The resumption of dialogue between India and Pakistan in 2011 has revived the hope that the two countries would make a renewed effort to resolve their bilateral problems.

The dialogue on the contentious issues is a challenging task for the leaders of India and Pakistan because of the legacy of troubled relations. They began to view each other as an adversary in the immediate aftermath of independence because they represented two competing nationalisms. Later developments reinforced the initial disposition due to divergent security and foreign policy perspectives, periodic propaganda against each other, military confrontation and wars and mutual distrust.  However, there were periods when their relations could be described as cordial and they encouraged greater societal interaction.

This means that Indians and Pakistanis are not born with negative disposition or hostility towards each other.  These attitudes have been cultivated by a number of factors and reinforced by negative historical experience. Both sides have individuals and organizations that have made their political and professional careers by propagating and sustaining negative disposition against each other.

These cultivated attitudes can be modified and even removed altogether by a conscious effort by both countries. This calls for reformulation of the orientations of the people by creating a new positive narrative of India-Pakistan relations through greater societal interaction that will have to be supplemented with problem solving between the two countries. The governments and people should learn through experience that cooperative interaction is mutually beneficial. Such an experience will create strong lobbies of peace and cordiality. Link to PDF

By Safiya Aftab

According to the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), in FY2010, the value of Pakistan’s exports to India was $260 million, and the value of imports from India was $1061 million. Provisional figures for FY2011 suggest that exports to India increased to $287 million and imports from the country increased to $1445 million. The estimates of the Federal Bureau of Statistics (FBS), also reported by the SBP, were slightly different, showing exports worth $264 million in FY2011, and imports worth $1743 million. Thus, on an average, the total value of trade between the two countries appears to be close to $2 billion according to official estimates. The value of Pakistan’s exports to India is just over 1% of total export value for Pakistan, while the value of India’s exports to Pakistan constitutes barely 0.6% of its total exports

Official estimates do not, however, tell the full story. In addition to smuggling, or outright illegal movement of goods, trade between India and Pakistan sometimes takes quasi-legal forms. Thus goods are re-routed through third countries (mainly Dubai and Singapore) before appearing in the markets of either of the two countries. For obvious reasons, it is impossible to quantify the value of such trade with certainty, but estimates range from $0.5 to $10 billion. A recent study confirmed the lower end of the range, and estimated informal trade in 2005 at about $540 million. Link to PDF

Colombo, Sri Lanka

Key opinion makers from India and Pakistan – including former diplomats, military officers, journalists from the print and electronic media, academics and analysts – met at Colombo for the 9^th and 10th round of the Chaophraya Dialogue from 28^th February – 3^rd March, 2012, organized by the Jinnah Institute (JI) and the Australia India Institute (AII).

The Chaophraya Dialogue is an Indo-Pak Track-II initiative jointly undertaken by the Jinnah Institute (JI) and Australia India Institute (AII) to encourage informed discussion of bilateral relations and enhance stakes in peace. The process has is now in its third year. The dialogue is primarily meant to give an opportunity to members of the policy and media communities and other groups in India and Pakistan to interact with each other on a sustained basis.

The Chaophraya Dialogue has encouraged participants to share the conclusions of each round with their respective governments. It has also provided a useful forum when the official dialogue process between India and Pakistan has been frozen, especially after the 26/11 attacks in Mumbai. During this period, when the official talks between the two countries were suspended, the Chaophraya Dialogue managed to bring together senior interlocutors from India and Pakistan multiple times.

ISLAMABAD February 16, 2012: Pakistan’s problem of extremism is a greater threat to the country than terrorism. This was the consensus during the February 16^th launch of Jinnah Institute’s report ‘Extremism Watch: Mapping Conflict trends in Pakistan 2010-2011’. The report records and examines various types of extremist incidents that have occurred in Pakistan over the past year, and the effects that these incidents have registered on Pakistani society.

Click here to download the report.

Ejaz Haider, Executive Director of Jinnah Institute, opened the event by welcoming the panelists and guests at the report launch. Mr. Haider spoke about the purpose and design of the report, and acknowledged the need to integrate various issues categorized as extremist activities so that effective policy recommendations could be developed for Pakistan. Mr. Haider stated that extremism is a greater menace in terms of a state's ability to deal with it, rather than terrorism, and this fact enhances the importance of studying extremism in Pakistan.

Salman Zaidi, Deputy Director Jinnah Institute, delivered a presentation on the major findings of the report and spoke about the early stages of the project. Mr. Zaidi relayed the methodology that was used to define extremism as it is registered in Pakistan today, and identified the prominent trends revealed by the report. He said that despite certain policy recommendations, the report was not intended to be prescriptive as it presented the data and analyzed it according to various metrics. He also spoke briefly about some of the findings of the report. According to the findings, 181 incidents of extremism were reported in various parts of Pakistan, causing a total loss of 534 lives and leaving an additional 1391 persons injured. Mr. Zaidi acknowledge that the data was alarming rather than interesting, and is a wake-up call for policymakers and legislators who are dealing with human security issues facing Pakistan's citizenry. 

After the presentation, Fahd Husain moderated a panel discussion on the report and on the various aspects of extremist incidents in Pakistan. Mr. Husain noted that the report launch came at a time when the perception of extremism was undergoing changes. He said that extremism cannot be eliminated by the force of a gun; instead, it requires a certain measure of persuasion which Pakistani society does not appear ready for. Dr. Moeed Pirzada, host of PTV News' Sochta Pakistan, stated that the incidence of extremism shows how the social fabric of Pakistan is disturbed. Dr. Pirzada outlined seven major factors that have catalyzed extremism in Pakistan, and felt that though the worst may be over, policy prescriptions to deal with extremism are still necessary. Dr. Pirzada also stated that reconciliation with India would help in healing Pakistani society.

Human rights activist Tahira Abdullah, on the other hand, stated that the data and analysis showed how Pakistan is going in the wrong direction, and that the situation seemed to be getting much worse. She lamented that the lives of journalists in Pakistan are at stake, and wondered how credible media reports could be in terms of evaluating the incidence of extremism in Pakistan. Ms. Abdullah said that the Constitution of Pakistan could not be fully restored until the 8th Amendment was repealed. Marvi Sirmed, columnist for the Daily Times, insisted that the report had immense academic value because it brought forth the crucial distinctions between extremism and terrorism. She said that violent extremism is not only borne out of religious differences, and that extremism in Pakistan has a gendered dimension as well. 

Following remarks from the panelists, members of the audience expressed their views on different aspects of the report in the questions and answers session. The response on extremism in Pakistan was mixed; audience members acknowledged strides made by civil society against extremism elements, while others criticized the response of state and society to extremist incidents. Audience members asked whether actions taken by the state against extremism could be reoriented or energized, and how the state's success against extremism could be measured. When asked whether the Pakistani state has failed or not, the panelists argued that the Pakistani state has not failed, but is under tremendous stress, especially in areas where violence and terror has become entrenched in the last decade. Audience members also asked about the linkages between extremism and tradition, and how such overlaps could be dissected and corrected, especially in a society like Pakistan. The responsibilities of the Pakistani state, and the percolation of extremism to the grassroots of Pakistani society, were repetitively discussed by the audience and panelists in a highly interactive question and answer session. 

The Jinnah Institute is an Islamabad-based public policy think-tank, advocacy group and public outreach organization that has published several reports on various issues that affect Pakistan today. Last year, the Institute published a report titled ‘Pakistan, the United States and the End Game in Afghanistan: Perceptions of Pakistan’s Foreign Policy Elite’ as part of its Strategic Security Initiative, which informs academic and policy discourse regarding regional security developments and Pakistan's role in the world.