Arun Joshi
May 2, 2017
China has virtually announced its role as a mediator in the Kashmir “dispute” between India and Pakistan to fulfill its responsibility as a “stabilising force and conflict mediator” in South Asia.The state-run ‘Global Times’ has focused on the “Kashmir dispute” and its resolution through Beijing’s intervention and mediation as it says: “China has always adhered to the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries, but that doesn’t mean Beijing can turn a deaf ear to the demands of Chinese enterprise in protecting the overseas investments. Given the massive investment that has been made in countries along the One Belt, One Road, China now has a vested interest in helping resolve regional conflicts, including the dispute over Kashmir between India and Pakistan.”
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China has invested $54 billion in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that runs through Pakistan occupied Kashmir, including Gilgit. Beijing has already stationed its troops for the safety of its workers in Gilgit-Baltisan and other parts of the PoK and it has turned a deaf ear to the Indian objections that it was undertaking projects in the territory which is legally part of India. Last Dogra king of Jammu and Kashmir had acceded the entire state as it existed before the tribesmen’s invasion of the state, to India in 1947.The newspaper, however, prods Beijing in its article titled ‘China ready to play a greater role in resolving conflicts in South and Southeast Asia’ by saying, “Mediating between India and Pakistan over the Kashmir issue would perhaps be one of the toughest challenges facing China in dealing with regional affairs to safeguard its overseas interests (read CPEC).”China has shifted its stand that Kashmir was a bilateral issue to be resolved by Delhi and Islamabad. It had maintained and stuck to this stand vociferously in 1999, when it advised Pakistan to adhere to the “sanctity of the Line of Control” and withdraw its troops and proxies from the Indian side of the LoC.Things changed at the diplomatic and geo-strategic levels when Pakistan during negotiations on the Siachen glacier submitted non-papers seeking the involvement of China in deciding the fate of the highest battleground in the world, most part of which is under India’s control. The Karakorum highway, the lifeline of CPEC, runs across edges of the glacier.Kashmiri separatists, considered His Master’s Voice of Pakistan, have often made calls for China as a partner to settling the “Kashmir dispute”.The MEA had been dismissing these as peripheral noises, maintaining that India and Pakistan could resolve it bilaterally. Now, China has announced that it is willing to acquire a new role as a mediator as it is doing in the case of Myanmar and Rohingiya refugees. The one belt, one road runs through Myanmar too.That China has brought Kashmir on its agenda needs to be understood.
