Making SAARC meaningful....Rooting out terror is imperative

Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram is known for speaking out his mind so it should come as no surprise that in a veiled attack on Pakistan, he emphasized at the SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Co-operation) interior ministers’ conference in Thimpu on Saturday that no country could escape its responsibility by blaming non-state actors for terrorist activities emanating from its soil. His statement that as long as the territory of a country is used by non-state actors to prepare for terror attacks, that country owes a legal and moral responsibility to its neighbours and to the world to suppress those non-state actors and bring them to justice, is unexceptionable. It is not as though India has not said this in the past, but its reiteration was necessary to send out the right signals in the wake of the new terror attacks in Mumbai.

It is no secret that despite all that Pakistan may say, recruitment centres and training camps for terrorists continue to operate from Pakistani soil and parts of the establishment tend to provide sanctuaries to such elements. For an affected country like India, it is immaterial whether it is State actors or non-State actors that provide the means for such activities. The responsibility rests with Pakistan to ensure that punitive action is taken to stop such nefarious activities on their soil. Indeed, Chidambaram’s observation that South Asia was perhaps the most troubled and vulnerable region in the world as the vast majority of terrorist incidents this year — as well as last year — occurred there, bares why the SAARC has failed as an effective regional forum where forums like the European Community, the Association of South East Asian Nations and the Asia Pacific Economic Forum have succeeded in significant measure.
Clearly, so long as the terror threat persists, the benefits of SAARC, be they in terms of greater regional connectivity, better transport infrastructure and enhanced flow of material and goods, would continue to be of very limited value. It is therefore imperative that the forum works to its full potential while removing the impediments in its way.