Fact Files

Pakistan-Bangladesh Relations

Chief Editor
Muhammad Arshad Tariq
Editor
Sobia Haidar

When British India was partitioned and the independent dominions of India and Pakistan were created in 1947, the region of Bengal was divided along religious lines. The predominantly Muslim eastern half was designated East Pakistan — and made part of the newly independent Pakistan — while the predominantly Hindu western part became the Indian state of West Bengal. Pakistan’s history from 1947 to 1971 was marked by political instability and economic difficulties. Dominion status was rejected in 1956 in favour of an “Islamic republic within the Commonwealth.” Attempts at civilian political rule failed, and the government imposed martial law between 1958 and 1962, and again between 1969 and 1972.

Almost from the advent of independent Pakistan in 1947, frictions developed between East and West Pakistan, which were separated by more than 1,000 miles of Indian territory. East Pakistanis felt exploited by the West Pakistan-dominated central government. Linguistic, cultural, and ethnic differences also contributed to the estrangement of East from West Pakistan. Bengalis strongly resisted attempts to impose Urdu as the sole official language of Pakistan. Responding to these grievances, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman — known widely as ‘Mujib’ — in 1949 formed the Awami League (AL), a party designed mainly to promote Bengali interests. Mujib became president of the Awami League and emerged as leader of the Bengali autonomy movement. In 1966, he was arrested for his political activities.

After the Awami League won all the East Pakistan seats of the Pakistan national assembly in 1970-71 elections, West Pakistan opened talks with the East on constitutional questions about the division of power between the central government and the provinces, as well as the formation of a national government headed by the Awami League. The talks proved unsuccessful, however, and on March 1, 1971, Pakistani President Yahya Khan indefinitely postponed the pending national assembly session, precipitating massive civil disobedience in East Pakistan. Mujib was arrested again; his party was banned, and most of his aides fled to India, where they organized a provisional government. On March 26, 1971, following a bloody crackdown by the Pakistan army, Bengali nationalists declared an independent People’s Republic of Bangladesh. As fighting grew between the army and the Bengali Mukti Bahini (freedom fighters), an estimated 10 million Bengalis, mainly Hindus, sought refuge in the Indian states of Assam and West Bengal.

The crisis in East Pakistan produced new strains in Pakistan’s troubled relations with India. The two nations had fought a war in 1965, mainly in the west, but the refugee pressure in India in the fall of 1971 produced new tensions in the east. Indian sympathies lay with East Pakistan, and in November, India intervened on the side of the Bangladeshis. On December 16, 1971, Pakistani forces surrendered, and Bangladesh — meaning ‘Bengal nation’ — was born; the new country became a parliamentary democracy under a 1972 constitution.

U.S. Department of State, March 2000,

http://www.state.gov/www/background_notes/bangladesh_0003_bgn.html

A Case for Damage Limitation

The national interest of Pakistan, as indeed, that of Bangladesh, and the larger considerations of regional cooperation, peace and security demand that the entirely avoidable unpleasantness between Islamabad and Dhaka at the millennium session of the United Nations should be overcome as quickly as possible. The fact that the people of Pakistan have reacted more in sorrow than in anger to the incident speaks volumes for the permanence of love and esteem in which they hold the people of Bangladesh.

Those with a little more specialised knowledge of South Asian affairs are generally aware of the common agenda that the two countries should evolve not only for enhanced bilateral friendship but also for a coordinated approach to saving the dream called SAARC from fading away.

In fact, the saddest aspect of the millennium session was that South Asia seemed to be out of tune with its general ambiance, largely because the biggest South Asian power assigned a higher priority to its pursuit of isolating Pakistan in the international community and even more so, in the context of Prime Minister Vajpayee’s visit to the United States. The millennium session was noteworthy for the manner in which more than 150 heads of state and government dealt with the state of the world. Taken together, their addresses were a corrective to the exaggerated triumphalism of the post-cold war era.

I recently read a piece by Fouad Ajami in which in this very context he recalled Alexis de Tocqueville’s dictum: “Claim too great freedom, too much licence, and too great subjection shall befall you.” We have been told a million times about the final victory of the democratic ideals, of the market economy over command economies, of irreversible globalization of the economy and the internationalism that the Internet would irresistibly bring.

Only in recent years have we started conceding that the actual state of the world is far more complex and fragile. Fouad Ajami’s comment was: “There is a zone of peace, to be sure, but it is in the main in the industrialized world. There is an American primacy that underpins this new order, but there is no proof that Americans would willingly expend their blood and treasure to defend it. The market has triumphed over the command economy but the verdict is neither sacred nor necessarily permanent.”

The millennium declaration reflected this new awareness of global complexity and was a synthesis of high-minded rhetoric about a glorious future characteristic of such proclamations and a pragmatic perception of existing ground realities. It laid emphasis on the fight against poverty and illiteracy, showed a keen awareness of the dichotomies of globalization, and resolved to eliminate conflict and work for a just and lasting piece.

Pakistan’s offers to India from this solemn platform could not conceivably be dismissed as propaganda. In reacting harshly to these peace initiatives in a language so discordant with the symphonic flow of the session, India lost an opportunity to begin a genuine peace process in South Asia.

It was perhaps something inherent in this extraordinary atmosphere thoroughly vitiated by the vitriolic approach of the Indian prime minister that Sheikh Hasina Wajid’s comments took on the air of a calculated attack on Pakistan. That democracy is recognized as a universal value now cannot be disputed. Hasina Wajid could have articulated her decisive preference for democracy or parliamentary democracy in a different style and formulation. Statesmanship should have decreed that she differentiated her address from that of the Indians and that it would come through as a distinctive voice of the proud people of Bangladesh.

There is a possible role for Bangladesh in the present crisis in South Asia. It can help restore the interrupted dialogue between India and Pakistan. But much more important, it can take meaningful initiatives to save SAARC from extinction, as the BJP government is clearly risking, or from fragmentation that was implicit in too narrow an application of the Gujral doctrine. Admittedly, India has provided to Bangladesh opportunities for fitting into some sub-system, some triangle or quadrant of regional cooperation but such arrangements are always internally divisive in Bangladesh. Insofar as they limit the country’s choices, they exacerbate the tensions by heightening the apprehensions of a large percentage of the population that distrusts excessive dependence on India.

During my mission to Bangladesh (1982-86) my task was to re-build bridges and promote rapprochement between our two countries. The emergence of Bangladesh, one of the very few successful struggles for secession in recent history, was traumatic for both sides. We needed moral courage to transcend the bitterness of this bloody event by accepting the sovereignty of the breakaway state without any reservations. This meant seeking openings also to Sheikh Hasina and her party.

It was not easy but in the end I met her. She believed in the initial Bangladesh version of events though many of her own countrymen by then had developed a more objective view of them. Instead of exchanging polemics with her, I explained to her why I felt strongly that South Asia’s strategic situation warranted that Pakistan and Bangladesh should work together in the larger interest of the region. She did not contradict the argument for the future and rewarded my efforts to get through to her by coming to the Pakistan national day party along with several of her close associates for the first time after 1971. This was a major sensation in the capital and evoked much interest from the diplomatic community as well.

I believe we need to search for a common space where we should interact positively. Even in a normal calendar year, there are at least three occasions when Pakistan is subjected to much undeserved negative comment in Bangladesh. This is a mythological celebration of their struggle for independence and it does entail a certain cost, though happily a diminishing cost, in terms of bilateral relations. Admittedly, what happened at the United Nations could have struck as particularly provocative because of India trying to lead a massive diplomatic onslaught on Pakistan.

But we should take a judicious measure of it and set it in the perspective of the compulsions that are developing in South Asia.

Wherever these compulsions work to our disadvantage, we have to counteract them and not exacerbate them. We must also never forget that the people of Bangladesh have a great spirit of generosity and that a vast majority of them would prefer to have friendly relations between our two countries. Their own politics is highly entangled and polarized and these internal stresses occasionally work themselves out in posturing towards Pakistan.

Talking of common space, since the early eighties, Pakistan and Bangladesh have developed a substantial area for mutually beneficial cooperation. Their political discussions embrace a large spectrum of agreement and understanding though some issues like the question of assets and liabilities, and the repatriation to Pakistan of non-Bengalis ‘stranded’ in Dhaka invariably emerge as points of discord that still await reconciliation. Under any Awami League government, some elements in Bangladesh would also raise the issue of atonement for the events of 1971.

Moderate opinion in both countries is aware of the factors why atonement and total reconciliation are processes that have to be sustained over years. It is not easy to get up one day and stage a ceremony of mutual forgiveness even though such ritualistic events have their own symbolic value.

Historiography in both the countries has also not really helped significantly in establishing a correct sequence of events, much less their details. There are active political compulsions at work in both societies that stand in the way of truth. As we have seen recently the Hamoodur Rahman Commission report, without fail, gets caught up in these webs of special interests and its publication gets deferred. An Indian journal, India Today, put parts of it on the internet on August 11, this year and that version was widely circulated in South Asia.

Modern states possess techniques of manipulating public opinion, which may in many cases induce collective amnesia about certain events. But the 1971 secession of East Pakistan from the country, in the founding of which it had played a crucial role, is not in the category amenable to such amnesia. Personally, I have been of the opinion that the publication of the report will question many exaggerated and incorrect versions of events that are taken as facts in Bangladesh and, therefore, the impact of publication will have mixed consequences, the positive ones probably outweighing the negative ones.

I think Pakistan and Bangladeshi diplomacy can address this issue. So much time has passed that some of the report’s recommendations are only of academic importance.

The two countries can discuss the issue in their quiet diplomacy and reach a common position on what needs to be done in this context. In Pakistan, the least we can do is to set up a special committee to study the pros and cons of publishing it and making appropriate recommendations to the National Security Council.

Together, Pakistan and Bangladesh can make an outstanding contribution towards saving the idea of regional cooperation from extinction. Only the other day, in the last week of August, the Bangladesh foreign secretary came to Islamabad as a special messenger of his prime minister. It would be fit and proper for Pakistan now to take the initiative in restoring normality after successfully negotiating the air pocket hit in New York.

The incident, caused by factors germane to the latest trends in South Asian politics and also by virtually gratuitous factors, can and should be reduced to correct proportions.

Tanvir Ahmad Khan, Dawn, September 25, 2000,

http://www.dawn.com/2000/09/25/op.htm#2

Bangladesh Pakistan Relations

Thirty years after its liberation from Pakistan, Bangladesh has a strong desire to strengthen relations with Islamabad despite the unpleasantness of the past. The recent visit of Pakistan’s commerce minister Mr. Abdul Razak Dawood to Bangladesh and his negotiations in Dhaka aiming to broaden trade relations between the two countries is another example to prove the depth of positive feelings held in Islamabad to review its relations with Dhaka, primarily in the realm of trade and commerce.

The present volume of trade between Bangladesh and Pakistan is merely 133 million dollars of which the balance is in favour of the latter. Because of the presence of huge gap, which exists in trade relations between the two countries, Bangladesh since long has been trying to persuade Islamabad to provide duty free access to 21 items, including Jute and tea in Pakistani markets. Pakistan’s commerce minister has promised to consider giving duty free access to jute and tea and has called for the diversification of trade between the two countries. The visit of Pakistan’s commerce minister to Bangladesh was the first high-level contact between the two countries after the unpleasant episode of Pakistan’s Deputy High Commission, Mr. Iran Raja in December last year when he was expelled on occasion of his alleged remarks against the liberation movement. Moreover, in the last year of Awami League’s rule, bitterness between Pakistan and Bangladesh reached its peak when Prime Minister Hasina Wajid referred to military rule in Pakistan. The question of tendering apology on account of excesses committed during the military operation of March-December 1971 also remained a major areas of discord between the two countries. Before the visit of Pakistan’s commerce minister to Dhaka, Barrister Shahida Jamil, minister of parliamentary affairs had also paid a visit to Bangladesh and a meeting also took place between President Musharraf and Prime Minister Khalida Zia on the occasion of 11th SAARC summit in Katmandu in early January this year. It seems that with the coming into power of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) in elections held in October last year, relations between Islamabad and Dhaka are gradually improving, particularly in trade and other areas. The reception which Pakistan cricket team got in its recent visit to Bangladesh is also a reminder to the fact that there exists strong pro-Pakistan feelings in that country and notwithstanding the bitterness of the past, a great degree of urge exists in Dhaka to move in the direction of cooperation with Islamabad.

Bangladesh-Pakistan relations, viewed from a rational standpoint are still a victim of past legacy. The memories of 1971 still haunt the concerned circles of the two countries and any effort which is carried out in the direction of bettering relations is some how or the other impeded by what the Bangladeshis call ‘genocide’ by the Pakistan Army and what the Pakistanis call ‘betrayal’ by the Bengalese. Be as it may, the new generation of the two countries is not exposed to the trauma of 1971 and they want to move ahead and formulate relations on the basis of pragmatism. Trade and technology are the areas, which Bangladesh and Pakistan can surely explore in order to strengthen their own economies. As Daily Bangladesh Observer in its editorial ‘Bangladesh-Pakistan Trade Prospects’ of January 30 rightly pointed out that “all concerned should take note of the fact that trade is an economic issue and it should not be confused by politics by either side.” However, the reality is, because of past bitterness and suspicions, trade and commercial relations between Pakistan and Bangladesh have remained at the lowest. Such a trend needs to be changed by adopting a forward looking approach in which the two countries make sure that they will not be victim of vested interests groups any more and keep political issues out of economic matters.

Still there are strong factors, which prevent and discourage the formulation of meaningful ties based on mutually beneficial relations between the two countries. From Pakistan’s point of view, two important factors tend to make things difficult for close relations with Bangladesh. First, the existence of strong anti-Pakistan elements who leave no opportunity in launching a tirade against Islamabad. The fact that Bangladesh won its independence from Pakistan as a result of a violent liberation movement is sufficient to give legitimacy to such people who in view of the bitterness of past wouldn’t like to see any existence of Pakistan on their soil. Second, as pointed out by the visiting commerce minister, the biggest hurdle in expanding trade relations with Bangladesh is the Indian role. That India, because of its strong influence, would never allow a situation in which Pakistan and Bangladesh are able to get closer and will destabilize such efforts in this regard. But, the question is why are Dhaka and Islamabad influenced by the Indian factor? If there exists will and determination on the part of the two sides to improve their relations, they should not be coerced by any third party. As far as the existence of anti-Pakistan elements in Bangladesh is concerned, it is a serious matter because the memories of 1971 military operation against civilian Bengalese are still strong and over the years, in scores of places in Bangladesh, monuments depicting atrocities committed by the Pakistan Army against Bengali people have been built which are a cause of tremendous shame and embarrassment for Pakistan. What can Islamabad do to deal with the burden of history (1971)? Should it formally apologize to the people of Bangladesh for the excesses committed by the Pakistan Army during 1971 or should it continue with the same policy of not acknowledging the killing of its own people in military operation. It seems as long as the question of apology is not sorted out, there is little likelihood of going beyond the present state of Bangladesh-Pakistan relations.

As far as Bangladesh’s perception vis-à-vis Pakistan is concerned, it is divided into three visible groups. First, there are those who belong to the liberation league and are quite critical and suspicious of having links with Pakistan. They can be called as nationalists who quote the atrocities committed during 1971 by Pakistan army as a major factor deterring cordial relations with Islamabad. Granting of apology by Pakistan is considered essential by that group for seeking an acceptance to Islamabad’s role in Bangladesh. Second, is the pro-Indian lobby supposed to be under the shadow of Awami League, which is also against establishing warm and friendly relations with Pakistan. That group is considered to have direct links with New Delhi. Third, is the overwhelming majority of people who want brotherly and friendly relations with Pakistan but feel that regret by Islamabad of army’s atrocities in 1971 is essential for clearing the burden of history. Their support for Pakistan is because of India’s policy to humble Dhaka and New Delhi’s covert support to insurgency in Chittagong Hill Tracts. That group believes that better relations with Pakistan can help Dhaka withstand the Indian pressures. Moreover, on account of historical and religious factors, people belonging to that group have a soft corner for Pakistan.

Can Pakistan seize the opportunity, which exists in the presence of a vast silent majority who are willing to institutionalise Bangladesh’s relations with Pakistan despite past unpleasantness? President Musharraf can take the initiative and with the support of Dhaka take measures, which can help heal past wounds and unleash the process of goodwill and cooperation between the two Muslim countries. For that matter, he will have to respond to the sentiments of the people of Bangladesh who simply want the apology from Islamabad that the policy of genocide which was pursued by the then military rulers against the people of East Pakistan, particularly its native people was wrong.

Of course, apology doesn’t mean that Pakistan’s honour will be sacrificed because such a step will not be taken in front of any enemy state but with those people who were once part of the same country and belong to the same religious faith. A compromise may be reached if apology is given by both sides, i.e. Dhaka and Islamabad for the shameful acts committed during 1971. Undoubtedly, either because of the military action or retaliation acts of Mukti Bahini against Urdu speaking people in the then East Pakistan the ultimate sufferers were the innocent people who lost their lives and property to the madness which was going on in 1971. However, it is certain that as long as the question of apology is not settled, the people of Bangladesh, who have still not forgotten the bitter memories of 1971 military operation, will not be able to forgive the loss of their honour and lives during the liberation war. Similarly, a similar expression by Bangladesh to regret the loss of innocent lives during 1971 will also help unleash the healing process leading to the formulation of close ties between Pakistan and Bangladesh. Both sides should act above their ego and resolve contentious issues in a rational manner.

Dr. Moonis Ahmar, Pakistan-Bangladesh Forum,

http://www.pak-bd.org/

Pakistan Tells Bangladesh to

Forget ‘Tragic Past’

Pakistan urged Bangladesh on Tuesday to put the ‘tragic past’ aside and forge ahead with stronger relations, as angry protests erupted in Dhaka over allegedly insulting remarks by a Pakistani envoy.

“As Gen Pervez Musharraf has said, we have to move away from the tragic past and build a strong relationship for which all the goodwill exists between the two countries,” a foreign office spokesman said.

Leftist activists on Tuesday torched a Pakistani flag in anger over a diplomat’s comment that atrocities during the 1971 independence war were committed not by Pakistan’s army but by the ruling party ‘Awami League miscreants.’

Members of the Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal torched the flag in front of the National Press Club, shouting anti-Pakistan slogans, witnesses said.

The comment by Pakistani deputy high commissioner Irfan-ur-Raja has led to calls for declaring him ‘persona non grata.’

The Bangladesh foreign ministry summoned Pakistani High Commissioner Iqbal Ahmed Khan and told him Dhaka ‘has taken strong exception’ to the remarks made by his deputy.

He was told that his deputy’s comments “reflected a total lack of understanding of the history of the freedom movement of Bangladesh.” “I am angry, I express my anger and condemnation at the audacious and derogatory remarks,” Bangladeshi Foreign Minister Abdus Samad Azad said.

The Pakistan foreign office spokesman in Islamabad, in comments said the events of 1971 were “a tragedy both for Pakistan and Bangladesh.”

“The people of both countries have suffered because of the tragedy,” he said. Dhaka-Islamabad ties have been strained since Sheikh Hasina spoke against military dictatorships at the United Nations this year and later went on to demand Pakistan’s apology for the 1971 crimes.

Dawn, November 29, 2000,

 http://www.dawn.com/2000/11/29/top4.htm

Moin for Better Ties with BD

Interior Minister Moinuddin Haider on Saturday called for improvement in Pakistan-Bangladesh relations to remove ‘misgivings’ between the two countries.

“The relations between Pakistan and Bangladesh should be advanced on solid lines to remove misunderstandings,” he said while speaking at a function. With regard to the Hamoodur Rehman Commission report, he said, the government would fulfil its promise in this respect.

Gen (Retd) Rao Farman Ali was of the view, that the then West Pakistan also greatly contributed to the tragedy. “We all including politicians, the civilians and the military leaders and individuals have our share.”

Mr. Ali said not much efforts were made to correct the point of view of the Bengalis that they were exploited by the West Pakistan. He also held India responsible for the tragedy who violated the international norms and meddled in Pakistan’s internal affairs.

Kamal Mattiuddin said, “we all including, politicians, government officials, incompetent civilian and military rulers are responsible for the East Pakistan tragedy.” But, he said, misgivings of some Bengalis also contributed to it.

Supporting the military action on March 25, 1970, he did not agree with the strategy, saying, the action should have been selective.

Dawn, December 17, 2000,

 http://www.dawn.com/2000/12/17/top5.htm

Musharraf Cancels Meeting with Hasina

Pakistan-Bangladesh relations suffered a major setback on Friday when General Pervez Musharraf cancelled a scheduled meeting with BD PM Hasina Wajid.

At a press conference, the chief executive confirmed that his meeting with Ms Wajid had been ‘postponed,’ and the decision had been made after she had obliquely attacked Pakistan in her United Nations address and demanded suspension of Pakistan from the United Nations following the Commonwealth example.

When Gen. Musharraf was asked what had happened, he said the meeting had been postponed and referred to Hasina Wajid’s remarks about the bitter past of Pakistan. “We should forget the past. We should move on and look to the future,” the chief executive said, adding that the Pakistanis still loved the Bangladeshi people.

Dawn, September 9, 2000,

 http://www.dawn.com/2000/09/09/top4.htm

An Unfortunate Outburst

Mrs Hasina Wajid’s outburst at the U.N. Millennium Summit was not only uncalled for but it left us wondering whether she was the ventriloquist or the ventriloquist’s dummy. It seemed a singularly inappropriate forum to open old wounds and it earned her a snub from General Pervez Musharraf who cancelled a meeting with her.

No one is proud of what happened in East Pakistan in 1971 but the Bangladesh prime minister overlooks one central fact. East Pakistan was an integral part of Pakistan and her father openly led a violent movement for secession. What was the Pakistan government expected to do? Nor does she mention in her outburst, events that led to the military crackdown.

The reign of terror unleashed by the Awami League, the indiscriminate killings, the torching of public buildings and private properties, this madness preceded the military madness. The Pakistan Army did not just go berserk. There was a grave provocation. But this too is a part of opening old wounds. It would have been more prudent had the Bangladesh prime minister not raked up the past and concentrated on the present.

She, herself, seems to be out of touch with Bangladeshi sentiments. She is a great cricket fan and she was present at all the Asia Cup matches and would have seen for herself the tremendous crowd support for the Pakistan team and the sea of Pakistani flags. This was the ordinary man and woman letting his heart do the cheering.

I have been to Bangladesh on a few occasions and found not a trace of bitterness and I was welcomed with open arms and met some old friends who got misty-eyed at the reunion. No one brought up the tragic events of 1971. I do not want to speculate on what prompted Mrs Hasina Wajid to say what she did. It would be unfair to say that our Foreign Office was caught napping. I would think that even the people of Bangladesh were caught napping. They may or may not have been embarrassed by the tirade but they must certainly have been surprised at what appears to be a hundred and eighty degree shift in policy.

What has triggered the shift? Surely it can’t be the Hamoodur Rehman Commission Report? There is nothing in the excerpts that have been published to warrant such a hysterical reaction? Most of it is old hat and though the official report still remains under wraps, a classified document, parts of it have been appearing in the newspapers from time to time.

The timing of the Bangladesh prime minister’s remarks is fiendish. The remarks seem to dovetail neatly with the ferocious verbal assault of the Indian prime minister. Do we smell some kind of collusion? If so, to what purpose? Why would Bangladesh want to become a puppet of India? Bangladesh has problems of its own and it is not in its interest to get sucked into the BJP agenda for the subcontinent. The ailing Indian prime minister Mr. Vajpayee gave ample clues of what the agenda was when he lashed out at Pakistan but betrayed the BJP mindset with his references to ‘jihad’ and equating it with terrorism and to the values of the medieval age.

He made no reference nor did he deplore the demolition of the Babri Mosque, the storming of the Golden Temple in Amritsar and the burning of churches and attacks on Christian missionaries. If Bangladesh, which is a Muslim country, believes it is a natural ally of India, it need only to look at the treatment meted out to Bangladeshi migrants in India who are persecuted and hounded.

Bangladesh has recently been admitted to elite club of cricket test playing nations. No country worked harder to get this membership than Pakistan. We even offered to play an inaugural test match with them. It was our way of offering a hand of friendship and the Pakistan Cricket Board has indicated that any assistance we can give in the development of cricket in Bangladesh will be forthcoming.

Cricket may seem something trivial in the larger scheme of things but one has to visit Bangladesh to know what the game means to the people there. When Bangladesh beat Pakistan in the World Cup in 1999, the celebrations took on the form of a national festival and when it was given test status all but a public holiday was declared.

Whether or not General Musharraf did the right thing in cancelling his meeting with the Bangladeshi prime minister is something only he and his advisers will be able to elaborate on. Personally, I think he should have met her, if only to ask her why she found it necessary to fly off the handle. Pakistan was owed an explanation, as indeed are the people of Bangladesh who must be perplexed by what appeared to be a wholly irrelevant speech in the wrong forum. She was, after all addressing the United Nations Millennium Summit and not a public meeting at Paltan Maidan.

I don’t think that her speech has unduly upset people here. We are more sorry than angry. But it would be interesting to find out what the reaction in Bangladesh has been to her speech. References to the 1971 events may strike an emotive chord but they are not likely to be helpful in her domestic difficulties. It is no longer an issue. The people of Pakistan wish Bangladesh well and are happy that the country is making steady progress. The subcontinent shares many common problems of which the grinding poverty of its people is the most prominent and the most urgent. This should be the highest priority in all the countries that make up the subcontinent. Everything else is a sideshow. We should not allow ourselves to be diverted from this main event. I hope the Bangladesh prime minister has realized that she spoke in haste. I don’t think it was her intention to derail Pakistan-Bangladesh relations. It is not in the interest of either country that these relations should be anything else but cordial.

Omar Kureishi, Dawn, September 19, 2000,

 http://www.dawn.com/2000/09/19/op.htm

Pakistan to Publish War Report

Pakistan’s military ruler, General Musharraf, says he will publish a version of a long-withheld report on the events of 1971 when Bangladesh broke away to become an independent state.

In comments late on Monday, General Musharraf said the report would be published except for sections dealing with international relations.

The report dates back to the 1970s when the then Prime Minister, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, appointed a commission under Supreme Court Chief Justice Hamoodur Rehman to look into the war.

The inquiry was completed in 1974 — but successive governments, citing national interest, did not make the report public. However, its findings were recently published by the Indian magazine, India Today.

Their version showed the report heavily criticising several top-ranking Pakistani army personnel, calling for them to be court-martialled. The war ended in December 1971, with some 90,000 Pakistani personnel in Bangladesh surrendering after India intervened.

General Musharraf indicated that he did not believe action was called for against former senior officers.

“What happened in ’71 was a disgrace to the nation. Should we remember such disgraces?” he asked. “Why the hue and cry now when most of the people are not alive?”

The report was recently at the centre of a row between Pakistan and Bangladesh over calls from Dhaka for Pakistanis allegedly involved in war crimes in 1971 to be put on trial.

General Musharraf criticised the Bangladesh Prime Minister, Sheikh Hasina, for her comments on the matter, and remarks she made at the U.N. against military regimes.

Dhaka says at least three million Bengalis were killed in 1971 when Pakistani forces attempted to suppress Bengali nationalist agitation. Pakistan has asked Bangladesh not revive memories of the war, saying they could damage future relations.

The BBC’s Zafar Abbas in Islamabad says the decision to publish parts of the report has less to do with pressure from Bangladesh than with calls from politicians and intellectuals in Pakistan. He says that ever since excerpts appeared in India Today, demands have grown in Pakistan for the report to be published, and pressure may now increase for its recommendations to be implemented.

BBC, October 3, 2000,

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/954372.stm

Bangladesh ‘Atrocities’ Row

Bangladesh has reacted angrily to remarks by a senior Pakistani diplomat about war crimes allegedly committed in 1971 when Bangladesh broke away to become an independent state.

Pakistan’s Deputy High Commissioner in Dhaka, Irfan-ur-Raja, ignited the latest row over the issue by saying that Bangladeshi fighters, not the Pakistani army, were to blame for the atrocities.

His intervention sparked angry protests on the streets of Dhaka, and a swift response from the Bangladesh Government which summoned Pakistan’s high commissioner to explain his deputy’s “uncalled for and provocative” remarks.

Dhaka says at least three million Bengalis were killed when the Pakistani army attempted to suppress Bengali nationalist agitation in 1971, and wants Pakistanis to stand trial for crimes against humanity.

“I express my anger and condemnation at the audacious and derogatory remarks,” Bangladeshi Foreign Minister Abdus Samad Azad said. “I hope the Pakistani Government will take immediate action to arrest the irreparable damage done to bilateral relations.”

Pakistan’s High Commissioner, Iqbal Ahmed Khan, was told his deputy’s remarks “reflected a total lack of understanding of the history of the freedom movement of Bangladesh.”

Mr. Raja told a seminar in Dhaka on Monday that atrocities committed during the 1971 war were started by ‘miscreants of the Awami League’ — Bangladesh’s current ruling party — and not by the Pakistani army.

He also quoted a recently-published Pakistan judicial commission report into the conflict, which put the number of dead at only 26,000 — not the three million claimed by Bangladesh.

Angered by his comments, Bangladeshis took to the streets of Dhaka, torching a Pakistani flag and shouting anti-Pakistan slogans. They want Mr Raja to be expelled.

Bangladesh, formerly East Pakistan, won independence after a bloody nine-month war led by the Awami League and headed by the country’s founder, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, father of the current Prime Minister, Sheikh Hasina.

The relationship between Bangladesh and Pakistan has been strained since September when Pakistani military ruler Pervez Musharraf cancelled a meeting with Ms Hasina on the sidelines of U.N. millennium summit in New York. In the summit, Sheikh Hasina spoke against military dictatorships, and later went on to demand Pakistan’s apology for the events of 1971.

Pakistan told Bangladesh not to revive memories of the war, saying they could damage future relations.

BBC, November 28, 2000, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/1045066.stm

Hovering Shadow of 1971

Tension continues to fester in Pakistan-Bangladesh relations even after a lapse of 29 years. In the past few months there have been two unpleasant incidents between them in quick succession. First, there was the abrupt cancellation of a scheduled meeting between the Bangladesh prime minister and our Chief Executive during the U.N. Millennium Summit in New York because of a statement by Bangladesh prime minister on which we took umbrage and recently our deputy high commissioner made some ill-advised remarks at a seminar in Dhaka which provoked such a storm of protest by the people and government of Bangladesh that Pakistan had to recall the diplomat concerned.

However, even after that there have been demonstrations in front of the Pakistan high commission and incidents of burning the Pakistan flag. A leading Bangladesh poet, Shamsur Rahman, has even demanded that Bangladesh should sever relations with Pakistan and declare it an enemy country.

The current spate of bitterness and anger of the people and government of Bangladesh centres round the Pakistan army action of 1971 in what was then East Pakistan. However, what happened in 1971 has a long history, which we will presently discuss. It is important for the post-break up generation of Pakistanis to know what led to the break-up. Our bitterness and anger stem from the break-up of Pakistan and the emergence of Bangladesh as an independent country.

It is evident from what happened at the seminar where the unpleasant incident occurred. Referring to the Bangladesh demand that Pakistan should apologize for the events of 1971, the deputy high commissioner is reported to have said: “Why should Pakistan apologize when we lost half of our country?” He made it worse by calling the Mukti Bahini as bunch of ‘Awami League miscreants.’

This is a common sentiment among the people in Pakistan and is indicative of a perception which is totally different from the perception of the people in Bangladesh. The emergence of Bangladesh was, for the East Pakistanis of 1971, the breaking away from the shackles of ‘colonial rule.’ What we regard as an insurgency was for them their ‘War of Liberation.’ True, the Indian military intervention was responsible for the physical act of dismemberment of Pakistan, but it is also true that the ground for it had been prepared earlier by our acts of omission and commission over the years.

The demand for provincial autonomy in East Pakistan, which eventually developed into a secessionist movement, had a whole set of political, economic and cultural reasons. It was the agitation for the Bengali language which turned out to be the first schism in the Centre-East Pakistan relationship. The agitation in question was afoot within months of the inception of Pakistan and, in fact, immediately after the Quaid-i-Azam had declared in a speech in Dhaka on March 21, 1948, that Urdu and Urdu alone would be the official language of Pakistan.

A crucial point, however, came four years later, on February 21, 1952, when police opened fire on a demonstration in favour of the Bengali language and three students of Dhaka University were killed. Later a monument called Shaheed Minar was built to commemorate their martyrdom and February 21 was regularly observed as Bengali Language Day in East Pakistan with great fervour.

Another crucial point in the history of the Centre-East Pakistan relationship came in 1954 when the party in power at the centre, the Muslim League, was completely routed in the East Pakistan provincial election and the United Front of the opposition parties won an overwhelming majority. The United Front fought the election on a 21-point programme. The first and foremost was the demand for the adoption of Bengali as one of the state languages followed by provincial autonomy so wide as to restrict the Centre’s authority to three subjects only: defence, foreign affairs and currency.

The venerable old leader of East Pakistan, Maulvi Fazlul Haque, who had moved the Pakistan Resolution at the Lahore session of the Muslim League in 1940, became the chief minister and formed the first non-Muslim League government in Pakistan. Within two months, he was dismissed having been charged with treason, complicity with India, secessionism, etc. Governor’s rule was imposed in the province and Iskander Mirza was appointed governor.

The fact of the matter is that the West Pakistan power elite did not trust East Pakistani leaders, even people like Fazlul Haque and Suhrawardy — Mujibur Rahman of the late ’60s and early ’70s was a different kettle of fish.

To come back to our survey of events leading to the break-up of Pakistan, it was Fazlul Haque and Suhrawardy who, in spite of what happened in the preceding years, cooperated with the West Pakistan leaders and the Constituent Assembly and produced the 1956 constitution, in which Bengali was recognized as a state language. Two years later, in October 1958 Ayub Khan abrogated it and imposed martial law, which in retrospect can be seen as a watershed in the history of Pakistan, particularly in the context of the relationship between the two wings of the country.

The great merit of the 1956 constitution was that it represented a consensus between the political leaders of East and West Pakistan. East Pakistan surrendered its numerical advantage as a majority province by agreeing to the principle of parity with West Pakistan at the national level. Ayub Khan’s martial law upset the entire scheme of things. It confirmed the worst fears of East Pakistanis which they had started entertaining earlier, noticing some straws in the wind blowing at the centre. Three of the prime ministers hailing from East Pakistan — Khawaja Nazimuddin, Mohammad Ali (Bogra), and H. S. Suhrawardy — had either been dismissed or manoeuvred out of office by the West Pakistani power elite. Ayub Khan’s martial law proved to be the proverbial last straw.

This was the impression I gathered some ten years later when I served in East Pakistan as a federal government official in a position which brought me in contact with intellectuals, writers and journalists of that part of the country. In their perception at that point in time, the abrogation of the 1956 constitution and the imposition of martial law were unmistakable signals that the West Pakistani power elite was not prepared to share power with the majority province of East Pakistan even on a fifty-fifty basis. In fact, it did not want East Pakistanis to participate meaningfully in the political process; it just wanted to rule over them. One frequently heard in the Dhaka of those days East Pakistan being referred to as a ‘colony’ of West Pakistan, sometimes in angry protest and sometimes in friendly jest, but in both cases it clearly showed how the relationship between the two wings was being perceived.

The feeling of alienation in East Pakistan continued to aggravate during the Ayub years. Ayub’s election as President in January 1965 was considered a hoax. He was elected, in spite of a hostile popular sentiment, under a system of his own making, called Basic Democracy, by an electoral college which could easily be manipulated. Having spent seven years under Ayub’s military and civil dictatorship, another five-year term for him as President was not seen as a palatable prospect. It only added to the feeling of frustration in East Pakistan.

Then came the Indo-Pakistan war of 1965, which took place along the borders of West Pakistan, and East Pakistan was totally cut off from rest of the country.

The Pakistanis in that wing of the country felt undefended and completely abandoned to their fate. The theory that the defence of East Pakistan lay in West Pakistan only added to the feeling of isolation and alienation in East Pakistan. No wonder, after the war when the dust settled Shaikh Mujibur Rahman came up with his Six-Point formula at an opposition leaders’ meeting in Lahore in January 1966.

Unfortunately, no attempt was made by Ayub Khan who held the reins of government for eleven years to engage Mujibur Rahman in a dialogue with a view to finding out what exactly the Six-Point programme implied and how a compromise formula could be evolved. He was continually treated as a political outcast and then as a traitor when he was implicated in the Agartala Conspiracy case. Finally, when the tide against Ayub turned, the case was withdrawn during the anti-Ayub movement. Mujib was invited by Ayub Khan to the Round Table Conference in 1969.

By then the Six-Point programme had become a clarion call and Mujib as a charismatic leader of East Pakistan was a power to be reckoned with. Yahya Khan who succeeded Ayub Khan as president and martial law administrator did not have it in him to deal with the situation politically. He, therefore, resorted to army action in East Pakistan, with accompanying atrocities on the civilian population. It is this which Bangladeshis cannot forget or forgive.

We often ask Bangladeshis to forget the past. But we also need to forget about our ‘loss,’ which they consider their gain, and accept Bangladesh with good grace, as another independent Muslim country of the subcontinent.

Dr Aftab Ahmed, Dawn, December 16, 2002,

http://www.dawn.com/2000/12/16/op.htm

What Prudence Demanded

The expulsion of Pakistan’s deputy high commissioner in Bangladesh, under sharp criticism in that country for his utterances on the tragic happenings of 1971, may have lent a touch of bitterness to the friendly relations between the two countries. In a statement by the foreign ministry spokesman, the Pakistan government rejected as ‘baseless’ the allegations made by the Bangladesh government that the deputy high commissioner had carried out activities incompatible with his status as a diplomat.

What makes Bangladesh’s decision particularly surprising is that the DHC had already been called back by Pakistan in response to a demand by Dhaka for his recall and was preparing to leave in the next few days. This,