Almost a week after their foreign-secretary level talks at Thimphu the governments of Pakistan and India have issued a joint statement spelling out the "agreed outcome" of their meeting. The foreign secretaries have agreed to resume dialogue on "all issues", in line with the spirit of their foreign ministers' desire.
Amongst the issues mentioned in the statement include counter-terrorism, humanitarian issues, peace and security, Kashmir, friendly exchanges, economic issues, Siachin and water dispute - almost all the subjects which formed agenda of the Composite Dialogue.
But the words 'composite dialogue' seems to be conspicuously missing from the formulation of the new rubric for the resumed talks - for which officials from the two countries are expected to meet in near future, to be followed by a meeting of the foreign secretaries and culminating in a visit by Pakistan's Foreign Minister to New Delhi for talks with his counterpart sometime by July.
Ever since June-1997 when India's Foreign Secretary Salman, a Muslim, agreed to name the Pak-India talks as 'Composite Dialogue' for discussions and negotiations of a variety of disputes including Kashmir - and in the process earned Indian media's stiff rebuke - New Delhi has been allergic to that nomenclature.
The new cover of "all issues" may appear to be tempting to many in Pakistan thinking at long last that India is coming round to discuss Kashmir. But the mischief lies in the detail; India seems to have agreed to the resumption of bilateral talks and meetings, which its Foreign Sectary Rao dubs as "a new approach", to some developments, which were in the making for some time but have now begun weighing in with its foreign policy affairs.
First, the ongoing 'intifada' in the occupied Kashmir is being interpreted by the international community differently from the former phases of freedom struggle, which were branded as Pakistan-sponsored Jihad. Now it is the youth, using modern tools like social media and asking more emphatically for 'independence' than joining Pakistan, that brought Kashmir dispute under a much wider focus of not only foreign governments but also world intelligentsia.
Secondly, the unsavoury disclosure of Indian security forces' collusion with Hindu extremists in bombing the Samjhota Express has forced New Delhi climb down from its moral high ground, creating a kind of equalisation of threat of terrorism both to Pakistan and India.
Thirdly, the United States' keenness to make Pakistan believe that India is no more a threat to its security on its eastern borders cannot be ruled out as the lever that might be nudging the two sides to some kind of engagement. The latest spurt in Pak-India relations has been interpreted by the western media a consequence of US worry that their rivalry tends to undermine efforts to stabilise the situation in Afghanistan.
The erstwhile Composite Dialogue did include 'peace and security' but by no stretch of imagination it included the Afghanistan situation. But if Indian Foreign Secretary Rao's reported comment in Thimphu following her meeting with Secretary Salman Bashir is any guide then "all issues" include the ongoing turmoil in Afghanistan. Of late, India was fast losing its diplomatic ground thanks to Kabul's realistic appraisal of the Indian involvement and the Taliban's attacks on Indian assets.
India is not a neighbour of Afghanistan, but for all practical purposes an outside power which is trying to fish in the troubled waters of Afghanistan. Therefore, the Pakistani side needs to see through the game of India's prompt readiness for resumption of talks on issues including Kashmir. Of course, resumption of dialogue is welcome, even if it is not under the rubric of "Composite Dialogue", in the words of Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir to "proceed ahead with hope and confidence". But it should be an all-encompassing comprehensive approach covering all outstanding issues.
Some of the issues like Siachin and Sir Creek are ripe for agreement and some others like human rights violations in Held Kashmir need no dialogue and India can stop these forthwith. How New Delhi acquits itself in these ready for resolution issues is the litmus test for the resumed dialogue. Otherwise, there is nothing new and it is not "a significant breakthrough".