University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

The International Community and Kashmir

Schaffer, Howard B.

Content Files
The_International_Community_and_Kashmir.pdf

Permalink

https://hdl.handle.net/2142/15470

Description

Title
The International Community and Kashmir
Author(s)
Schaffer, Howard B.
Issue Date
2008
Keyword(s)
  • Jammu and Kashmir -- Conflict
  • Jammu and Kashmir -- Diplomacy
  • Jammu and Kashmir -- Policy -- United States
  • Jammu and Kashmir -- Policy -- United Nations
Date of Ingest
2010-05-11T14:59:16Z
Abstract
The international community’s efforts to help resolve the Kashmir issue began only weeks after the dispute erupted in October 1947. The controversy remained on the world’s radar scope for a quarter of a century, then faded away when India and Pakistan agreed at Simla in 1972 to resolve it peacefully by bilateral negotiations. The outbreak of an insurrection against Indian rule in the Kashmir Valley at the end of 1989 returned the problem to world attention. The United States and other major powers soon recognized that the nuclear capabilities of the rival claimants made the issue more dangerous and its resolution more urgent. But Washington’s main initiatives in recent years have focused on managing the India-Pakistan crises Kashmir has sparked, not on the elusive search for resolution of the Kashmir dispute itself. It has urged both countries to reach a mutually acceptable settlement that takes into account the wishes of the Kashmiri people, and has declared its willingness to play a facilitating role in helping the parties resolve the issue if both the Indians and Pakistanis wish it to. Other interested powers have been even less involved. All have recognized that the continuing refusal of the Indian government to countenance an international role in Kashmir makes it likely that any outside efforts will be as unsuccessful as others were in the past. This conventional—and till now sensible— approach may not necessarily remain valid. In this article, I will argue that recent important developments may—just may—offer opportunities for the world community led by the United States to play a useful part in resolving this seemingly intractable problem.
Publisher
Program in Arms Control, Disarmament, and International Security (ACDIS), University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Series/Report Name or Number
Swords and Ploughshares, winter 2007-8
ISSN
1046-7734
Type of Resource
text
Genre of Resource
Article
Language
en
Permalink
http://hdl.handle.net/2142/15470

Owning Collections

ACDIS Swords and Ploughshares PRIMARY