Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has once again placed Kashmir at the centre of Pakistan's diplomatic discourse. At the UN General Assembly, he forcefully reaffirmed Pakistan's principled position on this unfinished agenda of Partition: the Kashmiri people's right to self-determination in accordance with the relevant UN Security Council resolutions.

He coupled Kashmir with another existential national interest: the Indus waters. India cannot unilaterally suspend a binding international treaty, nor can it stop, impede or divert Pakistan's rightful share of water. Sharif's warning was categorical: any such attempt would constitute an "act of war." This resoluteness contrasts sharply with Pakistan's Kashmir policy during Imran Khan's government. The PTI government had opportunities both before and after India's illegal actions of August 5, 2019, but failed to convert Pakistan's longstanding position into an effective diplomatic and legal campaign.

The failure was particularly serious because India had hardly concealed what it intended to do. The BJP's 2019 election manifesto explicitly promised to revoke Articles 370 and 35A. After Modi's re-election, the intensification of India's security campaign in Kashmir provided further warning that a fundamental change was approaching.

An even greater opportunity came from the United Nations itself. In July 2019, barely a month before India's action, the UN human rights office issued another damning report on abuses in Kashmir and reiterated the call for an independent international inquiry. Pakistan could have used that moment to mobilise friendly states and seek stronger action at the UN Human Rights Council before India acted. It did not. By the time Khan addressed the UN General Assembly in September, India had already revoked Articles 370 and 35A, divided the disputed territory and fundamentally altered its constitutional status.

Pakistan had faced such moments before. When the BJP promised before the 1998 elections to make India an overt nuclear power, Nawaz Sharif's government understood the implications. When India eventually conducted nuclear tests, Pakistan was prepared to respond despite enormous international pressure. Opportunities remained after August 2019 as well. Imran Khan told the National Assembly that Pakistan would consider challenging India's action before the International Court of Justice. Yet no sustained legal initiative followed. Pakistan's response increasingly became what may be called solidarity diplomacy: speeches, commemorative events, expressions of support and periodic condemnation. These had symbolic value, but they could not prevent India from steadily creating new facts on the ground.

Worse still, Pakistan needed its friends most at precisely this moment. Kashmir cannot be effectively internationalised without a conducive diplomatic environment and sustained engagement with major powers, the Muslim world and Pakistan's strategic partners. Yet relations with Saudi Arabia deteriorated after Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi publicly criticised the OIC over Kashmir in 2020. This was particularly damaging because Saudi Arabia remained........

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