KARACHI: The Karachi Council on Foreign Relations (KCFR) invited Pakistan’s former high commissioner to India, Abdul Basit, to talk about the contemporary relations of Pakistan and India and the geopolitical factors involved in determining the relationship between the countries.
In the opening session, KCFR Secretary-General Ahsan Zubairi, Vice-Admiral (retd) Khalid Mir and former ambassador Shahid Amin maintained that India considers Pakistan a ‘weak state’ and has always played a role in destabilising the country.
Basit shared his experiences in India as a Pakistani diplomat, focusing on how the Indian political thought has switched towards cornering Pakistan internationally as well as domestically. References were made to the Kashmir issue and how it will always be linked to the geopolitical situation, with specific reference to peace in the region.
India and China are engaged in a very careful relationship based on economic interests, whereas Pakistan sees China as a friend and so, India is threatened by China’s new stance towards Pakistan, claimed Basit.
According to him, Pakistan is rising as a new economic power in the region and the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor will relieve Pakistan’s economic problems and benefit it in the long run.
Indian aggression on matters of interference within Pakistan through proxies and the terrorism derived from that intervention may well be perceived by Pakistan as aggression and regional peace cannot be secured until and unless India shows a peaceful confidence-building gesture to Pakistan, he added.
Pakistan is one of the most important stakeholders in this region and hence India needs to take Pakistan more seriously, he warned.
The session was attended by a large audience, including diplomatic delegations from the United States Consulate, Islamic Republic of Iran, Russia and Germany, among others.
