The United Arab Emirates is said to be behind the recent thaw in relations between neighbours India and Pakistan and that the middle eastern country is working to forge a long lasting peace between the two nations.
Bloomberg reported that about 24 hours after military chiefs from India and Pakistan surprised the world last month with a rare joint commitment to respect a 2003 cease-fire agreement, the top diplomat of the UAE popped over to New Delhi for a quick one-day visit.
The official UAE readout of the 26 February meeting gave few clues of what Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed spoke about with Indian counterpart Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, noting they “discussed all regional and international issues of common interest and exchanged views on them.”
According to the report, the India-Pakistan cease-fire marked a milestone in secret talks brokered by the UAE that began months earlier, according to officials aware of the situation who asked not to be identified.
Adding that the cease-fire is only the beginning of a larger roadmap to forge a lasting peace between the neighbors.
The next step in the process, the official said, involves both sides reinstating envoys in New Delhi and Islamabad, who were pulled in 2019 after Pakistan protested India’s move to revoke seven decades of autonomy for the disputed Muslim-majority state of Jammu and Kashmir.
The report further noted that talks on resuming trade and a lasting resolution on Kashmir, the subject of three wars since India and Pakistan became independent from Britain in 1947 will be a hard part.
The report pointed out that expectations were low that the current detente would achieve much beyond the return of envoys and a resumption of trade through their Punjab land border.
Last week Pakistan army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa asked India “to bury the past and move forward.”
On Saturday, PM Narendra Modi wished in a tweet wished Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan, well after he was diagnosed with Covid-19 — another sign that relations between the countries are getting warmer.
After the cease-fire, the UAE was one of a handful of countries to issue a statement welcoming the cease-fire announcement, highlighting the “close historical ties” it has with both India and Pakistan and hailing “the efforts made by both countries to come to this agreement.”
