VIEW : Conflict resolution and negotiation Curating intelligence analysis — Dr Fawad Kaiser

Last week US Secretary of State John Kerry sought Pakistan’s help to press the Taliban into opening peace negotiations with President Hamid Karzai’s representatives. The Taliban leadership is believed to be living in Pakistan. One of the Taliban negotiators, Mullah Abbas Stanikzai, met a senior member of the High Peace Council in Dubai last month and tried to jump-start the peace process. He declared that the two tried to reconcile differences and pave the way for an official meeting, while Sartaj Aziz, adviser to Pakistan’s prime minister on national security and foreign affairs, said on Sunday, “It is at a very fragile place right now.”...

The term conflict resolution and negotiation is sparingly used in political dialogue or in foreign relations parlance and the usual term we hear is peace. It can be argued that conflict resolution and negotiation is the process that leads to peace. Politicians who use the term ‘peace talks’, project the assumed outcome from the discussion, which is fine when you are dealing with social issues but what about situations where one side or the other doesn’t want peace or is not willing to push towards that goal? 

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