Afghanistan, India and Pakistan: the changing relationships

The triangulation of relations between Afghanistan, India and Pakistan, will assume an increasing level of centrality in the balance of the region, especially after the withdrawal of Western forces from Kabul, will be completed. The electoral victory in Pakistan by Nawaz Sharif is likely to worsen sharply relations between Islamabad and Kabul, as the new leader of the Pakistani government in its previous experience, in 1997, in the same position, it was one of the first to recognize the foreign political regime that the Taliban had imposed in Afghanistan. The leader of the Pakistani ethnic origin is of Bengali origin, an ethnic group represented in a very army which, by his conduct, has caused several conflicts with the U.S. in the fight against Islamic terrorists. What is feared in Afghanistan with Nawaz Sharif to power is an increased possibility for training Taliban to find refuge in the rugged border areas between the two states, excellent bases for attacks against a country that is going to be without the protection of Western military. This sentiment is strongly felt in the Afghan population, which has acknowledged in public events contrary to Pakistan, with tones also quite bright, what you fear most is a possible return of the Taliban own favorites from the new government in Islamabad. What disturbs Pakistani political circles, however, is the level of relations increasingly intense that you are coming to create among the Afghan country and India, Islamabad, which is a historic rival of New Delhi, fear of ending up in the middle, geographically as well as politically to an alliance that is becoming very narrow and that could lead to military developments and geopolitical dangerous for Pakistan. To overcome this tendency Sharif would be developing a strategy that attempts to reconcile with India, so as to distract from the relationship with Afghanistan. At the center of this effort should be the development of economic and trade relations can bring benefits to Pakistan in these areas. However, this attempt, which seems to contradict the line previously carried out by Islamabad, appears desperate, both for internal reasons, or for reasons of international order. On the domestic front appears very unlikely that the Pakistani army, which is one of the dominant social forces of the country, should bow to this new line, which would like to see India, if not as an ally, at least as a partner. The international scenario, however, has on Pakistani soil bodied Chinese investment, made by Beijing following a precise strategy of containment of the opponent Indian, a change of course of relations between Pakistan and India would certainly not be seen well from China, which is already alert on this line of the new Pakistani government. It must also be said that for now India is silent on these developments, but it seems likely that these projects can gain consensus Sharif believe in a country traditionally adversary, where even the alliance with China since its borders was seen as an act of open hostility. In this moment of unbridled economic competition is difficult to be both friends in Beijing and New Delhi, especially in close political level. Finally, the political line of Sharif did not have openings to Afghanistan, emphasizing the distance between the two states, living tense relations because of Islamic terrorism. A theory of the behavior of the new government of Pakistan could be explained by the need to liberate their land from the Taliban bases: this could be achieved, rather than with contrast media, with the encouragement, through aid, the return of the Taliban in the motherland. If this were true the Pakistan should address, as well as the reactions of Afghanistan, the more important reactions of the United States.