Source: The Hindu, June 6, 1998. _____________________________________________________________
Give peace a chance
By Kalpana Sharma and Ayesha Khan
_____________________________________________________________
As journalists from India and Pakistan, currently Fellows at the Bulletin
of the Atomic Scientists in Chicago, U. S., we registered the shock,
bewilderment and anxiety that echoed around the world, and in our
countries, when India -- and later Pakistan -- conducted nuclear tests. We
came here to work together in researching women's potential as peace
builders between our countries. Instead, we have been forced to address
the possibility of war.
The discussion in the U.S. press has essentially revolved around whether
India was right or wrong to conduct the tests, did it really face a
security threat, was Pakistan justified in following the same path, and
whether some of the blame lies with the double standards adopted by
Western nations.
In our countries, the media has given primacy to the nationalist rhetoric
which has swept both countries. The voices of concern that military prowess
comes at an unaffordable price have been overwhelmed. While the
BJP-government inspired nation-wide euphoria over "Operation Shakti",
Pakistan retaliated with tests to "even the score". Sweets were
distributed in the streets in both countries to celebrate and
government-owned media played patriotic songs to "inspire the masses". The
casualty in such an over-hyped atmosphere is bound to be cold reason and
far-sightedness.
What we find missing in much of the discussion both in the media here in
the U. S., and what we have seen of the coverage in our respective
countries, is the recognition that there are real people on both sides of
the India-Pakistan border who will pay the ultimate price for decisions
taken by a handful of people.
Ordinary people understand little of how much nuclear weaponisation has
cost their governments and do not know how many millions will die a swift
death if weapons are ever used. Yet they have been asked to sacrifice and
both governments presume that they have given their consent.
Both our countries have been devoting large chunks of their budgets to
defence. During 1990-1996 India and Pakistan together spent a total of $70
billion on defence and only $12 billion on education. And while our
arsenals have grown, social indicators, in terms of literacy, maternal and
infant mortality, and access to basic health and sanitation, have improved
at an inexcusably slow pace and even declined in some instances.
Despite 50 years as independent nations, we have not learned the lesson
that true strength is displayed by attacking poverty and challenging the
social, political and gender inequalities within our own societies. The
current escalation of tensions will be cause to further prioritise defence.
If the choices were not mutually exclusive, perhaps there would be no
debate. But unfortunately, the more that is diverted to defence --
whatever the justification -- the less is available for eradicating the
evils that keep our societies poor and weak.
Fortunately, even though media depictions of wildly hysterical men and
women would suggest that all the people in both our countries have
suspended disbelief in their joy at being owners of weapons of mass
destruction, there are signs that the generations that have grown up in the
shadow of hostility have begun to challenge the status quo and ask
difficult questions. Who gains from war and from continued tensions
between our countries? How do ordinary people benefit? What respite is
there for thousands of divided families who still have close relatives on
the other side of the border? How are the poor empowered by militarism and
war? And ultimately, who pays the price?
The most unfortunate setback from the current developments in both
countries could be to the growing civilian efforts to build peace.
The people of India and Pakistan had begun to make a small but significant
investment in peace before the recent crisis. The earliest exchanges of
ideas among politicised and development professionals from India and
Pakistan took place during the 1980s at international conferences.
Activists met to work on women's issues, human rights, or environmental
problems at various United Nations and other international meetings and
discovered to their surprise that delegates from South Asia were united in
their positions on these pressing and common areas of concern.
For example, violence against women is a shared problem that both
governments need to address through comprehensive legislation and
protection to women. Further, the flesh trade which involves smuggling of
women across India from as far as Bangladesh to be sold in the Gulf
requires a regional solution in order to end it. Also, similar topography
on both sides of the border reveals similar environmental problems for
which solutions could be jointly devised and shared.
During informal conversations after the day's work was over, Indian and
Pakistani participants often voiced their sadness that they did not have
more access to each other's countries, and that the intransigent politics
of the region prevented them from working together to solve many shared
problems. Friendships were made, ideas for change were discussed and
stereotypes were shattered.
These early contacts paved the way for a formal civilian Indo-Pak dialogue
to take shape in 1994. Anyone can join in the annual meeting of 200
activists, intellectuals and concerned citizens who make up the
India-Pakistan People to People Forum for Peace and Democracy, which meets
alternately in each country to discuss and debate all the many issues which
keep our countries from normalising relations.
"These nuclear explosions have brutally shattered the hope of the people of
the subcontinent," said a recent statement issued by the Forum. "Basic
needs of ordinary people have been sacrificed to this altar of all
powerful 'national security'." Their pleas for Pakistan not to retaliate
with further tests were not heard.
Other groups joined in the condemnation. Dr. Haroon Ahmed, former regional
leader of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War --
which won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985 for its work to end the Cold War --
stated, "India has conducted these tests at a time when traditional rivals
all over the world are sorting out their differences and collaborating with
each other."
Not only have the 1990s seen unprecedented civilian collaboration in South
Asia, but non-official diplomatic dialogue channels have also sprung up for
the first time. In 1991, the United States Information Service brought
retired officials and policy-makers from India and Pakistan together for
talks at Neemrana. Frank debate and discussion on how to build confidence
between the two governments have been held every six months for the past
six years. The Shanghai Initiative, non-official talks which include
Chinese participants, and the South Asian Summer School in Arms Control, to
involve young journalists and future policy-makers in the dialogue, are
both on-going Track II efforts initiated by the W. Alton Jones Foundation
in the last four years. One estimate by the Washington-based Henry J.
Stimson Foundation puts the total number of non-official and civilian
dialogue channels at 40.
Much more of this slow and painstaking work, of laying the foundations on
which a political accord can be built, will now be affected. Non-official
diplomatic efforts, which seek to resolve the nuclear issue on a regional
level and address the global balances which have pushed proliferation, may
cease altogether. But without dialogue, there can be no language of peace.
If there is to be a real chance for peace in our region we must not let the
opportunities for dialogue lapse. Those who have begun the investment in
peace must renew their commitment now and every time a crisis erupts
because the cost of complacency will be paid in human terms.
It is only through talk that we can find answers to the questions that
haunt us all. What do we want our nations to be in the next 50 years? Do we
want current tensions to continue in perpetuity? Or is there a chance that
like Europe, South Asia could also be an area where mutual interests for
peace and economic growth overcome the myopia of military might?
Our research on women and peace in other arenas of conflict has revealed
the crucial role played by ordinary women in the most intractable
situations around the world. In the Middle East, for instance, over 5000
Palestinian and Israeli women are together part of a women's peace group,
Jerusalem Link. A good deal of the groundwork for the recent Irish accord
was possible because Catholic and Protestant women demanded of their
leaders that they find a way out of the political impasse. And in the
Balkans, where conflict has devastated a once beautiful part of the world,
Serbian women protested against the rape of Bosnian women by their soliders
even as the two sides were at war. Therefore, it is not unrealistic to
believe that peace can be a reality, even in South Asia, if ordinary people
on both sides want it enough.
Reutrn to the Homepage of: SOUTH ASIANS AGAINST NUKES