Pakistan Skips US Summit for Democracy

Pakistan’s last-minute decision not to attend U.S. President Joe Biden’s Summit for Democracy in December was surprising. For months, Islamabad pushed its supporters in Washington to get an invitation for the country. Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan had even expressed his wish to attend the summit when he congratulated Joe Biden on his election win in 2020.

The virtual summit took place on December 9 and 10 with an in-person meeting planned for its second edition in 2022.

Announcing Islamabad’s decision to skip the summit, the country’s Foreign Office in a statement said: “Pakistan was in contact with the U.S. on a range of issues and believes that we can engage on this subject at an opportune time in the future."

There are several reasons underlying Pakistan’s decision to give the summit a pass, which help to clarify the implications of this decision for the Pakistan-U.S. bilateral relationship.

It appears that Pakistan’s decision was heavily influenced by China’s position on the subject. The U.S. invited around 110 countries to participate in the summit and China was not on the list. Reports suggest that Islamabad consulted China on the issue and asked for Beijing’s position. As the Express Tribune reported, “Beijing was keen in making sure Islamabad stayed away from the U.S. initiative.” According to another report, Chinese officials told their Pakistani counterparts that participating in the summit would be damaging to their “increasingly interconnected relations,” particularly since Taiwan, which Beijing considers a province of the mainland, was also invited to the event.

Stakeholders in Islamabad point out that Khan was not invited to the summit as a speaker. Rather, Islamabad was asked to simply send a recorded statement. This is in contrast to the special treatment meted out to Pakistan’s neighbor and arch-rival. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was among the few speakers at the event.

Arguably, inviting Pakistan was aimed at forcing Islamabad to make a choice between Washington and Beijing. Islamabad perhaps calculated that skipping the summit was more feasible as it couldn’t afford to annoy China, its chief supporter.

It is possible that the military was not keen on pushing Khan to attend the summit for two reasons. One, like the civilian side, the military is eager to keep China happy. Two, the summit was not about any critical defense matter, nor did it have any strategic significance from the military’s perspective. Democracy is not a subject that the military wants to push as part of Pakistan’s ties with the United States. Thus, it didn’t mind Khan skipping a meeting that could have shone a spotlight on the military’s overarching role in Pakistan’s democracy and on the dwindling influence of civilians in the country.

The decision was also motivated by the fact that the summit itself couldn’t offer Pakistan much vis-à-vis its ties with the United States. The White House may have invited Khan to the summit as a form of appeasement, given the earlier snub at the Climate Summit and Biden’s cold-shouldering of Khan.

However, this snafu is unlikely to have a significant impact on the state of the bilateral relationship. Islamabad was not going to receive any high-level attention from Washington even if it had attended the summit, although it could have been beneficial for Pakistan’s well-wishers in Washington and their efforts to get Pakistan some attention beyond Afghanistan.

As things stand, Washington is not pleased with Pakistan’s role in Afghanistan and that is not going to change through mere attendance at a summit. Relations between Pakistan and the United States are likely to continue as before.

Following Pakistan’s refusal to participate in the summit, a group of U.S. senators visited Pakistan and met with Khan and Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa. In mid-December, U.S. Special Representative on Afghanistan Thomas West participated in the 17th Extraordinary Session of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation’s Council of Foreign Ministers in Islamabad and welcomed the forum’s role to support Afghanistan.

Moreover, the United States’ annual report on terrorism acknowledged that Pakistan took steps in 2020 to counter terrorism financing, restrain India-focused militant groups, and meet demands of the Financial Action Task Force.

These developments indicate that Washington will continue to engage with Islamabad as far as the issue of Afghanistan, terrorism, and ties with the Pakistani military are concerned.

For its part, Pakistan doesn’t want to completely jump into China’s bloc and weaken its ties with the United States. This may have already been communicated to Washington by Islamabad in one form or the other following the democracy summit.

It appears that Pakistan is making efforts to curtail the impression that its decision to skip the democracy summit was the outcome of choosing between the U.S. and China. Reports suggest that Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi spoke to U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman in late December and explained Islamabad’s position regarding its decision.

Skipping the summit was a tough choice for Pakistan.

Participating could have been an opportunity for Pakistan to end the existing cold phase in its relations with the United States. Islamabad might have been able to highlight how its democracy, regardless of all its flaws, has built bodies capable of governing a varied and multiethnic society.

Instead, it seems Pakistan will find it difficult to mend ties with the United States if China disapproves in any form. Pakistan’s growing reliance on China means that the country’s ability to balance between Beijing and Washington will remain under threat.