Mr. Guterres has been ‘in touch’ with Modi and Sharif

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has been “in touch” with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif over tensions along the Line of Control (LoC). The U.N. chief said this in New York in comments that were then confirmed again by his office in an e-mail to The Hindu.

Speaking to journalists at his first press conference in New York on Tuesday, Mr. Guterres fielded a question about whether he was “engaged in bringing about a dialogue between India and Pakistan to resolve the Kashmir dispute”.

“Why do you think I met three times the Prime Minister of Pakistan and two times the Prime Minister of India,” Mr. Guterres replied.

“For someone accused of doing nothing, it’s quite a number of meetings,” he said, which led to some laughter in the room.

Most recently, Mr. Guterres met Mr. Modi in Russia on June 3, while he held talks with Mr. Sharif at the SCO summit in Kazakhstan, which Mr. Modi too attended.

Another meeting

Officials said Mr. Guterres and Mr. Modi are also likely to meet next month at the G-20 summit in Germany and the East Asia summit in the Philippines later this year.

The Secretary-General’s comments were surprising, as though the question is one often asked by Pakistani journalists in the U.S. keen to evince a reply from the United Nations on Kashmir, U.N. officials normally tread cautiously on the issue, given India has always rejected “third party interventions” on the subject of talks with Pakistan.

When a clarification was sought on whether Mr. Guterres had indeed met Mr. Modi and Mr. Sharif and raised the issue of resuming bilateral talks, his office at the U.N. in New York confirmed the comments, and said: “The SG’s comments make it clear that he has been in touch with the leaders and he is following the situation. Beyond that, we would have nothing else to add.”

The External Affairs Ministry did not respond to several requests for a comment on the Secretary-General’s remarks, though it has in the past always insisted that all conversations on Kashmir would have to be discussed bilaterally with Pakistan according to the text of the Shimla Agreement of 1972 and the Lahore declaration of 1999.

Big concern

However, given that there have been no substantive talks between the governments on Jammu and Kashmir as well as other issues, a number of countries have begun to express their concern over rising violence at the LoC and ceasefire violations by both sides.

Last week, the MEA had been quick to deny a reported conversation between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Mr. Sharif, where the Pakistan Foreign Ministry indicated they had discussed the possibility of Mr. Putin mediating between India and Pakistan.

While the Russian Foreign Ministry denied any attempts at mediation on Kashmir, its statement said that “Russia is interested in good neighbourly relations between India and Pakistan” which would “directly contribute to regional stability and security.”

Similarly, when asked about Saudi support for India on its concerns with terrorism emanating from Pakistan, Saudi Ambassador to India Saud bin Mohammed Al-Saty told The Hindu in an interview this week, “We hope to see that the comprehensive dialogue between India and Pakistan is resumed, as this is the best way to resolve differences. From our side, we will be happy to help in any way we can, as we have excellent relations with Pakistan and India.” And in an interview published on Wednesday, Pakistan’s High Commissioner Abdul Basit said that a resumption of the “framework” of comprehensive bilateral dialogue agreed to by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj is “just a matter of time.”

China too has frequently made comments on the issue, pitching for India and Pakistan to resume dialogue that has been in abeyance, apart from summit meetings at the Prime Ministerial and Ministerial levels for the past few years.

Speaking to presspersons, Ms. Swaraj had laid out three conditions for resolving differences: dialogue, only bilateral dialogue with no third party, and that talks and terror cannot go together. Most analysts and diplomats said, as a result, it is unlikely that the “quiet diplomacy” suggested by the U.N. Secretary General and other countries was expected anytime soon.