From Article 370 Revocation to the Pahalgam crisis: examining India's strategy to resolve the Kashmir dispute and the renewal of US mediation.
This article is about the renewed US mediation efforts in Kashmir: historical engagement, recent diplomatic signals, and prospects for conflict resolution. How does the way the US operates in Kashmir affect the way it works in other world conflicts?
The suffering of the people of Kashmir has seldom received significant media coverage in the West, and what little it has received has been pushed from the public view as the atrocities in Palestine have taken centre stage. Those horrors, of course, must be stopped, but the repression in Kashmir cannot be ignored.
The role of the US
In May of this year, the erratic and unstable US president Donald Trump stepped into the fray, claiming to have brokered a ceasefire ending active hostilities between India and Pakistan that risked a wider and potentially catastrophic war. Some analysts dispute Trump’s assertions, questioning their validity. Even India’s main opposition Congress objected to Trump taking credit for the ceasefire, demanding an explanation of Trump’s statements.
Among these statements was an offer to work with both nations to resolve what he called the Kashmir “dispute”. The Indian government accused the US of “internationalising”, as they called it, a merely domestic dispute. The opposition Congress weighed in again, accusing the Indian government of opening long-closed doors to third-party mediation. India has spent decades attempting to frame its oppression of Kashmir as just that: a national issue in which the international community has no right to intervene.
This, of course, is a ludicrous position. The status of Kashmir was to be decided by a plebiscite, as demanded by the United Nations in 1948. The vote, which India to date has not permitted, was intended to allow the people of Kashmir to decide if they wanted to be part of India or Pakistan. More recently, the Pakistani government stated that if the Kashmiris voted to be part of Pakistan, but wanted full independence, Pakistan would grant it to them. No such offer was ever on India’s table.
Ejaz Haider, a foreign policy analyst from Pakistan, has stated that US assistance in the situation might prove minimal, since the US has traditionally been more interested in stabilising a crisis, rather than resolving its cause. And if that stabilisation meant installing a brutal, oppressive dictator, the US has been fine with that, as it has demonstrated for over 100 years.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio who, like Trump, seems to have only a tenuous grasp of world affairs and little to no understanding of their geopolitical nuances, met with Pakistani Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar on July 25. When asked about whether or not a discussion of Kashmir was on the agenda, a US spokesperson responded with the doublespeak typical of the US and didn’t answer the question. So what role, if any, the US hopes or plans to play in this so-called “dispute remains in question. Of course, there can be no consideration that the US would assist in liberating Kashmir from Indian repression. Freeing oppressed people is not the model the US ever follows.
The US, of course, is quick to label any resistance organisation a “terrorist’ group”. It doesn’t matter if that resistance involves just a few individuals, or is a well-organised group. The Resistance Front, which took responsibility for the attack in Pahalgam, Kashmir, in April, was, in July, designated a “terrorist” organisation by the United States. This is a prime example of the US seeking to stabilise a crisis, rather than to resolve it. By making The Resistance Front a designated US enemy, it deprives it of potential support for the liberation of Kashmir. One might object to some of the Front’s methods, but real benefit would come from taking action to coerce India to adhere to international law, not condemning resistance groups who only seek what the United Nations has guaranteed them.
What do the US’ actions mean?
Donald Trump is no fan of diplomacy, as evidenced by his bombing of Iran and complicity in the Israeli genocide of the Palestinians. As recently as March of this year, he described the brutal, repressive Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi as a “very smart man” and a “great friend”, while praising his leadership. He has made similar comments about North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. He has frequently praised Russian President Vladimir Putin, using similar words.
Wherever the US steps in, its motives must be understood. Hardly the beacon of peace, freedom and democracy that it wants to world to believe – against all evidence – U.S. leadership is concerned with ordering the world in a way that maintains its power and enriches government leaders and their corporate cronies. Trump has long coveted the Nobel Peace Prize, and his seething resentment that Barack Obama, who preceded Trump’s first disastrous term as president, was awarded that prize has never been concealed. So his stepping into the Kashmir situation is not to bring to the people there the basic human rights that India denies them, but to burnish his non-existent credentials as a peacemaker. That explains, at least in part, his offer to broker negotiations between India and Pakistan to settle the question of Kashmir, seeming to be unaware of the Indian government’s desperate need to keep the situation away from international attention.
So perhaps Trump unwittingly helped the Kashmiri cause by bringing focus to it as an issue that does, in fact, require the involvement of the global community. The ineffective United Nations could do something to salvage its reputation as a useless organisation by acting for the Kashmiri people, but that is unlikely. With five nations, including the United States, having veto power in the very undemocratic Security Council, nothing of substance will be done.
It is six years since India revoked the semi-autonomous status of Kashmir, and the brutal repression that Kashmiris experienced at the hands of their colonial Indian masters for decades has only worsened during this time. The international community has failed the Kashmiri people as it has failed the Palestinians, the Rohingya people of Myanmar, the Tigray people of Ethiopia, the Darfur people of Sudan – the list is almost endless, and the shame that world governments should feel is beyond endless.
It is possible, and certainly to be hoped, that with international bodies such as the International Court of Justice finally paying some attention to the atrocities that Israel is committing in Palestine, other nations will begin to make similar accusations before the court against India. But this will depend, of course, on how the court acts. While it moves at a very slow pace, if government leaders can be held accountable for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Palestine, perhaps it will encourage other world leaders to demand Indian adherence to international law, by using the same methods of bringing it formally to the attention of the International Court of Justice.
If this were to happen today, it would not be soon enough. The people of Kashmir exist in the most militarily-occupied place in the world. For decades they have endured arrest without charge, indefinite detention, torture, rape, and countless other appalling violations of their basic human rights. The world community and international institutions such as the United Nation have shirked their moral and legal responsibilities by allowing these atrocities to go on for so long, with no punishment or consequences for the perpetrators, and no relief for the victims. This must end, and those of us who are privileged to have a voice – unlike the people of Kashmir - must continue to speak.
Photo: The Pakistani government stated that if the Kashmiris voted to be part of Pakistan, but wanted full independence, Pakistan would grant it to them. No such offer was ever on India’s table. (By Adobe).