consequences. Our neighbor, Pakistan, is a prime example.”

These words reflect an intense hardening of India’s posture, one that seems focused on confrontation rather than reconciliation. It appears to be a political calculation, one taken despite Islamabad trying to adopt a conciliatory tone and engage with New Delhi.

A critical challenge for Islamabad lies in India’s continuous refusal to discuss the Kashmir dispute, which remains central to any potential talks. For Pakistan, entering formal dialogue without addressing Kashmir would be unthinkable — a peace process excluding Kashmir is no peace process at all. This isn’t a hard-line stance; it reflects the realities of law and principle.

The revival of trade presents further obstacles. While there are advocates for boosting economic ties on both sides, New Delhi has demonstrated no inclination to reopen those channels.

Following the Pulwama incident (a suicide attack by a young Kashmiri that killed more than 40 Indian soldiers in 2019), India imposed a 200% tariff on Pakistani imports. Islamabad officially suspended trade after India annexed Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019.

The distance between the neighbors appears to have widened, with even once-routine diplomatic gestures feeling cold and distant. The subtext of each exchange is clear: The region’s security challenges continue to overshadow any hope for reconciliation, at least for the time being.

source : asia.nikkei