A brief recap of the troubled Pak-Russia relationship

LAHORE: While the Pakistan Army Chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, is in Moscow for his second trip since 2009 and the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Viktorovich Lavrov, is incidentally in Islamabad at the same time, both nuclear powers are now seemingly striving to ignore the bitter legacy of their extremely tense past and move forward with a new zeal.
It has nearly been a decade since both Russia and Pakistan have been trying to come closer to each other, to the sheer dismay of the United States for sure.
In 2005, Pakistan had succeeded in getting an Observer’s status at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) because Russia had opted not to veto Islamabad’s presence at this forum.
Pakistan then reciprocated the gesture by helping the Russians get an Observer’s status at the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC).
The fact that the bilateral volume of trade between Russia and Pakistan has surged from a paltry $92 million in 2003 to over $700 million in 2011 also lends credence to the belief that both Islamabad and Moscow have come miles forward during the last decade or so to embrace each other and shun differences.
Many Western analysts, who had wildly speculated a lot after the cancellation of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s tour to Pakistan this year, might just be disappointed with the most recent developments though.
A few of these analysts had even commented that the Russian endeavours to gain access to Pakistan’s warm waters had halted with cancellation of President Putin’s visit.
It is imperative to note that Pakistan was the first to recognise Russia as the successor state of the former Soviet Union (USSR) and its formal bilateral ties with the Russian federation had commenced in 1991.
In 2011, President Putin had endorsed Pakistan’s bid to join the SCO, viewing that Pakistan was a very important Russian partner in South Asia and the Muslim world. Of late, Putin has not only offered assistance in expansion of Pakistan Steel Mills and provision of technical support for the Guddu and Muzaffargarh power plants, but has also expressed interest in developing the Thar Coal Project.
In 2011, Russia had also condemned the Nato strike on a Pakistan Army check-post, stating it was unacceptable to violate the sovereignty of a state even when counter-insurgency operations were being carried out.
Taking valuable help from the documents of the Institute of Strategic Studies in Islamabad, celebrated writer Peter Duncan’s book “The Soviet Union and India,” Indian author Ram Sharma’s book “India-USSR relations,” the “Indian Express” edition of April 14, 2011, the January 4, 2012 edition of “The Economist” and various Pakistani media archives, here follows a brief timeline of Pakistan-Russian Federation relationship since 1947:
1) Soviet ties with Pakistan are basically 90 years old. After the Bolshevik Revolution of 1922, innumerable Soviets had fled their country to reach a territory (now Khyber Pakhtunkwa); to start a communist revolution against the British Empire, which was already afraid of intelligence reports and prophecies that Communism might spread in India. The series of coups (at least five of them), also known as Peshawar Conspiracy Cases, were reported between 1922 and 1927 against the British Rule.
2) Russian Federation and Pakistan had first established diplomatic and bilateral relations on May 1, 1948, when Soviet leadership had sent a congratulatory message to the then Pakistani Prime Minister, Liaquat Ali Khan. However, Joseph Stalin had never sent any such message to Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah in 1947, when the country was actually born. This incidentally was an era when the Cold War between Moscow and Washington DC was taking birth.
3) In April 1949, Russians had invited Liaquat Ali Khan to Moscow, but Pakistani Premier preferred to visit the US instead in May 1950. Basically, the Soviet Union had kept mum to Pakistan’s repeated requests for military and economic assistance. And then the Indian Premier Jawarlal Nehru’s announcement in May 1949 to visit the United States made Liaquat Ali Khan regime think that it was better to knock at Washington DC’s doors instead of banking upon the ‘speechless’ Soviets.
4) Premier Liaquat Ali Khan’s visit to the United States infuriated the Soviets and during the 1954-58 era, the Pak-Soviet relations remained quite tense.
5) In 1954, Pakistan became member of South East Asia Treaty Organisation (Seato) and in 1955; it joined the Central Treaty Organisation (Cento)——a couple of moves which Soviet Union did not welcome. The Soviets responded by supporting India on the disputed Kashmir issue.
6) Between March and April 1954, a Soviet cultural troupe visited Pakistan and a festival of the Soviet films was held in Karachi. This was the time of Premier Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy.
7) In 1956, a Pakistani delegation also visited Moscow to study the Soviet development. As a gesture of goodwill, the then Soviet Prime Minister Nikolai Bulganin offered technical and scientific help to Pakistan for projects involving a peaceful use of nuclear energy.
8) In 1958, President Ayub Khan toured the US, but was also keen to develop ties with the Soviets. In 1959, Soviets shot down a US reconnaissance plane (Lockheed U2), which had actually flown from a Pakistani Air Base. Moscow was infuriated over the Pakistani leadership, which later said it was ignorant of the American spying plans.
9) During the 1965 Pak-India war, Russia supplied a huge quantity of arms to New Delhi—thereby seeking revenge from the Pakistani leadership. Moscow also extended lots of support to a few ‘rebellious’ political and ethnic parties like the Awami National Party (ANP) in Pakistan.
10) After the 1971 Pak-India war, Soviets supported the Indian Army and Mukti Bahini in East Pakistan. Moscow recognized the formation of Bangladesh. Throughout the East Pakistan episode, the Soviet Navy was on high alert, ready to extend any support to the Indians and the Mukti Bahini against Pakistan.
11) During the early 1970s, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto endeavoured to improve his country’s relationship with Soviet Union. He succeeded in convincing Moscow to establish a billion-dollar steel mill at Karachi in 1972. The Karachi Steel Mill still remains the hallmark of Pak-Soviet relationship. Bhutto was also the first Pakistani Prime Minister to tour the USSR. During his visit to Moscow, the Pakistani leader was accorded an honorary guard of honour by the Soviet Armed Forces.
12) However, the fairly warm Pak-Soviet ties under Bhutto were short-lived. In 1977, Bhutto was ousted by General Zia and a couple of years later, the eventful Soviet intervention into Afghanistan changed the world to quite an extent. Soviet leadership had also condemned Bhutto’s hanging and had gone on requesting for his clemency, but to no avail, as General Zia had refused to pay an ear to any such request. Pakistan then backed the United States and the Afghan Mujahideen against the invading Soviets.
13) In November 1982, General Zia traveled to the Soviet Union to attend the funeral of Leonid Brezhnev, then-General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. At Kremlin, Zia met the Soviet President Andrei Gromyko and the new Secretary-General Yuri Andropov.
14) Interestingly, Premier Benazir Bhutto also toed the line of Pakistan Army to topple the communist regime in Kabul and to end the Soviet influence. Benazir later recognized the Taliban-led government in Afghanistan in not the best of atmospheres.
15) In April 1999, Premier Nawaz Sharif paid a state visit to Kremlin, some 25 years after Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had done so. Russia then played a major role in ending the Pak-India Kargil War of 1999 and later condemned the ouster of Sharif in October that year.
16) After the 9/11 episode, Moscow and Islamabad came close to each other again after General Musharraf’s regime had denounced the Afghan Taliban. The US, Russia and Pakistan were all on the same page then.
17) In February 2003, the then Pakistani President Pervez Musharaf had also toured Russia for three days.
18) In 2007, Russian Prime Minister, Mikhail Fradkov, was seen visiting Pakistan. He was the first Russian Prime Minister to land on the Islamabad airport in 38 years. Pakistan and Russia were now talking in a cordial atmosphere. And since then, as newspaper archives reveal, Pakistan and Russia have never looked back, cementing their relationship with every passing day.