West Asia strife in India’s crosshairs

Saudi Arabia and Iran are at each other’s throats. Besides having significant Muslim population, both Sunni and Shia, India has vital economic and strategic ties with both. And their being the source of much of the oil imports is just one of them.

The conflict could, once again, raise the oil import bill, even though the current trend is downward. Saudi Arabia has the largest Indian workforce and West Asia as a whole accounts for $40 billion of a total of $70 billion annual remittances from the expatriates.

Growing security cooperation with it is of vital significance to India. The worsening of tensions may play spoilsport for India’s outreach to Central Asia and to land-locked Afghanistan through Iran

Yet another West Asia conflict, gaining momentum by the day, should cause worry for India. While Iraq and Syria are being marauded by a rising Islamic State (IS), Saudi Arabia and Iran are at each other’s throats.

Besides having significant Muslim population, both Sunni and Shia, India has vital economic and strategic ties with both. And their being the source of much of the oil imports is just one of them. The conflict could, once again, raise the oil import bill, even though the current trend is downward.

Saudi Arabia has the largest Indian workforce and West Asia as a whole accounts for $40 billion of a total of $70 billion annual remittances from the expatriates. India was hoping that Iran, minus the sanctions, would be its best bet in the region to advance its strategic interests, particularly with respect to Afghanistan. The conflict upsets that.

India was also hoping to gain through Iran connectivity to the oil and gas-rich Central Asian Republics and to provide land-locked Afghanistan access to the sea via Iran’s Chabahar port, bringing down Kabul’s dependence on Islamabad. All that could be put on the hold.

India also enjoys robust security cooperation with Saudi Arabia, which has deported several most wanted terrorists such as Abu Jundal, linked to the Mumbai attacks case. Although such steps do not in any way diminish the strategic partnership between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, the growing security cooperation is of vital significance for India.

As underscored, yet again, by the Pathankot terror attack, the Pakistan factor is vital for India. It has just hosted a conference on Afghanistan with China and the US, but minus the Afghan Taliban that it controls. And it is under constant Saudi pressure to join the conflict.

Constantly asked to repay for the numerous gestures made in the past and for continuing monetary support, Pakistan is finding it increasingly difficult to resist these pressures, even though this is bound to cause unrest among its significant Shia minority. The impact is much more on its military plans at home, fighting the militants in the restive tribal areas, and its ongoing tensions with the two other neighbous, India and Afghanistan.
This is why Islamabad wants to sue for peace and dialogue with an India upset after Pathankot. India firmly believes the terrorists came from Pakistan with Pakistani help. The Saudis are breathing down the necks of the two Sharifs – Prime Minister Nawaz and Army Chief Raheel.

Speculation is rife in Pakistani media of prospects of a “military cooperation arrangement” being worked out after two top Saudi ministers landed in Islamabad over the last weekend. While Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir visited on January 7, Deputy Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Salman, who is also the deputy prime minister and minister for defence, followed on January 10 to seek Pakistan’s support as the kingdom mulls additional steps against Iran.

Of the two, Prince Muhammad bin Salman is the more aggressive man, all of 29, who is the real power behind the throne his ailing and ageing (79 years) father, King Salman, occupies since January 2015.
Under him, last year witnessed dwindling Saudi trillions earned from oil, with global oil prices depressed, contrasted by military campaigns that have vitiated the already volatile Middle East further.

Stuck in Yemen, the prince has since precipitated a conflict with Iran by hanging Saudi Shia minority leader Nimr-al-Nimr, forcing Iran to react. The world is now divided, more than ever before, on what is a Shia-Snnni conflict, precipitated by the Saudis, dividing the Muslims across the world.

Referred to as MbS, the defence minister, the man behind the Saudi campaign against the Shia Houthis in Yemen, is stuck there militarily as the Houthis have held out. A major Muslim military power Pakistan was sought out for military support to this campaign. It was even admonished for not cooperating after Raheel, the Army Chief preferred keeping his troops out of it and Nawaz, the Prime Minister, involved the Pakistan National Assembly to debate and pass a resolution wanting to keep out of the conflict.

Not used to this democratic shenanigan, the Saudis saw through the Pakistani ploy. This surfaced again when Jeddah last month announced a 34-nation anti-terror alliance, essentially of the Sunni-majority nations and equally essentially, aimed at the Shias.

This was without consulting – officially at least – those countries’ governments. Many, including Pakistan, express surprise and have prevaricated. Following high-level visits and parleys, Pakistan indicated that it could consider the Saudi invitation to join the coalition, but no official announcement was made. Like many Sunni-led nations, Islamabad has criticised Iran for reacting to Saudi cleric Sheikh Nimr’s execution and sees it as interference in internal matters of the kingdom.

Things are getting hotter as al-Jubeir last week, after an extraordinary meeting of the foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council, said that Saudi Arabia could take further steps against Iran if tensions were to escalate.

Pakistan may find it difficult to resist Saudi pressures on a defence pact that could envisage Pakistan sending troops and/or committing its air force in the Saudi-pre-empted conflict. Neither the conflict with Iran, nor the efforts at forging an anti-Iran, anti-Shina alliance are new. Nor, for that matter, are the Saudi efforts to contain and counter Iran. The Saudi royalty has not relished the US under Obama reaching out to Iran.

It has similarly worked to counter other West Asian governments having Shia elements. In Iraq, after the installation of a pro-US Shi’ite regime in 2003. it extended support to the Sunni opposition led by Al Qaeda’s Abu Musab al Zarqawi. Following the Arab Spring in 2011-12, it intervened aggressively in Syria by supporting extremist Sunni forces against the Baathist regime.

Pakistan has aligned with both Saudi Arabia and Iran in the past as an American ally during the cold war era. It has to keep in mind the Shia population at home, although it has been unwilling/unable to prevent Sunni militant groups like Sipah-e-Sahaba to carry out systematic killing of Shias at home.

Until now, the Saudi influence in Pakistan has been limited to funneling money to extremist Sunni mullahs, mosques and non-state actors/groups. The jihad against the Soviets in Afghanistan was exclusively led by Sunni groups and parties.

The Saudis were active partners with Pakistan in recognising the Sunni Taliban regime in 1997 and only backed off when the Taliban openly lent support to Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda that was hostile to the Faustian bargain between the House of Saud and the USA – oil for Sunni-Wahhabi ideology.

The backlash of these policies manifested itself in the rise of anti-Shia militias and Lashkars in Pakistan which eventually extended their tentacles and alliances into the domain of Al Qaeda, Taliban and now ISIS. According to General Sharif, sectarian-IS poses the greatest danger to his country.

Pakistan faces the challenge of reconciling its long-term friendship and economic interests in Saudi Arabia combined with the grim prospects of dealing with the sectarian challenge at home that is bound to get a fillip if Pakistan enters the anti-Shia alliance brokered by the Saudis.

“Pakistan must not get embroiled in the sectarian wars of the Middle-East. ….. Extreme Sunni ideologies are undermining our state and society. It is time to look inward and consolidate our gains in the war against extremism instead of renting ourselves out again to foreign powers for short-term material gains,” the Friday Times weekly strongly advocated in its editorial (January 8,2016). Whether Pakistan will heed this advice or succumb to Saudi pressures remains to be seen.

For India, the challenge is different, but no less daunting. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s likely visits to the region, including to Saudi Arabia, Palestine and Israel during this year should help keep the focus on the developments.