'Pakistan Needs to Get Out of Business of Jihad', Former Pakistan Diplomat Husain Haqqani Tells NDTV: Full Transcript

One of the most articulate and outspoken voices from Pakistan, former diplomat Husain Haqqani, says Islamabad's doublespeak on terror continues despite the Peshawar shock, and what India can really do, in an interview to Nidhi Razdan on NDTV's 'Left, Right and Centre'.

Here is the full transcript of the interview:

NDTV: We are speaking on a day when I woke up this morning there were worries that this young man would be hung for the crime he was accused of. Shafqat, it's a story that has made international headlines not just because his case was a humanitarian one but many are saying that it perhaps reflects the internal dynamics within Pakistan right now. After Peshawar, has the country become blood-thirsty for revenge, is that necessarily the right approach, if you could reflect on that first?

Husain Haqqani: First of all, I don't agree with anybody being blood thirsty. What Pakistan needs to do is get out of the business of jihad, which we got into on the premise that (sic) how to solve the Kashmir problem. For that, we need to go after the jihadi groups. We need to shut down LeT, we need to shut down JeM, we need to make sure that the remnants of Al Qaeda are no longer in Pakistan and that the Islamic State in Pakistan does not use Pakistan as a safe haven. We need to go after the Afghan Taliban. All we have done so far is go after the Tehreek-i-Taliban. And then, we are using the anti-terrorism law to go after what are basically normal murder cases. I'm not saying that there is anything normal about murder, but all I'm saying is these are murder cases that are passed on as part of normal criminal justice system. That's not what anti-terrorism is supposed to be. Anti-terrorism law should be used for terrorist groups. And unfortunately, we have not yet focused on the terrorist groups that the international community has described as terrorist groups.

NDTV: So, is the focus misplaced now on these mass executions that are taking place?

Husain Haqqani: Absolutely, the executions are not the issue. The issue is, will the linkage between the state apparatus and jihadi groups be broken? Will the legitimacy that has been afforded to people like Hafiz Saeed and Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi be eliminated? Will Pakistan's courts stop saying there is not enough evidence, when the rest of the world feels there is enough evidence against a well-known terrorist?

NDTV: So tell me, many wondered whether Peshawar would then be a wake-up call for Pakistan that India is particularly looking for, when it comes to groups like the LeT? And clearly, three months on, as you now say, that linkage is still very much there, do you see though that in the foreseeable future that link may slowly start to break, or as you had put it in a column recently that there is also an obsession that the Pakistani establishment has and the military particularly has with Kashmir and India and that may not go away?

Husain Haqqani: As a Pakistani, I would say that Pakistan needs to get out of the business of jihad for Pakistan's sake. We don't need to do it for India. We need to do it for ourselves. More Pakistanis have been killed by terrorists than Indians have been, let us be very frank about that. That said, Peshawar was a sort of turning point in the sense that a national consensus started emerging that terrorism poses a threat to Pakistan. But we don't have a consensus on who to target and in what priority order. I fully understand the need for our efforts to be sequential, one group first then another. But at the same time we need to create a national environment in which legitimacy and acceptance of terrorism and terrorists is diminished. That is not being done. That makes me very concerned now. Will that happen? I hope that will happen, but I don't see that happening right now. The whole approach, with Pakistan's approach to terrorism, has been that we at one time made the argument that one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter. Even after 9/11, we did not absorb the international community's definition of terrorism. Our diplomats, some of them continue to argue that the cause and the real reason for terrorism should be understood. There is no real reason justifiable in the international environment of today. We need to be clear about that, and that clarity is not yet there.

 
NDTV: Is LeT still very much seen as a strategic asset for the Pakistani army vis-a-vis India, and in Kashmir is that the problem?

Husain Haqqani: Look, the Pakistani officials say that it is not, but none of the evidence on the ground shows that they have changed that approach. Hafiz Saeed continues to operate freely. LeT is now Jamaat-ud-Dawa. Nobody has gone to prison for having engaged in activity on behalf of LeT abroad. It is as if it doesn't matter if these terrorists conduct operations in Pakistan, in Kashmir or India. It's only a crime if they attack Pakistanis inside Pakistan, like the TTP has. That is not what the world is looking for, and I 'm sure that's not what India is looking for too, although I don't speak for India and I don't intend to.

NDTV: And therefore, I think you would understand India's rather angry reaction that was described as 'over-the-top' and 'emotional' by the Pakistani government in the case of, for instance, of Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi's bail that just happened a few days ago. You would understand why India is reacting the way it does? What does India do in a situation like this?

Husain Haqqani: I cannot speak for what India could do, but let me just say that my problem with the Lakhvi issue is not just that he was given bail. Bail is a perfectly legitimate right of somebody who's accused of a crime. My problem with the Lakhvi terrorist trial is that Pakistan has history - that we executed one of our former Prime Ministers, a very popular Prime Minister, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, in a trial that was concluded in two years. Our judicial system was very responsive. Within two years, the entire proceeding was completed and the Supreme Court heard and disposed of the appeal, and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was executed, a popular, elected Prime Minister. But when it comes to Mr Lakhvi, our judicial system cannot find evidence. It cannot find sufficient judicial reasons to keep him detained. And that worries me. What worries me is that in our society, still there is an acceptance of sorts for a man like Mr Lakhvi, about whom, and I know this because I was Pakistan's Ambassador to United States when 26/11 happened, and at that time a lot of evidence was provided by the Americans. They intercepted the conversations. I'm sure your government provided evidence. I think that instead of dragging feet over something like this, Pakistan should play on the front foot and say, yes, one of our citizens was responsible for something wrong and we are willing to hold him accountable, because we are committed to eliminate terrorism. Now, if the Indians get worried about these things, I'm one of those who understand it. I understand that your people were victims of a terrorist crime, of a terrorist attack. What happened in Mumbai was also shameful, and as a Pakistani, I actually have sympathy for Indians who are victims, just as I hope you have sympathies for Pakistanis who are victims of terrorism. But our state should stop dragging its feet on these issues.

NDTV: Speaking of the state, then the question is which part of the state? And what is your assessment of where Nawaz Sharif stands today? There was a feeling here in India that when Mr Modi invited him for his swearing-in, the oath-taking when he took over as Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif stuck his neck out and, you know, he came despite all the odds and the opposition back home, and perhaps took a big political risk with that. How weakened is Nawaz Sharif today you feel? Do you feel that the Hafiz Saeeds of the world are also a vote bank for him?

Husain Haqqani: Absolutely, I think that Hafiz Saeed and other jihadi groups are a vote bank for the Muslim League. They certainly don't sympathize with Pakistan People's Party, which is the principal opposition party, and may be some of them sympathize with cricketer Imran Khan's PTI. But, I think the real issue here is not just the vote banks. The civil-military imbalance in Pakistan is enormous. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has good intentions, I think, in relation to India at least. But he keeps coming up against a hostile, what I call, national discourse. Pakistan cannot change its discourse until we change that discourse, a discourse in which Pakistani children are told that India is our existential and eternal enemy, when you tell people that somebody's your eternal enemy then anything that's done against that enemy is justified. I'm one of those Pakistanis who feel we need to start thinking of India as a neighbor, rather than as an enemy. But unfortunately, Nawaz Sharif and his colleagues have not succeeded in creating that discourse, and therefore they are becoming a victim of the pressure of hardliners, who do not want them to move forward.

NDTV: In fact, you said very recently that there should be a decisive shift in Pakistan's Kashmir approach, that Pakistan has to give up its obsession on Kashmir. That's a pretty brave thing to say?

Husain Haqqani: Well, it's a realistic thing to say. Let's be honest. For 67 years, we've tried. We have had four wars. We have always said Kashmir to be decided first, then anything else. But, there are countries of the world who have dealt with disputes differently. They have not made themselves hostages to stand. We don't have to give up our stand. We can still say we dispute the accession of Kashmir to India but then, we need to move on with the rest of the relationship. We could become friends first and discuss disputes later. We insist at the moment that we should solve disputes first and then think about becoming friends. That hasn't happened in 67 years. I doubt if it's possible over the next 67 years either.

NDTV: And therefore, this schizophrenic relationship between India and Pakistan, you think, will continue because here we are again, at this, when the talks were called off seven to eight months ago, then the Foreign Secretary went, then the whole thing with Lakhvi happened, the acrimony exists, tu-tu-main-main happened, it's going to continue in a cycle?

Husain Haqqani: We will be victims of events unless and until we attend to the core issue and the core issue is that people in India have moved beyond Partition. Most Indians, if one has a discussion with them, they will say we did not agree with Partition, but we accept that Pakistan is there to stay. Pakistan is a nuclear-armed country, no one can eliminate Pakistan today, Pakistanis should also become self-confident, we should become oriented towards understanding that the threats and fears that we have started believing are no longer there. Nobody is about to finish us off. So stop thinking of India as an enemy. Realize that it's a huge neighbor. It's bigger than us, but at the same time, it's a neighbor with whom we need to do business. Our people need to be able to travel. There are families in Pakistan who are connected to families in India. There they should be able to visit them. We have 5000-years of shared history and only 67 years of Partition. Why do we want to insist on that Partition to be the basis of that relationship.

NDTV: What then do you think of Mr Modi's approach to Pakistan then?

Husain Haqqani: I would say that Mr Modi initially made it very clear that he wanted to reach out. And once he reached out, the onus was on the Pakistani side. Even now, even though he canceled the Foreign Secretaries talks, once he re-initiated the visit of Foreign Secretary Jaishankar to Islamabad, but the point is, the ball went into Pakistan's court. What are we going to do with it? I think that just being, shall we say enamored of the process is not the way forward. Now, Prime Minister Modi has indicated that he wants to talk to Pakistan, but the talks have to be substantive, I think Pakistan too can come back with a more substantive response than using the old cliches of let's resume the composite dialogue, let's just have Foreign secretary talks.

NDTV: But the talks were called off over Pakistan High Commissioner meeting separatist Hurriyat leaders from Kashmir, which has been happened for many years. Do you think retrospectively that that's a mistake, to make that a benchmark? Or do you believe it's possible for Pakistan to break those links with Kashmiri separatists, like the separatists are coming to Delhi at Pakistan High Commission for a dinner, so that shows, was it unrealistic for India to call off talks based on that as the benchmark?

Husain Haqqani: I think it's for India to decide as to how to react. It's not for me as a Pakistani to comment on it, and I'm also not going to say that Pakistani High Commissioner has done anything wrong in continuing to do something Pakistan has done for many years. I think that's not the issue. I think we need to go beyond  such optical issues and go to the substantive issue. And, the substantive issue is that India feels injured by the presence of terrorist groups in Pakistan, and Pakistan also now feels that the terrorist groups are turning on Pakistan. So why not remove that irritant, and once Pakistan removes that irritant, I think we could find other reasons and basis to move forward. But this little dance we do, two steps forward, two-and-a-half steps backward, half-a-step forward, which means we are standing in the same place, is just not going to change things, France and Germany were enemies for almost two centuries. They fought several wars. They were part of two World Wars, and yet, they overcame all of that, became the leading nation states of the European Union. We need to think big.

NDTV: You think Mr Modi could be the person who sort of initiates that? Because there are many people in Pakistan, I remember meeting people after he became PM, that if there was anyone with whom they felt there was a shot at peace, it was with someone like Mr Modi as PM?

Husain Haqqani: Both Mr Modi and PM Nawaz Sharif have the potential. But then, we also thought that Mr Vajpayee and Nawaz Sharif had the potential, and there was a time we thought that Benazir Bhutto and Rajiv Gandhi had the potential. I think this goes beyond individuals, this goes to the crux of the matter. I think the Pakistani establishment needs to yield authority to elected civilian leaders, to let the civilian leaders assert themselves, and the national discourse needs to change. On the Indian side, there needs to be a greater magnanimity towards Pakistan, which I think could be forthcoming under Mr Modi, or anybody else. But Pakistan also needs to move forward, we need to get beyond manufacturing history, and towards building a future.

NDTV: My final question to you is that I've seen for years now that you have been very-very outspoken about the Pakistani establishment, about the ISI even, and now on terror groups. You are never afraid?

Husain Haqqani: My point is that somebody has to make these points, I speak not for myself. I speak for many many Pakistanis unfortunately we have created an environment in Pakistan where dissent is often described as treason that does not enable Pakistanis to seek the whole range of options for the betterment of our country, true debate is when people are willing to look at options that have been ruled out by their leaders as impossible, it's those impossible alternatives that will go into building the future of our country.