India’s disinformation games

On December 9, 2020 the EU-based watchdog DisinfoLab uncovered an Indian disinformation network, operating since 2005, tasked solely with promoting India and damaging the reputations of nations it is at odds with.

The report highlighted the network’s efforts to discredit Pakistan by publishing anti-Pakistan content on a variety of seemingly credible online platforms. EU DisinfoLab’s investigation unearthed several websites and UN-accredited NGOs either belonging or tied directly to the Delhi-based Srivastava Group. Using this network of fake NGOs and news sites this operation vociferously lobbied in favor of India and against Pakistan, holding demonstrations, courting European politicians, and holding press conferences and delivering speeches – often before the UN itself – on behalf of the several UN-accredited NGOs it concealed itself behind.

While the revelations are shocking, they are hardly novel; earlier this year a decade-long operation by Indian intelligence agencies to “covertly influence” Canadian politicians came to light in Canadian Federal Court proceedings, where the editor-in-chief of an Indian newspaper was accused by Canadian intelligence services of interfering in Canadian politics. During the proceedings, the accused admitted being asked by Indian intelligence – including RAW and IB – to “covertly influence Canadian government representatives and agencies on behalf of the Indian government”, attempting to “direct them into supporting issues that impacted India,” and to provide financial assistance and propaganda material to Canadian politicians to influence them.

Pakistan and India’s less than ideal relationship is no secret. February 2019 saw Indian combat aircraft violating Pakistani airspace, and in 2016 the Indian saboteur and agent provocateur Kulbhushan Jadhav was apprehended in Balochistan. DisinfoLab’s revelations should thus come as no surprise. The dirty business of international realpolitik aside, however, India’s actions also constitute grave violations of international law.

The duty of non-intervention – that a state not interfere in the affairs of another – is one of the foundational principles of international law, forming the bedrock for the concept of ‘sovereignty’; indeed, articles 2(1) and 2(4) of the UN Charter predicate the entirety of the UN framework on the principle of sovereignty, barring states from interfering with others or from acting in a manner inconsistent with the purposes of the UN Charter respectively. This principle is based on mutual respect for states’ sovereignty; governing their relations and respective rights and obligations; and has also been explicitly expressed in several UN General Assembly Resolutions, including the Declaration on the Inadmissibility of Intervention and Interference in the Internal Affairs of States of 1981 – most notably assented to by India itself.

The principle of non-interference has been established as a determinative principle of customary international law, also expressed in the International Law Commission’s Draft Articles on the Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts (Draft Articles). The Draft Articles describe ‘internationally wrongful acts’ – such as India’s persistent efforts to undermine its western neighbor’s sovereignty and territorial integrity – as constituting a breach of an international legal obligation attributable to the wrongful state.

In context, it becomes clear that India’s fomenting of sedition and extremism within Pakistan – and its campaign to harm Pakistan’s international reputation – are “wrongful” under international law, as a breach not only of broader international legal principles but also of the 1972 Simla Agreement. According to the Agreement, both India and Pakistan committed to respecting one another’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, and to refrain from interfering in one another’s affairs. India’s track record, however, speaks to its blatant disrespect for its international commitments.

The revelations regarding India’s disinformation network should also serve as a wakeup call to Pakistan. India has paired this anti-Pakistan propaganda with sponsoring extremism in Balochistan to foster a vicious cycle of internal instability and global disrepute for Pakistan.

These multifarious transgressions arguably represent one of the most serious encroachments by India upon Pakistan’s sovereignty. In contrast to its February 2019 violation of Pakistani airspace, these covert campaigns by India – to foment discord and extremism within Pakistan and to slander it internationally – also work to destabilize and undermine Pakistan’s long-term attempts to develop its economy. Being maligned internationally renders Pakistan less able to engage other states in trading relationships, and it is a matter of public record that one of Jadhav’s key goals was to direct extremists to sabotage CPEC-related facilities.

India’s close ties with the US under the Trump administration and its monomaniacal desire to become the South Asian hegemon also prohibit it from engaging positively with China. China’s outreach and engagement – through the One Belt, One Road; CPEC; and other initiatives – has been coolly received by the US and EU, and by allying with the second most populous country in the world – and a fractious neighbor to China – the intent is to counterbalance China’s growing global significance. This Western willingness to tolerate India’s delinquency is patent in the complete lack of concern in the US and EU regarding the violent crackdown on farmers protesting the BJP government’s new farm bills which allow private industrial concerns to pillage India’s agricultural sector; India’s similarly violent response towards its Muslim citizenry and demonstrators peacefully protesting the imposition of the CAA – all while Indian Premier Narendra Modi played dutiful host to US President Donald Trump; and the ongoing siege perpetrated on Indian-occupied Kashmir.

The ongoing Indian pogrom in Kashmir, and gleeful exhortations by Indian politicians to grab land and “fair-skinned Kashmiri girls” for themselves, fall entirely within the definition of genocide under the 1951 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, to which India is a party. The fact that India remains party to such international instruments – yet continues to violate them with impunity – speaks not only to its own casual disregard for international law but also to Western disinterest in India’s malfeasance. In point of fact, while the 2020 index of Peoples Under Threat, prepared by Minority Rights Group International and hosted by the US Department of Justice, waxes eloquent over human rights issues in Pakistan, it makes scant mention of Indian human rights violations despite recent events in Kashmir and India, even attributing the loss of life due to Indian shelling across the LoC to Pakistan.

As per political analyst Eeman Quereshi, the Indian propaganda campaign DisinfoLab uncovered also serves a domestic purpose, feeding the domestic misinformation and false-news cycle presenting Pakistan as an existential threat. Modi and his BJP have consistently indulged in dirty politics, presenting themselves as strong leaders dedicated to preserving a mythical and idealized version of “Hindustan” from its Muslim neighbor – and arguably from its own Muslim citizenry. Disseminating anti-minority fiction against Pakistan also enables India to strategically maneuver the world’s attention away from Kashmir, avoiding what little global scrutiny there is.

Given that CPEC runs through parts of the country that have historically remained underdeveloped, with its terminus on the Balochi coast, in addition to an overall boost to the economy, the project will specifically contribute towards the economic uplift of these regions. The UN Declaration on the Right to Development enshrines the inalienable human right to “participate in, contribute to, and enjoy economic, social, cultural and political development, in which all human rights and fundamental freedoms can be fully realized”. CPEC and its ancillary projects are the cornerstone to ensuring economic development in these parts of Pakistan, and India’s attempts to sabotage the endeavor violate the Pakistani people’s international legal right to development.

DisinfoLab’s revelations of India’s decades-long campaign to discredit Pakistan is a wakeup call to Pakistan’s foreign policy mechanisms to respond to these new threats. Pakistan needs to leverage support from its allies to call out India for its propaganda campaign; the clear human rights violations inflicted on India’s minorities; its continued occupation of Kashmir; and its efforts to compromise the right to development in Pakistan by fostering discord and attempting to sabotage international development projects within its Western neighbor.

Pakistan cannot afford to play the passive role of a victim, especially when India is proving itself so capable at manipulating international perceptions of Pakistan to suit its own geostrategic and diplomatic ends.

Sikander Ahmed Shah is a professor at the LUMS Law School.

Abid Rizvi, is an international law expert.