The border

The events of the past few days have shown us that there is only one side that is trying to find a diplomatic solution to the Pakistan-India conflict. Last Friday, de-facto foreign minister Sartaj Aziz, likely trying to defuse any tension that may have been caused by assertions that the Quetta attacks were carried out by hostile neighbouring countries trying to destabilise the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, offered a fig leaf to India by saying he was looking forward to a comprehensive dialogue with the country and that Pakistan was ready to agree to a bilateral moratorium on nuclear testing. India’s response made it clear that it is not looking for peace any time soon.                  

The BJP government, angered by the Pakistan High Commissioner Abdul Basit’s dedication of its independence day to the Kashmiri struggle for freedom, said that the only freedom struggle it would support is to liberate Pakistan-administered Kashmir from Islamabad.   On August 14, there were again further tensions as both sides accused each other of unprovoked firing along the Line of Control, although surely the bigger story should have been that they also exchanged sweets on the occasion of our independence day, something Indian soldiers had refused to do last year.

Nadir Khan

Karachi