How do you see the visit of External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar to Pakistan, the first in nine years by an Indian Foreign Minister, and the fact that he has come for an SCO meeting?

I would link it with the former Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari’s presence for the SCO (Foreign Ministers) multilateral meeting in India [in May 2023]. I think that has been reciprocated. It’s a multilateral event, and both sides understand that it is not a bilateral engagement, but at the same time, such moments, they sometimes create history. They sometimes give you an opportunity to connect to things which, in normal circumstances, probably the parties that have taken extreme positions wouldn’t think of. So let’s hope that something would come for the region. We need to know what is going on in the mind of India intellectually? What is going on in the mind of the Pakistani political establishment, the other players who are stakeholders in both countries? Let’s give that a chance.

What, according to you, is on the mind of Pakistan’s military establishment, especially given the LoC ceasefire since 2021? 

I believe honestly, there’s consensus on the Pakistani side: when it comes to India, everyone wants a good relationship, the military political establishment, even Pakistan’s right, religious political entities, the Jamaat-e-Islami. All of them agree that we should have healthy, constructive balance, equal or equitable relations. Does it translate into [similiar sentiments] in India?

Some would argue that the ball is actually in Pakistan’s court — it was Pakistan that cancelled trade with India, and stopped road and rail links in 2019. Do you think there will be a rollback of those decisions now?

Pakistan’s external security is paramount — and obviously there will be a response to any threat. We have spent some five decades on our security doctrine development, enhancing our conventional capability; it’s a realistic expectation. 

Do you think that some of the people-to-people transport links could be restored anytime soon?

Who would argue against the interaction between common people? I would love to see that happening, but to my mind when I see Indian diaspora and Pakistani diaspora interacting for last seven decades in the West and the rest of the world, I wonder. Has it brought us any closer? I think we should be more realistic that people-to-people ties may not actually help resolve issues by themselves when there are such entrenched positions on both sides, and the challenge is how to get over this.