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Strategies & Market Trends : Asia Forum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Worswick who wrote (2503)	3/4/1998 11:10:00 AM
From: Worswick	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 9980

Further to my comments of last month on the BJP and India. For Private Use only (C) Stratfor Global Intelligence Update Red Alert March 4, 1998 Pakistan Warns India Against Hindu Nationalist "Misadventure" With India's Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) showing substantial gains in Indian election returns, Pakistan has issued a warning against any Indian provocation. Pakistani Foreign Minister Gohar Ayub Khan asserted before parliament in Islamabad on Tuesday that, "If there is any misadventure by India then there will be a very swift and telling reply." Khan went on to accuse the Research and Analysis Wing of India, India's intelligence service, of staging recent terrorist attacks in Pakistan, including the shooting deaths of two Iranian engineers that have strained Pakistan's relations with Tehran. Commenting on India's missile program, Khan vowed to use all resources and indigenous capabilities to counter the Indian threat. The BJP stuck to their traditional hard line rhetoric during the recent election campaign, vowing to acquire nuclear weapons for India and to take back by force a portion of the disputed state of Kashmir held by Pakistan. The Kashmir issue is the single most serious point of contention between India and Pakistan. The two countries have fought two wars over the northern Jammu and Kashmir region since 1947, and artillery duels and firefights across the border are common. Only Sunday, Indian and Pakistani troops exchanged fire at three locations along the Jammu border, with India claiming to have killed six Moslem guerrillas attempting to infiltrate Indian territory. India and Pakistan last year resumed negotiations over outstanding conflicts between their countries, but India's assertion that its possession of Kashmir was non-negotiable stalled the talks. On Monday, Pakistan's Foreign Ministry stated that it would not permit free trade or "sustained cooperation in various fields" with India until the Jammu and Kashmir issue was meaningfully addressed. Progress on the issue is all but out of the question should a BJP government take power, although the BJP may be forced to relent on some of its more extreme and confrontational policies in order to attract coalition partners necessary to form a government. Faced with the potential for an openly hostile and aggressive India, Pakistan is ripe for overtures from regional powers, including Iran and Russia. Both countries have reason to approach Pakistan, which has supported the Taleban militia that controls two thirds of Afghanistan and battles a coalition of Russian and Iranian backed Afghan factions. Though Russia has forged strong military and economic ties with India for over thirty years, relations with Pakistan have been thawing lately and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Boris Karasin is currently visiting Pakistan in an attempt to improve bilateral relations. An Iranian delegation will soon be visiting Pakistan to investigate the murders of the Iranian engineers, which Islamabad is now blaming on Indian provocateurs. The BJP have yet to forge a ruling coalition, but should the intense coalition-building negotiations now underway in New Delhi produce a Hindu nationalist government, it could serve to spread the Middle East realignment farther east to incorporate Islamabad. At very least, the installation of a BJP regime will dramatically increase political and military tensions between India and Pakistan, further destabilizing South Asia.