While the recent remarks of Pakistan Army Chief General Raheel Sharif on Kashmir and other issues re-emphasise that it is that country’s Army — and not the legislature or the Prime Minister — that determines policy towards India (and Afghanistan), it will be short-sighted to view the general’s observations as being a mere counter to some of the loose articulations from the Indian side.
It is plain that for Pakistan the regional equation has changed in its favour, and that the statements of the top brass are intended to give notice of a new-found sense of assertion as an internal morale booster. In a deeply political statement that recalls an old line, the Army Chief refers to Kashmir as “an unfinished agenda” of Partition while he seeks plebiscite under UN resolutions. This is puerile and historically inaccurate.
Pakistan actually ran away from a plebiscite when it refused to remove its troops and irregulars from all areas of Jammu and Kashmir, including Gilgit-Baltistan, as mandated by the UN.
China’s promise of $46 billion to build the Xinjiang-Gwadar corridor, and the US pumping billions into Pakistan, have given confidence to Islamabad. The talk of Indian support to terrorism is meant to influence the Afghan theatre where President Ashraf Ghani has recently signed an intelligence cooperation agreement with Pakistan.
