Adam Thomson, Her Britannic Majesty’s High Commissioner in Pakistan, could do with a refresher course on diplomacy. He told a select group of journalists at his residence in Islamabad on January 24 that the “government has failed to come up to the expectations of the people.” Pakistan was ensnared in the deadly grip of horrendous crises. The foremost of these was its comatose economy which was difficult to revive because of the chronic power shortfall and incessant incidents of terrorist violence.
There was the self-assurance of a viceroy, reminiscent of the long-faded glory of the British Raj, when the envoy said that his country wanted a successful transfer of power to the next government, but “the elections must not be tainted.” The Election Commission of Pakistan was the most ‘independent’ in the country’s history, and it must play its role of ‘purging’ parliament of those who do not match up to the high standards set for them in the constitution. Furthermore, the tenure of the caretaker dispensation must not be extended beyond the time-limit stipulated in the basic law.
Britain is a friend of Pakistan and so is, undoubtedly, High Commissioner Thomson. His country has provided Pakistan considerable assistance in diverse sectors – notably, education. An opportunity has suddenly presented itself for Islamabad to reciprocate this generosity, albeit in modest measure. The government could offer the well-intentioned envoy a crash course on diplomatic practice at the Foreign Service Academy (FSA).
This would help the high commissioner recollect what he must have been taught when he entered the profession. In fact, all that the envoy needs to be reminded of are two immutable norms of diplomatic practice: first, never openly badmouth the host government, especially before the local media; second, meticulously eschew any public pronouncement that can even remotely be construed as interference in the country’s internal affairs.
But it is unlikely that High Commissioner Thomson will have time to undertake an FSA refresher programme. The alternative is for the foreign office to present the envoy leather-bound editions of Sir Earnest Satow’s 1917 seminal work A Guide to Diplomatic Practice and Sir Harold Nicholson’s 1939 masterpiece Diplomacy: a Basic Guide to the Conduct of Contemporary Foreign Affairs. This will demonstrate Pakistan’s acknowledgment of Britain’s significant contribution to the evolution of diplomatic practice and, perchance, even persuade the spirited diplomat to abide by the norms of his profession so ably enunciated by his own countrymen.
But probably the high commissioner’s remarks were deliberate. A precedent for making outrageous statements against Pakistan was, after all, set by Prime Minister Cameron who, during a visit to India in July 2010, said that Islamabad could no longer “look both ways by tolerating terrorism while demanding respect as a democracy.” The motive of the leader from “John Bull’s little island” was no higher than to please his hosts.
This was mercantile or shopkeeper diplomacy at its worst. For the purpose of reaping lucrative economic and commercial benefits, Pakistan’s unmatched sacrifices in the fight against terrorism were thrown to the wind and obscured in the haze of selective forgetfulness.
Admittedly, there are still vestiges of the jihadi mindset within Islamabad’s power structures. But this was never native to Pakistan. It was imported into the country from the Arab world, with the encouragement of the west, to reverse the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Money and weapons were never in short supply. In his Pulitzer Prize-winning bestseller Ghost Wars, Steven Coll reveals that run-of-the-mill mujahideen were paid $20,000 to $50,000 each per month while their commanders received as much as $100,000.
After the Soviet withdrawal, these fighters stayed on and had a field day pursuing their own warped interpretation of jihad. The lethal poison of their extremist ideology seeped into the sinews of Jinnah’s Pakistan, as a result of which the country continues to bleed profusely and is the world’s primary victim of terrorism.
But all this is lost on a world obsessed by realpolitik in which foreign policy is crafted increasingly by the prospects of corporate dividends. It is, therefore, not surprising that the British prime minister told his Indian audience that Islamabad was, in effect, a wolf in sheep’s clothing and was pursuing a duplicitous policy of “tolerating terrorism” while wearing the garb of liberal democracy. The hackneyed theme, worn threadbare by incessant reiteration, has lost its shine.
What High Commissioner Thomson said in Islamabad was probably on cue from Whitehall. It is, however, highly unlikely that his counterpart in India would dare deliver a similarly intrusive and self-righteous sermon in New Delhi.
This is an age of new thinking and new diplomacy. The inviolability of national sovereignty, non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries, and many such concepts are outmoded.
Finesse, which was once the hallmark of diplomacy, has been replaced by crudity. But this, again, is not really novel. Between the two world wars, Soviet diplomats in Iran were under instructions from Moscow to be abrasive with functionaries of the host state. The purpose was to determine the extent to which Tehran was susceptible to external dictation.
Similarly, High Commissioner Thomson must have assumed that Pakistan, chronically dependent as it is on external assistance, was incapable of reacting to provocation. His assessment proved correct. Despite the emotional hype that politicians and the media like indulging in about zero tolerance for external interference, a leading Lahore-based English newspaper actually commented that: “The British government on Thursday lent Pakistan’s fragile democracy a helping hand, rejecting all calls for any acts beyond the boundaries of the country’s constitution” – so much for national self-respect.
On the other hand, foreign dignitaries are perfectly justified in lashing out against Pakistan, particularly when their own county’s concerns are involved. For instance, earlier in the week British International Development Secretary Justine Greening was understandably livid that 70 percent of Pakistan’s parliamentarians and top functionaries of the government are tax evaders. Yet, these are the people, she said, who consider foreign aid their birthright quite, forgetting that such assistance comes from the taxpayers of donor countries.
But High Commissioner Thomson was judgemental. The only relevant statement he made in the course of his rambling interaction with the Pakistani media was the disclosure that President Zardari, General Kayani, and Foreign Minister Khar will be participating in the trilateral meeting on Afghan reconciliation convened by Prime Minister Cameron on February 3-4. One hopes that the Pakistani delegation has dispassionately brainstormed the issues and removed the cobwebs from its mind.
The perils are enormous for Pakistan and the world. The Taliban have fractured and this makes the restoration of durable peace that much more difficult. The ulema conference proposal that emerged in November during the visit of the Afghan High Peace Council was a harebrained idea and has been rejected by the Taliban.
The 352,000-strong Afghan National Security Forces will require $6.5 billion annually to keep it intact. But only $3.6 billion was pledged during the Chicago conference in May last year. The disintegration of the Afghan army, as has happened on three occasions in the last four decades, is a possibility and this will have disastrous consequences.
Similarly, the assessment of the Tokyo conference in July 2012 was that the Afghan economy will need $4 billion annually over the next four years. Though this is barely sufficient to stave off a meltdown, it is unlikely that funds will be forthcoming. The writing on the wall is chaos which will unavoidably spill over into Pakistan.
The outcome of the ongoing meeting in London will probably end with another wordy and meaningless communique. Had High Commissioner Thomson shared his thoughts on the trilateral Afghanistan conference instead of indulging in clumsy and unsolicited comments on Pakistan’s internal affairs, he would have served his country well.
The writer is the publisher of Criterion Quarterly. Email: iftimurshed@ gmail.com
S. Iftikhar Murshed, "Dereliction of diplomatic norms," The News. 2013-02-03.Keywords: