Indo- Saudi Relations

[Vinod2070]

Pakistan has been the biggest spoilsport in our relationship with the Islamic world. It is also responsible for much of the communal troubles in India.

If we didn't have a pesky terror supporting Islamic country in our neighborhood, we would have had a great relationship with the Islamic world, our having one of the greatest Islamic populations that was also the most professional would ensure that.

It is great that we are finally attacking the heart of the issue and trying to normalize our relations with the Saudis. If that happens, the Pakistanis have nowhere to go and will come to their senses pretty soon about the non-sustainability of their anti India posture.

 

[Vinod2070]

Manmohan Singhs Saudi Arabia visit and its affect on Pak-India talks.

Naseem Zehra with
1. Nawabzada Malik Amad Khan
2. Marvi Memon
3. Tariq Fatemi
4. Hamid Gul


[video]http://pakistanherald.com/Program/Policy-Matters-March-01-2010-Naseem-Zehra-3133[/video]

Thx. for sharing.

They are going apeshit! Pretty insecure these guys are.

 

[thakur_ritesh]

Thx. for sharing.

They are going apeshit! Pretty insecure these guys are.

in a more refined term, pakistan is a rental state, that you use and throw as the situation warrants and no one likes to have a liability for long. they are stuck, all this time they remained dependent on others on running their affairs and today the very same people who earlier used them are turing their backs on them and they are developing a sense of betrail, one wonders what happened to all that muslim brotherhood talk. this just shows, for the interests, the best of friends can backstab eachother.

india has quite literally pulled off the rug from the feet of pakistan and pakistanis have no clues how to react, and they have no plan in sight on how to tackle the evolving situation.

Manmohan Singhs Saudi Arabia visit and its affect on Pak-India talks.

Naseem Zehra with
1. Nawabzada Malik Amad Khan
2. Marvi Memon
3. Tariq Fatemi
4. Hamid Gul


[video]http://pakistanherald.com/Program/Policy-Matters-March-01-2010-Naseem-Zehra-3133[/video]

can someone please upload this video on rapidshare or else where and share the link in this thread, so that i could then download it. this video plays for sometime at my end and then disrupts, tried downloading it but again there is a disruption. it is a 58mb file, would be very greatful. thanks.

 

[ajtr]

Indian Flag on the roads of Saudi Arabia during Pm Manmohan singh's visit



Startfor Video Dispatch: India, Saudi Arabia and a Changing South Asia

 

[Yusuf]

Only thing good in that pakistani news video is the girl pretending to be a strategic analyst.

 

[Vinod2070]

Only thing good in that pakistani news video is the girl pretending to be a strategic analyst.

Everyone and his uncle in Pakistan is a strategic expert. The girls who manage to get some education too become that pretty soon.

Anyway watching a few clown shows is all you need to be a strategic expert in Pakistan!

 

[GokuInd]

Manmohan Singhs Saudi Arabia visit and its affect on Pak-India talks.

Naseem Zehra with

2. Marvi Memon

4. Hamid Gul


[video]http://pakistanherald.com/Program/Policy-Matters-March-01-2010-Naseem-Zehra-3133[/video]

I think, Number 2 and 4 are big jokes, twaddlers to be precise!

 

[ajtr]

With the strategic ties with Saudi Arabia the real test of indian diplomacy comes in terms of balancing its ties with israel pertaining to palestine issue.

India plays Saudi tune

RIYADH: In what seems to be a clear indication of the strategic partnership in the making with Saudi Arabia, India in the Riyadh Declaration has endorsed the Saudi position on the question of Palestine by backing the Arab plan and asking that all key issues be addressed comprehensively “within a definite time frame”. And that these comprehensive discussions should lead to the establishment of a “sovereign, independent, united, and viable Palestinian state, in accordance with the two-state solution”.
This is the first time, diplomatic observers say, that India has used the term “united” as a prefix to Palestine. India further joined the Saudi king in emphasising that “the continued building of settlements by Israel constitutes a fundamental stumbling block for the peace process”. In other words New Delhi has categorically asked that Israel stop building settlements, a new tone.
The mention of a time frame, which sources say is a new wrinkle in India’s usual formulation on this issue, is sure to raise hackles in Tel Aviv which is likely to seek clarification on another departure from standard practice. This pertains to that portion of the Riyadh Declaration in which India joins the host country in endorsing “regional and international efforts focusing on making the Middle East and the Gulf region free of all nuclear weapons and all weapons of mass destruction”. In effect New Delhi has called to make the region free of Israeli nuclear weapons.
Previously India has endorsed efforts to eliminate nuclear weapons and weapons of mass destruction in a region as long as there was consensus in the region for such efforts. It is unheard of that New Delhi should endorse in a political document a nuclear weapons- free West Asia while continuing to swear by deterrence in its own case. Neither India nor Israel is a signatory to the discriminatory NPT and Israelis are going to wonder what is going on in New Delhi.
The statement is all the more significant considering that Saudi Arabia has routinely endorsed at various fora the Pakistani stance for a nuclear-free South Asia which targets Indian nuclear weapons. This is sure to upset Pakistan no end and undoubtedly there will be many demarches issued to Riyadh on this count as well.
Pakistan is further likely to be miffed to discover that Saudi Arabia ringingly endorsed the Indian role in Afghanistan by expressing its “full support” in the joint statement for efforts aimed at helping Afghanistan achieve social and economic development. Saudi Arabia also seems to have given up its support for the Taliban by agreeing to a formulation that condemns terrorist organisations.
In the next days there are sure to be Israeli demarches to New Delhi, Pakistani demarches to Riyadh and Iranian demarches to both Riyadh and Delhi.

 

[ajtr]

GOI's indo-saudi strategic deal seem to be a masterstroke.With all this crying from pak editorials and tv talk shows there seems to be a lot of heartburn going on across wagha.following is ZAID HAMId's take on SAUDI INDIA NEW AGREEMENT

 

[IBM]

Even saudi's have realised that relations are not built on the basis of religion. Now they acknowledge India's position and stand in the world. Nobody wants to be with looser or feed parasite for long (Hope u know wat i mean). They got nothing from friendship with our neighbours till today.

 

[Yusuf]

Interestingly, the older gentleman in that video of the tv channel said that Pakistan has done the most among all for OIC and in return has got nothing for its services. What has pakistan done for OIC other than explode a nuke and call it an Islamic bomb?

 

[Vinod2070]

^^ They think they are the only ones left in the Islamic world with H&D.

As per some of them, if they didn't have the Islamic nukes, Israel (and India) would have overrun the Islamic world. That alone seems to qualify them for this claim.

 

[ajtr]

Miles to go

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has gone all the way to Saudi Arabia (the first time an Indian PM has visited Saudi Arabia for 28 years) to tell us what he could have just as easily told us if he had stayed at home. "If Pakistan cooperates with India, there is no problem that we cannot solve and we can walk the extra mile to open a new chapter in relations between our two countries", he said in Riyadh. He called on Saudi Arabia to use its good relationship with us to persuade us that harbouring terrorists and sending them across the border to commit all manner of skullduggery was no way to foster good international relations. Quite so, Mr Singh, but then neither is bolstering the corrupt and tottering Karzai regime in Afghanistan, is it? No matter – the Indian visit to Saudi Arabia is another marker along the road of an emerging regional superpower which needs to get the best from its relationships with other states in the region. The Saudis for their part see a harmonious relationship with India as both desirable and profitable, and for the time being are willing to live with the paradox of India restocking its arsenals by buying Israeli weaponry.

Saudi Arabia is already established as the key broker with a range of Muslim states; but the Indians were keen to play down the idea that Saudi Arabia would be acting as a mediator in the various areas of conflict that lie between us. However it is nuanced or phrased, a different path is now being trod. The ripples of the Mumbai attack are beginning to die away and there are the first moves towards restarting the Composite Dialogue. Nobody is expecting miracles, but there is a whiff of positivism in the air that might just fan into a spark of meaningful dialogue. That process would be greatly assisted if the Indians would refrain from opening every single exchange with ourselves with the diplomatic equivalent of a smack on the hand. We never seem to be able to do enough to satisfy the Indians (or the Americans for that matter) and both regularly remind us of this. So India wants to go the 'extra mile', does it? We are pleased to hear that and will go the extra mile as well, but let's lighten the load for both of us and leave unnecessary luggage at the roadside, in particular the unhelpful rhetoric that forms the overture whenever India makes diplomatic moves in our direction.

 

[ajtr]

Singh in Saudi Arabia

EDITORIAL (March 03 2010): As India acquires pretensions to be the regional power, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was in Saudi Arabia over the weekend to spell out what appears to be the Indian vision of the post-US pullout from Afghanistan.

Not surprisingly then he looked forward to cashing in on the Kingdom's perceived influence with the Afghan Taliban, only to be rebuffed by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal who publicly declared that his government's relations with the Taliban stand abrogated ever since the latter gave sanctuary to al Qaeda. Dr Singh must have explored also the possibility of Saudi Arabia persuading Pakistan 'to act against Pakistan-based militants groups'. Here too, his government has earned the flak of its domestic political rivals, who accused the Indian government of looking for third-party mediation.

Junior Foreign Minister Shashi Tharoor's perception that in the context of relations with Pakistan, "Saudi Arabia is a natural interlocutor for us" has been widely condemned by Indian political opposition. So even when the 'Riyadh Declaration', issued after Dr Singh's meeting with King Abdullah talks of raising the bilateral relationship to a "strategic partnership", it limits co-operation to 'exchange of information on terrorist activities, money laundering, narcotics, arms and human trafficking'. May be the Indians had thought, wrongly, now that Iran is in the line of American fire for its nuclear programme they would be scoring a bull's-eye by outlining a kind of US-India-Saudi Arabia security plan for the region.

But that is grossly underestimating the Kingdom's way of conducting its foreign policy. No other country understands Pakistan's position on Afghanistan better than Saudi Arabia. The two were together in the Afghan Jihad against the Soviet invasion, when New Delhi was a silent spectator, and were also among the only three - the third being the United Arab Emirates - who gave recognition to the Taliban government. Now both are the targets of al Qaeda. Much though Saudi Arabia would wish that peace returns to brotherly Islamic Afghanistan, it would be naïve to expect the Kingdom bypassing Pakistan in planning its moves.

Among the countries that bear the brunt of the Taliban's vendetta, Pakistan stands out; no wonder, as Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir said recently, "we have suffered many, many hundreds of Mumbais". Now that Pakistan's war on Taliban is in its final stages, and the Quetta Shoora has been almost wiped out, would it be wise to change horses midstream? Saudi Arabia will not. Yes, as long as Afghanistan had monolithic rule, the New Delhi governments could cultivate the rulers in Kabul and use them against Pakistan, but that was in the past, from now on, in the Muslim-majority democratic Afghan polity, the Indian role is cut out and it would be marginal and peripheral.

However, Indian potential as an economic partner of Saudi Arabia is considerable and that is where the two governments are seriously engaged. The two sides have agreed to cooperate in information technology, space science and such other frontier technologies, which in turn, is likely to increase joint venture from the present 500, in which the Saudis have invested something like 20 billion dollars. But it is the Saudi oil that is of paramount interest to the Indian economy. Rightly then, Prime Minister Singh, in his speech to the Council of Saudi Chambers of Commerce and Industry, called for a "comprehensive energy partnership". India would also like to finalise an India-AGCC Free Trade Agreement, but that is in the realm of the future, given the fact that while the AGCC countries extensively share foreign policy perspectives, they are each other's tough economic competitors, in India also.

 

[anoop_mig25]

its repeat of my eariler post but i didnt get any reply so posting again

saudi`s support to recocnilitation bet us and taliban ()
i know that pakistan has interest in establishing a government in afagistan taht is favourable to them and that`s why they are supporting TALIBAN and trying to re-instate them there but i dont understand saudia why tey are so much favorable TALIBAN and why they want to re-establish TALIBAN regime back in AFAGISTAN

 

[LETHALFORCE]

Interesting if everyone wants to support the Taliban then an interesting change of foreign policy maybe to have India support them to and to buy them like everyone else does I am sure India can spend much more than Pakistan in buying them and then use them as proxies against Pakistan before pakistan uses them against us in Kashmir sounds far fetched but money can change a lot of things no need to hold the moral high ground by India if Taliban is up for bids India should submit their bid.

 

[anoop_mig25]

Interesting if everyone wants to support the Taliban then an interesting change of foreign policy maybe to have India support them to and to buy them like everyone else does I am sure India can spend much more than Pakistan in buying them and then use them as proxies against Pakistan before pakistan uses them against us in Kashmir sounds far fetched but money can change a lot of things no need to hold the moral high ground by India if Taliban is up for bids India should submit their bid.

but is it possible i doubt because i higher clan of taliban would never revolt against pakistan isi since they are attached morality to them and even if they are ready what would be the proof i mean they will only make sure that their cadre arnt involve against india in agf.

 

[ajtr]

A lesson and a few reminders —Syed Talat Hussain

The Saudis, in their national interest, can get into a tighter hug with Pakistan’ archenemy without fearing as much as a raised eyebrow in Islamabad, because Saudi Arabia is a giver and Pakistan is a taker

Imagine Israeli Prime Minister
Binyamin Netanyahu speaking to the National Assembly of Pakistan and saying the following: “We seek cooperative relations with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Our objective is a permanent peace because we recognise that we are bound together by a shared future. If there is cooperation between Israel and Saudi Arabia, vast opportunities will open up for trade travel and development that will create prosperity in both the countries and the Middle East as a whole. But to realise this vision, Saudi Arabia must act decisively and stop supporting terrorists who operate in areas administered by the Palestinian Authority. If Saudi Arabia cooperates with Israel, there is no problem we cannot solve and we walk the extra mile to open up a new chapter in relations between our two countries.”

Even before anyone can say ‘go’, Pakistan shall have all its special economic and diplomatic privileges withdrawn by the illustrious Kingdom, and its entire civil and military leadership summarily summoned and lined up in the King’s court for an explanation and apology. Admitted, Saudi-India relations cannot be equated with the Pakistan-Israel equation, which diplomatically does not exist. But seen from the security point of view, India is to Pakistan what Israel is to Saudi Arabia — a lingering, permanent danger, whose core intent is hostile, whose propaganda is relentless and actions are exceedingly provocative.

Yet, the entire Saudi Majlis al Shoura intently listened to Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s usual refrain about Pakistan’s non-cooperation in the field of terrorism, implying this was the main hurdle to peace and prosperity in South Asia. The perfect hosts graciously overlooked the fact that the honourable guest was in gentle violation of the third country rule (no one country’s soil can be used against another country for propaganda), and that he could perhaps have avoided mentioning Pakistan directly while illustrating his vision. But then it would have been silly to put in a tedious spot the representative of a country with whom Saudi Arabia has forged strategic ties, produced by decades of hard diplomatic work, and which now span the varied fields of defence, security, technology, science education and a dozen other areas.

Also, Saudi relations with India are not subject to Delhi passing the Pakistan test. With a burgeoning bilateral trade of over $ 25 billion, Saudi oil sales to Delhi touching $ 3 billion, plus an expatriate community nearing two million set their bilateral relationship on a footing that is self-sustaining and impervious to extraneous considerations. We should not forget that in 2006 the Saudi King Abdullah came to Delhi as a special guest on the country’s Republic Day, which the Kashmiris mark as a black day. There he described India as his second home.

In 2010, the title bestowed on the visiting Indian delegation was “our dearest friends”. Quite naturally, besides inking various agreements, the two were in line with the Riyadh Declaration, issued at the end of the visit: both “discussed the situation in Afghanistan” and found themselves in complete harmony over the road to stability in that broken country, including protecting the people of Afghanistan from “exploitation by the terrorist organisations...” This detailed reference to Afghanistan is seemingly benign, but the two paragraphs do endorse India’s say in Afghanistan — something that Pakistan is completely opposed to.

What does the visit mean for Islamabad? One easy-to-understand lesson, and a few timely reminders. The lesson is that Delhi is pulling its full diplomatic weight to establish an outreach in areas where Islamabad traditionally had an edge. Delhi’s relations with Iran, its presence in Afghanistan and its deepening engagement with China now have a thickening layer of diplomatic initiative on the Saudi front. This throws a ring of soft offensive around Pakistan’s immediate and important zone of influence. In all the friendly capitals, the battle for the hearts and minds is now going to get tougher for Pakistan. India’s defence spending increases, military purchases and its visceral vileness is one part of the challenge facing Pakistan, the other is the expansive nature of India’s proactive, forward-leaning diplomacy that it is increasingly being used to build a case for its stance on terrorism and Pakistan’s role in it.

And now the reminders. One is that the age of ideology in foreign policy is long over. While much of Pakistan’s worldview has become pretty down-to-earth and is immersed in hardcore realism, the hangover of being part of the Ummah continues to hover around like a patch of bad cloud. The visit’s various facets tell us that co-religionists can be perfectly incompatible in the alliances they forge in pursuit of their national interests and there is nothing wrong with this.

The other reminder is that when these interests converge, countries come together, and when these diverge, countries move away from each other. There is no lifelong bonding to any one country, nor can one be beholden to the other.

The third reminder is that economic power is the real foreign policy pedestal of countries. Those who are economically sound can have greater foreign policy room to manoeuvre. Besides size, the one thing going for India in its foreign policy is the state of its economy, which, in turn, is related to the quality of leadership and a national vision projected over decades. With money in its pocket, and glory on its mind, Delhi is capable of heightening its diplomatic surge.

Conversely, this is precisely the reason Pakistan is struggling. It is cash-strapped and is led by a floundering pack. The Saudis, in their national interest, can get into a tighter hug with Pakistan’ archenemy without fearing as much as a raised eyebrow in Islamabad, because Saudi Arabia is a giver and Pakistan is a taker. Oil has made one rich. Its rulers have made the other dole-dependent. And dependence, we know, is a super-stripper of dignity, a destroyer of self-esteem, and a breaker of spines. It ties your hands to your feet and hurtles you down in the abyss of choices that are none better than the other.

Foreign policy is an extension of domestic politics, the economy included. A country that is domestically disturbed can, at best, put up a brave face abroad and not wince when its friends make friends with its enemies. And that is exactly what Pakistan is doing in response to Manmohan Singh’s visit to Saudi Arabia.

 

[ajtr]

Saudi: PM sidesteps role of ‘interlocutor’

THE Prime Minister fought shy of using the word 'interlocutor,’ the expression used by his Minister of State Shashi Tharoor while etching out the role he expected Saudi Arabia to play, vis-a-vis New Delhi’s concerns on terrorism vis-a-vis Pakistan.
During the media opportunity on the way back from Riyadh he was asked by this paper, that given the primacy of place Saudi Arabia has with Pakistan and given the fact that New Delhi was now in a strategic relationship with Saudi Arabia, if he thought Saudi Arabia could be a credible interlocutor for some of the issues that we have with Pakistan.
Singh said while he did discuss Indo-Pak relations with the King of Saudi Arabia on a one-to-one basis, explaining to him the role that terrorism, aided, abetted and inspired by Pakistan was playing in India, he did not ask the King `to do anything other than to use his good offices to persuade Pakistan to desist from this path.’ It was clear from his response that the Prime Minister carefully chose not to characterise his request to the Saudi King as an act of interlocution. In response to another question he explained that to whoever he met in an increasingly inter-dependent world, to the world leaders 'I convey to them that all problems between India and Pakistan can be resolved through meaningful bilateral dialogue if only Pakistan would take a more reasonable attitude in dealing with those terrorist elements who target our country.’ In response to yet another question from another quarter, Singh said he felt the Saudi leadership now had a better understanding of the predicament that we ' face both in Pakistan and in Afghanistan’ and that there was a ‘great deal of sympathy and support for India’s point of view’ and that what `we are asking is very reasonable.’ Taken together, the clutch of remarks make it clear that Singh was not willing to semantically endorse Shashi Tharoor’s use of the word 'interlocutor’ which has a formal and specific dimension in diplomatic parlance.
It may be said that when the clarification was issued on Sunday on the word, it was not issued by the Ministry of External Affairs but by the minister himself. In effect, the ministry left it to the minister to clean up his own mess.

 

[ajtr]

INDIAN EGGS IN SAUDI BASKET

B.RAMAN

The Indian interest in closer relations with Saudi Arabia dates back to the period from 1980 to 84 when Indira Gandhi was the Prime Minister. As she was generally in the habit of doing, she initially sent a senior official of the Indian intelligence community on a secret visit to Saudi Arabia to test the waters for making an overture to the then ruling family. R.N.Kao, who was then the Senior Adviser to her, did the spade work in paving the way for a visit by her to Saudi Arabia. The then Indian Ambassador to Saudi Arabia played a significant role in convincing her about the positive feelings for India in the Saudi ruling family. These preliminary steps culminated in a successful visit by her to Saudi Arabia in 1982.


2. Her interest in closer relations with Saudi Arabia had four objectives---- to strengthen India's energy security, to use the good offices of Saudi Arabia to persuade Pakistan to stop supporting the Khalistan movement, to remove suspicions in the Islamic world in general and in Saudi Arabia in particular about India's Afghan policy which was widely perceived in the West and the Islamic world as supporting the Soviet interests in Afghanistan and to retain the continued support of the Indian Muslim community for the Congress (I).


3. The high expectations aroused by her visit did not materialise. Saudi Arabia was not able to or was not in a position to make Pakistan stop supporting the Khalistan movement. While the economic ties between the two countries continued to grow in fits and starts, there were no political or long-term strategic dividends from the visit. Even hopes that the visit could pave the way for a formal liaison relationship between the intelligence agencies of the two countries resulting in intelligence-sharing arrangements were belied.


4. Among the reasons for the disappointing sequel were---firstly, Indira Gandhi's preoccupation with countering the Khalistan movement which ultimately led to her assassination in October,1984, and, secondly, the emergence of Pakistan as a frontline state in the jihad against the Soviet troops in Afghanistan and the consequent reluctance of Saudi Arabia and the US to exercise pressure on Pakistan to make it stop supporting the Khalistan movement.


5. Under Rajiv Gandhi and Narasimha Rao as Prime Ministers, the exercise to upgrade our relations with Saudi Arabia was given a low priority. Both of them realised that India had to fight Khalistani terrorism and Pakistani sponsorship of it in its own way and through its own means and that it would be futile to expect the US or Saudi Arabia or any other country to exercise pressure on Pakistan. How to make the Pakistani use of Khalistani terrorism prohibitively costly to Islamabad? That became the main objective of Rajiv Gandhi and Narasimha Rao.


6. Any scope for a new look at India's relations with Saudi Arabia was considerably reduced by the success of the Afghan Mujahideen supported by the US, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia in overthrowing the India-friendly Government of Najibullah in Kabul and capturing power in 1992, the emergence of the Taliban in 1994 and its capture of power in Kabul in 1996, the Saudi support for the Taliban Government and the Saudi sympathies for the Pakistan-backed jihadi terrorist organisations in Jammu & Kashmir post-1989.


7. Faced with these developments, India started exploring new diplomatic and operational options --- with some success. Iran played a central role in the Indian search for new options. Among these options, one could mention India enlisting the support of Iran to defeat the move of the Benazir Bhutto Government to have India condemned in the UN Human Rights Commission on the Kashmir issue in 1994 and the covert alliance with Iran and Russia to help the Northern Alliance in its fight against the Taliban. India's relations with Iran reached the height of their development under Narasimha Rao. Iran became the toast of the Indian diplomacy in the Islamic world just as Saudi Arabia seems to be becoming of the Manmohan Singh Government's diplomacy. Narasimha Rao braved the displeasure of the US Government in developing India's relations with Iran and of the Arab world in developing relations with Israel. Iran and Israel became the two fulcra around which Indian overt and covert diplomacy to counter Pakistan turned.


8. The Manmohan Singh Government's renewed interest in developing closer relations with Saudi Arabia could be traced to his visit to Washington in July, 2005, during which the civilian nuclear co-operation agreement with the US was signed. New Delhi had to pay an unadmitted price for this agreement----downgrading its relations with Iran. The Indian vote against Iran in the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna and the low priority given by India to its participation in the project for the construction of a gas pipeline from Iran to India via Pakistan were the outcome of Dr.Manmohan Singh's visit to the US and the new strategic co-operation with the US. New Delhi, which had consistently resisted US pressure on its Iran policy, became increasingly amenable to pressure from Washington. Result: Iran quietly retaliated on energy co-operation with India.


9. The need to find alternate sources for India's increasing energy requirements in the face of the post-2005 unhelpful attitude of Iran once again made New Delhi turn to Saudi Arabia for its energy security. Our relations with Saudi Arabia have acquired a Pakistani dimension after the 26/11 terrorist strikes in Mumbai. Despite the terrorist strikes, the continuing Pakistani support to organisations such as the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) put the Manmohan Singh Government in a dilemma---to retaliate or not to retaliate. Dr. Manmohan Singh is not a man of confrontation. Even though in response to public anger and political pressure from sections of his own party and other political parties, he suspended the composite dialogue with Pakistan and wriggled out of the agreement reached by him with Pakistani Prime Minister Yousef Raza Gilani at Sharm-el-Sheikh in July last, he has not given up his hopes of reaching some sort of an agreement with Pakistan which would make Pakistan discontinue the use of terrorism against India in Indian and Afghan territories as a prelude to the resumption of the composite dialogue with Pakistan on Kashmir and other issues.


10. Just as Indira Gandhi sought to use ----unsuccessfully---the help of Saudi Arabia to make Pakistan stop supporting the Khalistanis, Dr.Manmohan Singh has sought the good offices of the Saudi King to make Pakistan stop supporting anti-India terrorism so that "he could walk the extra mile" with Pakistan as he put it. We are in for disappointment if we believe that Saudi Arabia will exercise pressure on Pakistan, another Sunni state, to stop supporting anti-India Sunni/Wahabi terrorist groups. There is a convergence between the views of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan on the issue of jihadi Sunni terrorism directed against India. Both condemn jihadi Sunni terrorism in the Indian territory outside Jammu & Kashmir, but both look upon what is going on in J&K as a "freedom struggle". In the unlikely event of Saudi Arabia interceding with Pakistan to give satisfaction to India on the question of terrorism in hinterland India outside Kashmir, it would expect India to give satisfaction to Pakistan on Kashmir. Would Dr.Manmohan Singh be prepared to do it?


11. Some of the recent statements of Dr.Manmohan Singh in Saudi Arabia are likely to be misinterpreted by Islamabad as indicating the beginning of a battle fatigue in New Delhi. It would make Pakistan even more determined than hitherto to keep up the pressure on India through terrorism to force a change in the status quo. Even if Saudi Arabia sincerely tries to exercise pressure on Pakistan on the terrorism issue, Pakistan is unlikely to give in at a time when it thinks that battle fatigue is setting in. It is one thing to strengthen our energy security by developing our relations with Saudi Arabia , but it is another to put our eggs in the Saudi basket in matters relating to our core concerns about Pakistani sponsorship of terrorism and Kashmir.


12. India is a frontline State in the battle against global Sunni/Wahabi jihadi terrorism. It has to fight the battle on its own, through its own means with the help of like-minded States. Saudi Arabia is definitely not a like-minded State in this regard. Another worrisome aspect of the recent visit (February 27 to March 1, 2010) of Dr.Manmohan Singh to Saudi Arabia is his support to the Arab point of view on a peace settlement with Israel without consideration to the core concerns and sensitivities of Israel, which has been a steadfast well-wisher of India and has been quietly playing a helpful role in our attempts to modernise our Armed Forces to counter the modernisation of the Chinese Armed Forces.


13.Just as Dr.Manmohan Singh paid a price in terms of Iran in his keenness to get closer to the US, he seems to be prepared to pay a price in terms of Israel in his keenness to get closer to Saudi Arabia. We supported the Arabs right or wrong to the detriment of Israel before 1967. What did we get in return? It will be very unfortunate if we revert to our pre-1967 policies in our keenness to cultivate Saudi Arabia. (3-3-10)



( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institutue For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: [email protected] )