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| India accused of non-compliance | |
By Dr. Syed Nazir Gilani
During his India visit in January, President Obama reaffirmed his support for a reformed UN Security Council with India as a permanent member. The hype created in Delhi on the merits of the visit has faded out on the return of AAP to power in Delhi. New York Times of 10 February 2015 begins its editorial and writes, “Fresh from the diplomatic high of a successful summit meeting with President Obama, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been brought down to earth by domestic politics. He and his Bharatiya Janata Party, or B.J.P., were crushed in the election Tuesday for New Delhi’s 70-member state assembly, winning three seats while the upstart Aam Aadmi Party, or A.A.P., captured the rest.”
President Obama’s statement to pitch India for a permanent slot at the UN Security Council all have a reality test to pass. The first challenge to India’s elevation to UN SC came from Pakistan. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif during his telephone conversation with President Obama on Thursday 12 February 2015 told the US President that “India cannot become a UNSC permanent member due to its non-compliance of all the resolutions passed by the UN on Kashmir and that it has not fulfilled the commitment to give the right of self-determination to people of Kashmir.”
The most important question remains whether there would be any other member nation of the UN that would join Pakistan in opposing India’s permanent place at the UN Security Council? And what is the manner of non-compliance that India would be accused of?
The merit of Pakistan’s opposition could be traced in its statement made at the 766th meeting of the UN Security Council on 30 January 1957 that, “The only international obligations which the Governments of India and Pakistan have undertaken in regard to the Kashmir dispute are embodied in the two resolutions of the United Nations Commission dated 13 August 1948 [S/1100, Para 75] and 5 January 1949 [S/1196, para 15]. I submit that it is now the duty of the Security Council to ensure that this international agreement is implemented without any further delay”.
Australia is another member nation of UN which has a strong reason to support Pakistan in opposing India’s candidature for the UN Security Council. Australia played a distinguished role in finalising the UN Security Council principles for the resolution of Kashmir dispute. The efforts of Australian Prime Minister Robert Gordon Menzies, the work of Sir Owen Dixon, United Nations Representative in 1950 and General Robert Harold Nimmo, United Nations Chief Military Observer in Kashmir from 1950-1966 represented an influential Australian interest in the resolution of Kashmir dispute.
It was at the 765th meeting of the UN Security Council on 24 January 1957, that Australian representative Mr. Walker challenged India at the meeting and queried the legitimacy of the ‘deliberations of the Kashmir Constituent Assembly’. He pointed out that, “The Security Council also considered it necessary almost five years ago to record its view that any action taken in a Constituent Assembly in Kashmir to determine the political future of the people of Kashmir would not constitute a disposition of the State in accordance with this principle”. He added that, “Indeed, the Council has, in its past resolutions, laid down certain basic steps that should be taken towards a solution, steps which were firmly founded upon the principles of the Charter of the United Nations”.
Australian representative, raised the pitch of the debate at the meeting and enquired from Indian representative, “What is not completely clear is to what extent this represents any new step purporting to determine the future affiliations of the State of Kashmir and whether it is regarded by the Government of India as raising a new barrier in the way of a plebiscite in accordance with the Security Council’s past resolutions”.
United Kingdom would be the second member nation of UN that would sign up with Pakistan to oppose the India’s candidature for her non-compliance. Sir Pierson Dixon the British representative at the UN Security Council at the 765th meeting held on 24 January 1957 also challenged India’s reported plans at variance to the principles laid down in UN Security Council resolutions for holding a Plebiscite in Kashmir. He stated, “The Constituent Assembly was established in Srinagar in 1951. As Mr. Krishna Menon pointed out yesterday, its primary task was to promote the process of self-government in Kashmir territory. That is not a matter which in itself comes within the jurisdiction of the Security Council, and my Government, for one, of course, welcomes any step towards the development of democratic processes in Kashmir as elsewhere; but when its attention was called to the matter in 1951, the Security Council could not fail to take note of the reports that one of the functions of this Constituent Assembly would be a decision on the future shape and affiliation of Kashmir”.
Sir Pierson Dixon added, “The Council was naturally concerned that nothing done in Kashmir should prejudice a settlement of the whole issue in accordance with the principle that had been the basis of its consideration of the matter since 1948, that is to say, that the final disposition of the State of Jammu and Kashmir should be made in accordance with the wish of the people expressed through the democratic method of a free and impartial plebiscite conducted under the auspices of the United Nations”.
The adoption of Jammu and Kashmir Constitution, (and its section 3) on 17 November 1956 and giving effect to other provisions on 26 January 1957 are a violation of the caution contained in UN Security Council Resolution of 30 March 1951. The matter has been fully debated at the UN Security Council on 24 January 1957.
Failure to carry out demilitarization would be another hurdle for India’s candidature for the Security Council. Its armies have violated the stipulation placed on their number, behaviour and location envisaged in the UN Security Council Resolution of 21 April 1948. The report submitted by Sir Owen Dixon on 15 September 1950 [S/1791, para 52] indicts India for her non-compliance. It reads “In the end I became convinced that India’s agreement would never be obtained to demilitarization in any such form, or to provisions governing the period of the plebiscite of any such character, as would in my opinion permit the plebiscite being conducted in conditions sufficiently guarding against intimidation and other forms of influence and abuse by which the freedom and fairness of the plebiscite might be imperilled”.
Pakistan has a better and respectable record in regards to demilitarization. Pakistan at the 766th meeting of the UN SC on 30 January 1957 has submitted that, “The Government of Pakistan is only too anxious to withdraw its forces from the State. The question that has been engaging the attention of the Security Council for the last eight years is how to persuade the Government of India to do what it had agreed to do. We on our part have accepted eleven proposals for the demilitarization of the State. It is India that has rejected all these proposals. Still Government of India tries to show that Pakistan is remiss, while Indian actions are above-board”.
President Obama may have made a statement out of courtesy and believing rightly that India deserves a place at the UN SC. It does not correspond to the position taken by USA at the UN Security Council. USA has to reconcile itself with her position taken at the 607th meeting of the UN Security Council held on 5 December 1952. Mr. Gross of USA submitted, “Secondly, the Security Council will, we feel, always welcome any agreement which the parties themselves can reach on any basis which will settle the dispute, provided of course that basis is consistent with the principles of the Charter of the United Nations”.
Kashmir is going to be around the neck of India’s candidature as an albatross’s curse. Until India cleans its record of non-compliance, slot at the UN Security Council is unlikely to come its way.
(Opinions expressed in write-ups/articles/Letters are the sole responsibility of the authors and they may not represent the scoopnews.in)
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