New Delhi, September 17
The Indian leadership should open channels of communication with the Pakistan military while the United States should do everything possible to assist Pakistan in protecting its nuclear arsenal, a high-powered Indo-US joint study group has suggested.

The report of the study group, co-sponsored by the US Council on Foreign Relations and the Aspen Institute India and titled “The United States and India: A Shared Strategic Future’’, was released here today by former Indian Ambassador to the US Naresh Chandra and strategic affairs expert C Raja Mohan. It was simultaneously released by members of the panel in New York.

Apart from Chandra and Mohan, the study group included former US Ambassador to India Robert Blackwill, former National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra and Stephen J Hadley of the US Institute of Peace, among others.

The 53-page report deals extensively with Indo-US relations and how the two countries could jointly face the challenges in Pakistan and Afghanistan as also with how a partnership between them was vital for dealing with the rise of China. “Neither India nor the US wants confrontation with China or to forge a coalition to contain China. Both states have a strong interest in pursuing strategies that maximise the likelihood of congenial relations with China,’’ the report said.

However, it is the policy prescriptions of the study group with regard to Pakistan which make for interesting reading. “India’s leadership should develop channels, including military-to-military, to talk with the Pakistan military,’’ it said.

To a question in this regard, Chandra wondered what was wrong with talking to Pakistan military when India was dealing with the military in Myanmar. In China too, there was a ‘heavy dose of military’ in the Communist leadership, it was stated.

He said if India desired to achieve results in its relations with Pakistan, wisdom demanded that it opened a dialogue with the military since the civilian leadership would not be able to deliver.

Raja Mohan, who works for the New Delhi-based Centre for Policy Research, alluded to the fact that the military held the veto in Pakistan as far as the relations with India were concerned. The report also suggested that the US, while holding the Pakistan military to a much more exacting code of conduct, should do all it could to avoid a sustained rupture of its relations with Islamabad.

India should also attempt to initiate quiet bilateral discussions with Pakistan on Afghanistan as well as trilateral discussions with Afghanistan.

On Afghanistan, the report said the US should maintain a residual military presence over the long term in the war-ravaged nation beyond 2014, if such presence was acceptable to the Afghan government. India should, meanwhile, continue expressing its endorsement of this important American role. Washington should not allow Pakistan to exercise a de facto veto over the dimensions of Indian involvement in Afghanistan. New Delhi should support US efforts to negotiate Afghan reconciliation toward a lasting end to the war in Afghanistan.

Regarding China, the report recommended to both India and the US emphasis on their constructive, stabilising and amicable purposes and endeavour jointly and individually to enlist China’s cooperation on matters of global and regional concern.

Islamabad: The trial of seven Pakistanis, charged with involvement in the 2008 Mumbai attacks, hit a fresh blockade on Saturday after the judge hearing the case was transferred, resulting in no proceedings for the second consecutive week. The case was being heard by Shahid Rafique of anti-terrorism court number 3, who was the fifth judge to hear the case. — PTI

New Delhi: Former National Security Adviser of Pakistan Gen Mahmud Ali Durrani (retd) has suggested a need for a paradigm shift in India-Pakistan relations and a switch from ‘confrontation to cooperation’. Durrani, who was here at the invitation of leading strategic think-tank, Institute of Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA) made a presentation in which he argued that the relationship between the two neighbours has to move from one of confrontation to that of cooperation. — TNS