Difficult diplomacy

Just two days after Army Chief Qamar Javed Bajwa met with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani (on Sunday), a hearing of the US House Armed Services Committee showed just how difficult it will be for Pakistan to balance its own interests in the region and maintain good ties with the US and Afghanistan. Defence Secretary James Mattis told the committee that the US was prepared to work with Pakistan “one more time” on terrorism and, should it fail, Trump would be prepared to take whatever steps are necessary. These ominous words were augmented by US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Joseph Dunford who told the same committee that he believes intelligence agencies in Pakistan have links to militant groups. These threats from the US will likely negate whatever good came from the meeting between Bajwa and Ghani. Before this meeting, Afghanistan had all but given up on diplomacy, instead repeating its mantra that Pakistan was somehow responsible for militancy on its territory. Pakistan, in turn, had taken to blaming Afghanistan for sheltering the TTP and its ilk. It is not clear what either Bajwa or Ghani had to say about this beyond the usual platitudes of working together towards a political settlement. Afghanistan and Pakistan right now are about as far apart as is possible to be, with Ghani seemingly squarely behind the US plan to send in more troops and to scapegoat Pakistan for the failure to defeat the Afghan Taliban and the Haqqani Network.

The statements made by Mattis and Dunford will only embolden Ghani to continue blaming Pakistan for violence in his country and to avoid taking the difficult but necessary step of initiating talks with the Afghan Taliban. While Mattis did not spell out what steps Trump might think it necessary to take, in the past his administration has hinted at expanded drone strikes within Pakistan and downgrading our status as a major non-Nato ally. Should they do this, Pakistan will be put in a position where it may find it difficult to work with the US and Afghanistan on a political solution to the war. It would have been better for the US to help Pakistan and Afghanistan improve their own ties first. Bajwa and Ghani have spoken about secondary issues like trade, commerce and person-to-person contact. Even though finding common cause in these issues will be difficult, it provides a better opportunity of identifying potential breakthroughs. Foreign Minister Khawaja Asif is now in the US for a three-day visit where he will meet with his counterpart Rex Tillerson. His task – admittedly difficult – is to convince the US to take a backseat, avoid inflammatory statements and allow Pakistan and Afghanistan to gradually work towards peace. The shotgun approach taken by the Trump administration will only make the situation worse and a political solution ever more distant.