Granting India transit rights through Pakistan to Afghanistan

[Screaming Skull]

a. It creates a mutually beneficial relationship between Afghanistan and Pakistan, and possibly reduces distrust.

b. It's the easiest way for trade to occur with Afghanistan, which is necessary for creating a sustainable economy.

c. In case of future sanctions on Iran, there is an alternate trade route for Afghanistan to use.

d. Later negotiations with India on obtaining TT may be a possible CBM that leads to other issues, but to get there we need an Afghan TTA first.

Some thoughts ...

Your assessment is absolutely spot on. But don't you see any ulterior motives of the US behind such a move? This is what I had posted before.

I am surprised that not many members have been able to read behind the lines.

Why do you think US is pushing for a trade route for India through Wagah? Is it only to further Indian interests?

A few weeks back I read a post by S-2 where he said that US was seriously looking for an alternate route for NATO supplies which currently are shipped to Karachi and reach Afghanistan by road.
He had hinted that US was considering diverting the cargo from Karachi to Mumbai from where India would repaint the containers and ship them to Iran as aid to Afghanistan as US can't directly ship them to Afghanistan.

Now read this news. US asks Pakistan to provide a land route through its territory for India. So now the containers reach Mumbai and you have a direct land transport route.

Consequences for Pakistan? Well US will be less dependent on Pakistan after this and Pakistan looses a considerable leverage over the US that she has right now.

Consequences for India? Apart from saving the costs of shipping aid to Afghanistan from Iran, India will see more cargo reaching her own ports (Read increased duties and business). This apart from all the strategic benefts.

Consequences for US? Well I think members here are clever enough to figure out that.

Your opinion on this?

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

There was no report in the Indian media claiming 'India had been granted Transit Trade access'. The PTI report that I posted before only said that US would pressurize Pakistan to grant India a transit trade access. IMO the US has succeeded in 'pressurizing Pakistan' in this regard and this is why I say that the Pakistani FO has 'taken Pakistani people for a ride' by claiming otherwise.

This time around it was the Pakistani media that reported on this. Both Dawn and The News reported that Pakistan had allowed India transit trade.

I think the FO was responding to the Pakistani reports.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

I am surprised that not many members have been able to read behind the lines.

Why do you think US is pushing for a trade route for India through Wagah? Is it only to further Indian interests?

A few weeks back I read a post by S-2 where he said that US was seriously looking for an alternate route for NATO supplies which currently are shipped to Karachi and reach Afghanistan by road.
He had hinted that US was considering diverting the cargo from Karachi to Mumbai from where India would repaint the containers and ship them to Iran as aid to Afghanistan as US can't directly ship them to Afghanistan.

Transit Trade through Pakistan doesn't really relate to this issue. US supplies through Pakistan don't depend upon an Afghan transit Trade agreement.

Nor does this impact any potential plans to covertly ship supplies through India and Iran.

Now read this news. US asks Pakistan to provide a land route through its territory for India. So now the containers reach Mumbai and you have a direct land transport route.

Consequences for Pakistan? Well US will be less dependent on Pakistan after this and Pakistan looses a considerable leverage over the US that she has right now.

Consequences for India? Apart from saving the costs of shipping aid to Afghanistan from Iran, India will see more cargo reaching her own ports (Read increased duties and business). This apart from all the strategic benefts.

Consequences for US? Well I think members here are clever enough to figure out that.

I don't understand your point here - why would the US send its supplies to India first and then have them transported to Afghanistan under transit trade, when they can ship them directly to Pakistan?

 

[Neo]

Transit trade: Pak denies concessions to India ​

ISLAMABAD (May 07, 2009): Pakistan today rejected the impression that it had granted ‘concessions’ to India by signing a pact with Afghanistan to conclude a new transit trade agreement by the end of this year.

"I don't know who has given concessions," Foreign Office spokesman Abdul Basit told a weekly news briefing in response to a question about the memorandum of understanding signed yesterday between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Reports have said that once the new transit trade agreement is concluded, it will allow India to use the route between the Wagah land border and Pakistan's Khyber tribal region for trade with Afghanistan.

However, Basit said the MoU only relates to negotiations between Pakistan and Afghanistan on devising a new arrangement to replace the existing transit trade agreement. The MoU commits the two countries to concluding talks by the end of this year and "all issues will be taken care of when the negotiations begin," he said.

Pakistan's "engagement with India for a transit route to Afghanistan is a separate issue" and will be discussed bilaterally, Basit said. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton yesterday said the MoU commits Pakistan and Afghanistan "to achieving a trade transit agreement by the end of the year, which we believe will have great economic benefits for both peoples".

Clinton also said the agreement had been "under discussion for 43 years without resolution". She described the MoU as "an important milestone" in efforts by the two countries to generate foreign investment, economic growth and trade opportunities.

Though India is not mentioned in the MoU, reports said it would be the main beneficiary of a transit trade agreement between Pakistan and Afghanistan as New Delhi is one of Kabul's major trade partners.

India and Afghanistan have for long been making efforts to get Pakistan to open its land routes for transit trade between the two countries.

 

[Zaheerkhan]

Transit trade: Pak denies concessions to India ​

ISLAMABAD (May 07, 2009): Pakistan today rejected the impression that it had granted ‘concessions’ to India by signing a pact with Afghanistan to conclude a new transit trade agreement by the end of this year.

"I don't know who has given concessions," Foreign Office spokesman Abdul Basit told a weekly news briefing in response to a question about the memorandum of understanding signed yesterday between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Reports have said that once the new transit trade agreement is concluded, it will allow India to use the route between the Wagah land border and Pakistan's Khyber tribal region for trade with Afghanistan.

However, Basit said the MoU only relates to negotiations between Pakistan and Afghanistan on devising a new arrangement to replace the existing transit trade agreement. The MoU commits the two countries to concluding talks by the end of this year and "all issues will be taken care of when the negotiations begin," he said.

Pakistan's "engagement with India for a transit route to Afghanistan is a separate issue" and will be discussed bilaterally, Basit said. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton yesterday said the MoU commits Pakistan and Afghanistan "to achieving a trade transit agreement by the end of the year, which we believe will have great economic benefits for both peoples".

Clinton also said the agreement had been "under discussion for 43 years without resolution". She described the MoU as "an important milestone" in efforts by the two countries to generate foreign investment, economic growth and trade opportunities.

Though India is not mentioned in the MoU, reports said it would be the main beneficiary of a transit trade agreement between Pakistan and Afghanistan as New Delhi is one of Kabul's major trade partners.

India and Afghanistan have for long been making efforts to get Pakistan to open its land routes for transit trade between the two countries.

This must be one of the typical deals that Pakistan has done in the recent past, even regarding the drone attacks..which Pakistan has got secret understandings with the Americans, and shedding crocodile tears in the media.
This transit deal is a done secret deal.And, all this without even a single Indian diplomat without even being present at the meeting..is a serious coming of age for Indian Muscle.

 

[Neo]

Premature to talk of transit trade: Pakistan ​

Nirupama Subramanian

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Thursday played down reports that it was about to give India a land route for its trade with Afghanistan, saying it was “premature” to draw this conclusion from a Pak-Afghan agreement to review the bilateral transit trade treaty.

Pakistan and Afghanistan inked a memorandum of understanding to revisit an existing agreement on transit and trade when the Presidents of the two countries met in Washington on Wednesday.

Although India is mentioned nowhere in the MoU, the Dawn newspaper said India would be the main beneficiary of a new agreement between Pakistan and Afghanistan on transit trade.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who was present at the signing of the MoU, said it committed the two countries to achieving a trade transit agreement by the end of the year “which we believe will have great economic benefits for both peoples.”

Both Kabul and New Delhi want Islamabad to allow Indian goods to transit overland to Afghanistan through Wagah. But Pakistan has so far stood firm on not conceding this demand, linking it to the resolution of the Kashmir issue or some other quid pro quo. Opening up a route through Pakistan will not only ease New Delhi’s trade with Afghanistan but also lay out for India a trade route with Central Asia. Pakistan also fears that opening up the Wagah-Khyber route will result in Indian goods flooding Pakistani markets.

Bombarded with questions on whether Pakistan was about to change its stance to India’s benefit, Foreign Ministry spokesman Abdul Basit said at his weekly briefing that “it was too early” to say that India would stand to gain from any new agreement on transit trade between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

“Pakistan and India will discuss this bilaterally,” Mr. Basit said. “It is premature to talk about India.”

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

This transit deal is a done secret deal.And, all this without even a single Indian diplomat without even being present at the meeting..

Right, and you know about it of course.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

Who benefits most?​

The News Editorial
Saturday, May 09, 2009

Watching Hilary Clinton as she sat between Presidents Karzai and Zardari and announced the signing of an MOU allowing transit trade between the two, the casual observer would not have picked up the subliminals. On the face of it the agreement looks like a move in the direction of the removal of a forty-three year-old stumbling block, a bit of creative diplomacy that enhances the relationship between the two noisy neighbours. Now look closer. The word 'India’ was never mentioned in public, but it seems obvious – though perhaps not in the short term – that India is likely to be the largest beneficiary of this MOU. India is already a significant trading partner of Afghanistan and a very substantial donor as well. It has invested heavily in infrastructure rebuilding in Afghanistan over the last eight years and looks set for the long haul as an Afghan donor - and India may be the unseen signatory of this latest piece of diplomatic footwork.

Both India and Afghanistan have long lobbied for the opening of the land route between the two. Pakistan, considering its fractious relationship with both at different times, has consistently resisted. Who knows what is inside the trucks that will be plying to and fro? It is not our endemic paranoia which underlies this question; it is a very real and present concern about what rights we as a sovereign nation have in terms of third-party operations on our soil. We already juggle with the conundrum of drone-strikes, and whether or not our sovereignty is actually violated or the strikes are tasked and flown from our own land with our tacit approval – but what of the movement of goods by potentially or actually unfriendly nations across our territory? Do we have oversight? Do we see the manifest? Do our customs officers have the 'right of rummage’ and inspection? What about transit taxes? Is there a tri-lateral Customs and Excise working party putting ink on the details of how this is going to work? A host of questions sit unanswered beneath the MOU now signed in Washington, and given the speed with which the Obama administration is reshaping foreign policy; we need to see those questions answered before shouting 'Hurrah’. There could indeed be benefit for Pakistan in this nascent deal. Anything that boosts our trade sector is good news, likewise anything that reduces tension between the three nations…but as the surgeon was once heard to say – 'The good news is that the operation was successful. The bad news is that we have amputated both your legs.’

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

Afghan trade corridor​

Dawn Editorial
Friday, 08 May, 2009 | 08:54 AM PST |


There is nothing wrong in principle with the memorandum of understanding signed in Washington on Wednesday for a new transit trade agreement between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Initialled by their foreign ministers, the MoU commits Islamabad and Kabul to talks with a view to achieving an agreement on transit trade between the two countries by year’s end. Pakistan is already a transit route for Afghanistan’s imports and exports through the Karachi port, and it goes without saying that, despite the occasional tensions between the two countries, Afghanistan has continued to benefit from Pakistan’s strict adherence to the transit trade agreement.

Wednesday’s accord doesn’t mention India by name, but it is obvious that the intended agreement seeks to provide a trade corridor for Indian goods to Afghanistan through this country. Euphoric, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the agreement would ‘bring prosperity to the two countries along the trade routes and beyond’. One wishes it were that simple.

Pakistan and India have a history, and no agreement signed under pressure can be seen in isolation from the reality of all that has happened in South Asia since independence. As recently as December, the two countries were close to war following the terrorist attack in Mumbai. India, it ought to be noted, is accused of using its presence in Afghanistan for negative purposes, and Pakistani officials have gone public with their view that New Delhi is helping insurgents in Balochistan. Seen side by side, one is unsettled by America’s anxiety to help India entrench itself deeply in Afghanistan and pursue aims that have nothing to do with the war on terror.

There is no dearth of statements from American officials, especially Richard Holbrooke, about giving India a major role in Afghanistan, even though the two are not neighbours. This means that either the Americans are naïve enough to buy the Indian line that New Delhi’s interests in Afghanistan are altruistic, or Washington knows what India is up to but looks the other way.

If America is interested in seeing a lasting regional peace, it should be cognisant of Pakistan’s security concerns. It is unrealistic to assume that the MoU, as it stands, will automatically pass muster with the security establishment even if it makes no public show of disapproval. If the Obama administration really wants cooperation to grow among Saarc members, it must first try to resolve Indo-Pakistan differences instead of expecting Islamabad alone to show goodwill.

One hopes former US Ambassador to India Robert Blackwill had some basis for his optimism when he said the other day that America may eventually pressure India to improve its ties with Pakistan by resolving the Kashmir issue. Commitment must be forthcoming from all parties, not just one country.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

One solid suggestion made by a Pakistani official, got immense attention and generated an intense discussion in one of these meetings. It was to build a railway track from the port of Gwadar to Peshawar, passing through the mainland of Balochistan and along the western side of Pakistan, then going into Afghanistan through the dormant Peshawar-Torkham rail link and to Kabul onwards through Jalalabad.

This idea was also presented to President Zardari by an American expert, the Pakistan Embassy sources revealed. Zardari was excited about it as the project could involve billions of dollars that the US was ready to invest, it would revive Pakistan’s industry and economy, it could bring Balochistan into the mainstream by generating jobs and providing them goodies coming out of the project, it could spur construction industry by building hundreds of railway stations and other facilities needed and it could provide Pakistan an alternate route from Karachi to Peshawar.

For Afghanistan, as well it could be a booster as the rail link could enter Afghanistan at the south-eastern border with Pakistan and could be carried to any place inside Afghanistan by US dollars, lessening the dependence on transit trade through troubled Fata and Taliban-infested areas. It also fits the US goal of joint ****** development, serving the US as well as Pak-Afghan interests.

The achievements and embarrassments of Zardari visit

Interesting - I wonder if this factors into the MoU on the Transit Trade Agreement...

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

Businessmen oppose transit trade facility to India​

Sunday, May 10, 2009
By Qaiser Khan Afridi

PESHAWAR: The business community of the Frontier Province has voiced objection to the signing of a trilateral memorandum of understanding (MoU), which they fear would ultimately allow India to use the Wagah-Khyber route for trade with Kabul.

While some of the businessmen dealing in the Pak-Afghan Transit Trade are of the view that trade between India and Kabul via Pakistan was already underway saying if the expected agreement was signed in December and India was allowed access into Afghanistan, then Pakistani transportation sector would be affected as India would use its own transport.

Sarhad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SCCI) President, Sharafat Ali Mubarak and Vice President Mohammad Ishaq told The News that the government had not taken the business community into confidence before signing the MoU.

“We want enhancement of the bilateral trade between Pakistan and Afghanistan but have reservations over the proposed World Bank’s Transit Trade Agreement about which we have informed the federal government,” they said.

They said trade between Pakistan and Afghanistan should on equality basis, like the Afghan government should provide the same facilities, which were being provided by the Pakistani government. “Pakistani goods should be given access into the markets of the central Asian states,” they said adding Afghan government had imposed 18 per cent import duty on the Pakistani goods whereas there was no import duty on the Indian items.

“If the government allows India access to Afghanistan then other countries like Iran, Iraq, Central Asian States and Pakistan should also be allowed trade with other countries while using the Indian route,” they said. They further said that due to discriminatory policies on part of the Afghan government, trade between Pakistan and Afghanistan had plummeted to $400 million from $2 billion in the last three years.

Replying to a question about the duty-free goods smuggled back to Pakistan from Afghanistan, which were being exported to Afghanistan under Afghan Transit Trade, they said the government should either reduce import duty on those items, whose demand is high in Pakistan or give incentives to the local industry for quality production in order to compete with the smuggled goods.

Peshawar Industrialist Association President, Nauman Wazir expressed reservations over the signing of the trilateral MoU in Washington, allowing India to use the transit Wagha-Khyber route for trade with Afghanistan.

Taking strong exception to the signing of the MoU, he said it was likely to turn into a full-fledged trade agreement by end of the year. He said goods brought to Afghanistan under the Afghan Transit Trade Agreement have wreaked havoc with the local industries adding the availability of all kinds of goods, even viable industrial units in the province failed to compete with the duty-free goods smuggled back to Pakistan from Afghanistan.

He was of the view that earlier China, Korea and Japan used to export their goods to Afghanistan. However, due to long distance they pay high transportation charges. Allowing India to use Wagha-Khyber transit route would render the remaining industrial units closed. He said the export of Indian goods through Wagha would cost India less and these goods would be smuggled back to Pakistan.

Wazir called for fencing of the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan to prevent the smuggling of goods imported under the agreement. He said they pay all taxes on the goods manufactured in the country while the smuggled goods are up for sale in the country openly.

“The government and the international community should either guarantee that the goods would not enter Pakistan or recommend tax on them,” Wazir said. He feared that allowing India to use Pakistani land would not only cast negative impact on the industries of NWFP, but also the units in Punjab.

All Pakistan Commercial Exporters Association (APCEA) Chairman, Zia-ul-Haq Sarhadi said trade between Afghanistan and India through Pakistani routes was already going on. “Its not a new thing as business activities were going on since 1965, when the Transit Trade Agreement was signed between Pakistan and Afghanistan,” he said adding, fruit and dry fruit were being exported to India from Afghanistan through Wagha border while some other items were being exported to India through Karachi sea route to Mumbai.

Businessmen oppose transit trade facility to India

 

[BanglaBhoot]

In a highly undiplomatic move, U.S. officials coordinated with Ambassador Haqqani to have the India-Afghan transit trade concession forced on Pakistan. The issue raises once again the perennial question: Does Ambassador Haqqani represent Pakistani interests or is he working for Washington? In March, Mr. Haqqani broke diplomatic norms and national security considerations by arranging a secret, one-to-one meeting between President Zardari and Mr. Holbrooke in Dubai to talk things behind the back of the entire Pakistani government, Foreign Office, and the Pakistani military.

By Qudssia Akhlaque

Monday, 11 May 2009

The News International.

Ahmed Quraishi-Pakistan/Middle East politics, Iraq war, lebanon war, India Pakistan relations

ISLAMABAD, Pakisan—The initial draft of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between the governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan at the U.S. State Department on May 6 to initiate negotiations for a new transit trade agreement and conclude it by the end of this year came from Washington, according to diplomatic sources.

The first draft of the MoU was sent to the Foreign Office by Pakistan’s Ambassador to the United States Husain Haqqani, who reportedly consulted the Americans on the matter. The draft arrived here around two weeks ahead of President Asif Ali Zardari’s first bilateral visit to the U.S. It was finalized after some back and forth shuttling between Washington and Islamabad with specific inputs from the Foreign Office.

The Americans played a key role in signing of this MoU, which was not high on Pakistan’s priority list at this stage when the country is facing unprecedented internal security challenges. In fact, it was on the U.S. insistence that Pakistan agreed to commit itself to a time frame for concluding and signing the revised transit trade agreement by December 31, 2009. Apparently, the Foreign Office was opposed to the idea of setting a specific timeline but the political leadership decided to go along with it.

The commitment to the time frame is clearly reflected in the second paragraph of the MoU, a copy of which was obtained by The News. It states that the two governments “undertake to conclude and sign a complete Afghanistan-Pakistan Transit Trade Agreement as early as possible, and no later than December 31, 2009.”

Some of the inputs given by the Foreign Office were incorporated into the final draft of the MoU. For instance, the Americans were also keen that Pakistan should commit itself to certain concepts but the Foreign Office’s view was that such details were unnecessary at this stage and should be discussed at the working-level negotiations.

Both sides will begin negotiations on the agreement here this week with top representatives of the two commerce ministries leading the process, sources told The News. In the one-page MoU, the two governments had committed to begin negotiations no later than May 14, 2009, with a first meeting of the Joint Working Group in Islamabad. “That meeting will establish a timetable for future negotiation sessions,” it said.

According to the understanding reached in Washington between the two sides, a joint Afghanistan Pakistan Transit Trade Coordination Committee will be set up by May 14, which in the interim period, pending the conclusion of the transit trade agreement, “will coordinate and resolve all issues relating to cross-border commerce and inland transit trade.”

The undertaking titled ëMemorandum of Understanding Between the government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan and the government of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan to Improve Trade and Accession Facilitationí signed by the foreign ministers of the two countries on May 6 in Washington was overseen by the U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who hosted the Afghan and Pakistani presidents for the first round of the second trilateral talks.

While pointing out that the agreement had been in discussion for 43 years without resolution, Hillary termed it a “historic event” and an “important milestone” that the two neighbouring countries had reached in their efforts to generate foreign investment and stronger economic growth and trade opportunities.

But the MoU, which is said to eventually pave the way for India to use the Wagah-Khyber route for trade with Kabul, was not received with such enthusiasm in Pakistan where neither parliament nor the cabinet was taken into confidence before its signing. Hence, it evoked much criticism and has become controversial. Since India, a major trading partner of Afghanistan is seen as the main beneficiary of it, serious reservations have been expressed about it by key political parties, including the PML-N, the PML-Q and the Jamaat-e-Islami. The MoU issue is also likely to be debated in the upcoming session of the National Assembly, which begins Monday (today). PML-Q leader Marvi Memon has submitted an adjournment motion seeking a discussion on this issue of ìurgent public importanceî.

Concerns about the MoU have also been voiced by retired Pakistani diplomats who have warned about its grave and far-reaching ramifications. Former foreign secretary Riaz Khokhar has cautioned that it is fraught with risks and would undermine Pakistanís security as well as strategic interests.

Although, India has not once been mentioned in the MoU, reference to it is implicit in its opening paragraph which underlines the need to improve the conditions of “international and cross-border trade and transit”, recognizing “the advantages of greater regional and global trade linkages and export-oriented business development.”

At the last weekly news briefing on Thursday, Foreign Office Spokesman Abdul Basit had to face a volley of questions echoing concerns about the major unilateral concession that would be given to India by virtue of this MoU. The spokesman tried to downplay it, saying this was just an MoU and nothing was finalized as negotiations on the agreement were yet to begin. While widely perceived as an “agreement to agree”, his contention was that it was not an agreement itself but a MoU on negotiations.

 

[Zob]

man KILL HAQQANI....remove all the close aides of ZARDARI..... i can't sleep in peace knowing these guysare running my country....these guys will sell of pakistan!!!

 

[Bane Blade]

As I ask you everytime Zob what do you believe will killing aceive for us?

 

[khanz]

This must be one of the typical deals that Pakistan has done in the recent past, even regarding the drone attacks..which Pakistan has got secret understandings with the Americans, and shedding crocodile tears in the media.
This transit deal is a done secret deal.And, all this without even a single Indian diplomat without even being present at the meeting..is a serious coming of age for Indian Muscle.

I think your overestimating your clout here just coz it happened with the drones doesn't mean it's gonna happen with india - so pakistan who is considered a hostile country to india has secret deals for the benefit of india without them even being there ? yeah right