Cover Story: Diplomacy: Circling the Block

With both sides hardening their stance, the talks are unlikely to throw up an early solution.

It is turning out to be a diplomatic cul-de-sac. Neither India nor Pakistan is willing to relent on their hardened positions over the war in Kargil. The foreign ministers of the two countries, India's Jaswant Singh and Pakistan's Sartaj Aziz, are talking but really not to each other.

Singh made it known that he had reluctantly agreed to Aziz's visit to Delhi on June 12. After all, India could not keep asking what there was to talk about, especially with international pressure on to resume the dialogue between the two countries. Aziz too was caught in his own rhetoric. For him, the Delhi talks were meant primarily to tell the people back home that Pakistan had forced India to some kind of a negotiating table over the control it claims to have of the commanding heights in the Kargil range.

NAILS ON THE ROAD

Pakistan continues to harp that Kashmir is the core issue and talks must focus around it. India says no, the current round is only meant to discuss the Pakistani intrusions in Kargil.

Pakistan has opened a new front by questioning the validity of the loc. An apoplectic India points out that its neighbour has so far never raised doubts about the LoC signed in 1972 and there is no question of any negotiations on the subject.

Pakistan now wants a joint working group set up over the border issue. India can't believe its ears and points out that Pakistan is unilaterally trying to abrogate the Simla Agreement.

Diplomatically, Aziz is already on the back foot. The US has made it clear that it believes India's version that Pakistan has violated the Line of Control (LoC) in Kargil. Pakistan's efforts to internationalise the issue have so far run into a brick wall. Pakistan's foreign minister even made a panic air-dash to Beijing days before Singh's scheduled visit to China on June 13. More to fill China's ears with Pakistan's version on what's happening in Kargil and to cut down any publicity mileage that Singh might derive from his visit.

After all, half a decade has gone since an Indian foreign minister visited Beijing. Coming after the hot words the two countries exchanged following the Pokhran tests in May last year, Singh's trip is an effort to revive the stalled Sino-Indian dialogue. China has so far not come out strongly in favour of its ally Pakistan over the Kargil issue, something that has Islamabad clearly worried.

To obfuscate the dialogue with India, Aziz harped on the familiar theme of Kashmir being the core issue. And added a new twist, questioning -- for the first time since the 1972 Simla Agreement -- the validity of the line of control between the two countries in Kashmir. The LoC had been delineated in 1972 after almost four months of dialogue and the two countries had signed on the detailed set of 19 maps on which the agreement was reached.

The external affairs minister was clear. He wasn't calling Aziz to discuss Kashmir or the loc. But only to drive home, as he put it, "India's sense of outrage at the violations of the LoC, its sense of betrayal by Pakistan over the Lahore process and also a categorical reaffirmation over the restoration of the status quo ante."

Pakistan hinted at establishing a joint working group (JWG) to sort out the Kargil issue. But India was emphatic about the fact that since Pakistan breached the LoC and had committed an aggression, it had already violated the Simla Agreement. So there was no question of agreeing to a JWG as that may bring the LoC under question. India has now indicated that it is prepared to wait as long as it takes to root out the Pakistani Army from the Kargil heights.

Singh is confident that if India keeps the Kargil conflict from escalating he has the diplomatic upper-hand. He believes that in time Pakistan will bleed a lot more than India is doing and will suffer from a severe haemorrhage if it persists with its "misadventure". If all this sounds a bit too bloody for diplomacy, remember there is a war on. And a lot more blood will have to be shed for sense to prevail.