Nation

Regardless of the outcome of the Indian-Pakistani
war, the demand for Bangla Desh, an independent
East Pakistan, should be given serious
consideration. For, not only does the genesis of
the current conflict lie in this demand but even
more important, it raises the uneasy question of
the parameters of the alleged right of
self-determination.

At the outset, the claim for Bangla Desh should be
differentiated from similar claims made in the
recent past, notably by Biafra and Katanga. First,
unlike Biafra and Katanga, East Pakistan is not
physically contiguous to the political body from
which it would break free. Second, East Pakistan
prides itself on a rich cultural heritage
reflected in a distinct language, literature and
life style developed over centuries of
history. Seventy-three million East Pakistanis,
constituting 55 per cent of the population of
Pakistan, identify themselves culturally and
intellectually much more with West Bengal and the
rest of Sanskrit based Indian thought than with the
Persian and Arabic based cultures of the people in
West Pakistan-the Punjabis, Sindhis, Baluchis and
Pathans.

East and West Pakistan have never comprised a
cohesive nation. At the time of its creation in
1947 the two factors that seemed to bring together
its disparate components were a common religion,
Islam, and hatred of India. Within a decade,
however, disillusioned intellectuals in East
Pakistan were having second thoughts about the
wisdom of their earlier decision to be a part of
Pakistan. For notwithstanding a common religion,
political and economic domination of East Pakistan
by West Pakistan, especially by the Punjabis, has
been characteristic of its East-West Pakistan
relationship. East Pakistanis have consistently
resented their treatment as inferior citizens.

The ruling elites in Pakistan have always been a
clique of West Pakistani military leaders cum
landlord politicians. The representation of East
Pakistanis in the central government services of
Pakistan was reported to be barely 15 per cent in
1970, and their representation in the officer
corps of the Pakistani Army has never exceeded 10
per cent. In the last fifteen years, only one East
Pakistani was appointed a minister in the central
government, holding the finance portfolio for only
four days.

There seems to be ample substantiation of charges
of "neo-colonialism" against West Pakistan's
economic exploitation of the East. The latter has
been used as a captive market for the former's
manufactured goods, while supplying the former's
needs of war materials and financial
resources. According to official estimates, $1
billion net of resources was transferred from East
to West Pakistan during the period 1948-68. East
Pakistan's budget has been a mere 20 per cent and
its share in Pakistan's development funds a mete
30 per cent. While the bulk of Pakistan's foreign
exchange-between 65 and 70 per cent-was earned by
East Pakistan, it received only a 30 per cent
return for it. Between 1965 and 1970, the annual
economic growth rate of West Pakistan was 6 per
cent as compared with 4 per cent in East Pakistan.

The simmering unrest surfaced in a most
spectacular fashion in December 1970, when in
Pakistan's' first general elections, the East
Pakistani electorate gave an overwhelming victory
to the Awami League, a party whose election
platform called for regional autonomy. The League,
under the leadership of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, won
167 out of 169 National Assembly seats in East
Pakistan. Since the total seats for the entire
country were 313, the League's victory at the
polls virtually assured it of implementing its
program, if normal political processes had been
followed.

However, West Pakistani leadership was firmly
opposed to allowing the League to assume power,
and was able to postpone the convening of the
National Assembly, the first task of which was to
draft a new constitution for Pakistan. Eventually,
a breakdown of negotiations between Pakistan's
President, Yahya Khan, and Sheikh Mujib was
swiftly followed by a military crackdown on Dacca
on March 25. Systematic and ruthless acts of
"genocide" committed by West Pakistani troops in
East Pakistan caused deaths estimated at between 1
million and 1.5 million, while 9 million to 10
million refugees fled across the border into India
and an equally large number scattered themselves
throughout East Pakistan. What followed is well
known. The Mukti Bahini (Liberation Army of Bangla
Desh - the Bengali Nation) started operations in
East Pakistan; the Indian-Pakistani war broke.

India recognized the Bangla Desh Government; the
U.N. Security Council reached an impasse and the
General Assembly took up the problem for
discussion. What took the United Nations so long
to start discuss this highly volatile conflict is
still a mystery even to most ardent supporters. A
legalistic and highly technical argument
justifying U.N. inaction is that under Article
2(7) of the U.N. Charter no intervention is
permitted in the "internal affairs" of a member
state. But interpretation of Article 2(7) so
strict as to ban all discussion of one of the
greatest human disasters in history does not
conform either to the letter or to the spirit of
the Charter. India had repeatedly alleged that the
problem was truly international, for India was
unable to bear the impact of the refugees on its
economy. Also, several Indian politicians had been
advocating war as the least costly
alternative. Allegations of "genocide" and
systematic violations of the human rights
provisions contained various U.N. covenants and
conventions should certainly have warranted a
discussion.

But unfortunately, even when war between India and
kistan was obviously imminent, U.N. members were
either wishing that the problem would disappear or
pretending that it did not exist. A lesson to be
learned from this conflict is that in similar
situations in the future, Article 2(7) will have
to be interpreted broadly. The new
Secretary-General must play a much more active
role under Article 99 of the Charter if the
prevention of such tragedies is to be considered a
major U.N. objective.

Since the question never even came to debate, the
U.N. did not pass on the validity of the argument
for granting self-determination to East
Pakistan. However, judging by U.N. practice, such
a claim probably would not have found favor with
most member states. For although the U.N. Charter
refers to the principle of self-determination in
Articles 1(2) and 55 and the international
covenants on human rights provide that "All people
have the right of self-determination," this right
variably has been viewed in juxtaposition with the
right a state to its "territorial integrity," also
recognized in the U.N. Charter. In U.N. practice,
the conflict between the two has always been
resolved in favor of the latter: in both the Congo
crisis and the later Biafran claim, the
U.N. preference was unequivocal, for while it came
to the aid of the central government of the Congo
to prevent the secession of Katanga, it did not
even discuss the Biafran claim. Similarly, the
world community has consistently ignored several
other claims for self-determination-those in
Formosa, Sudan, Chad, Ethiopia, Tibet,
Kurdistan. The only exceptions have been the
colonial situations. The U.N. and the Organization
of African Unity have repeatedly affirmed the
right to self-determination of white-dominated
black populations in Africa.

East Pakistan is an excellent example of why the
time has come when the right to self-determination
should be recognized on an individual basis even
in noncolonial situations. The people there had
voted in free elections, and their elected
representatives were forcibly prevented from
assuming power. The two parts of the country are
physically separated and the people in the two
parts are different linguistically, culturally and
ethnically. The political and economic domination
of one part has resulted in a consistent pattern
of exploitation of the other. Charges of gross
violations of human rights have been substantiated
by independent observers. An independent East
Pakistan has the potential to be a stable country;
with some international assistance, it could
become economically viable over a short
period. Finally, its separation from West Pakistan
would not threaten the economic viability of the
latter or plunge it in disorder or challenge the
existing world order. Therein, again, the
situation differs from both Katanga and Biafra.

Of course, East Pakistan would not be a major
military power. But this should not be a reason
for denying its claim to independence: a country's
political stability or its chances for survival
can no longer be measured solely in terms of its
military strength. The establishment of an
independent East Pakistan might eventually lessen
the tensions that have characterized the East-West
Pakistani and Indian-Pakistani relationships.

Although the possibility of a political settlement
in East Pakistan now seems specially grim, perhaps
the world community has learned not to ignore such
claims in the future. The criteria mentioned here
should offer a starting point to determine the
validity of a claim for self-determination, and
their intelligent and sensitive application might
avert similar future disasters.