It may be a coincidence of birth, but the Indian prime minister and the Pakistani president are prime examples of how difficult it is for borders to divide the inextricable links between the South Asian rivals.
Both were born before the bloody partition of the Indian sub-continent in 1947 -- Indian premier Manmohan Singh on Sept. 26, 1932 in Gah, which is now in Pakistan, and Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf on Aug. 11, 1943 in New Delhi, India.
On Sunday, Singh gave Musharraf a portrait of Neharwali Haveli, the Musharraf family's ancestral home in New Delhi, where the general spent his formative years.
Local woman Anaro Kashmiri, who was 12 when Musharraf was born and who was employed in his family home, remembers the president's four years in India fondly.
"He will always be my first child. He used to call me `Mummy.' He was a very sweet boy, not naughty at all," she said.
Kashmiri and Musharraf met in 2001, ahead of a summit with then premier Atal Behari Vajpayee.
"He hugged me and asked me what I wanted. I said I wanted the two countries to come together," she said.
At a banquet this weekend for his guest from across the border, Singh referred to the turbulent history of the two countries and the pangs of birth and separation.
"While I was born in what is now Pakistan, and you were born here, both of us have come to occupy these high offices in our countries," Singh said, reading softly from a prepared speech, occasionally bowing his trademark blue turban.
"Fate has placed on our shoulders the burden of a sacred responsibility," he continued. "Clearly, a lasting peace between India and Pakistan is essential to ensure a stable and prosperous South Asia."
The push for peace, contentious Kashmir, better trade and communication links were discussed during Musharraf's "informal" visit to watch cricket.
Sport and politics mingle curiously in this region, with bilateral cricket ties frozen after the Kargil conflict of 1999, when Pakistan-backed guerillas seized positions on the Indian side of the ceasefire Line of Control that divides Kashmir.
The Pakistan team is touring India after six years. Cricket diplomacy has eased tensions in the past when Pakistan president Zia-ul-Haq visited India in 1987 to watch the two teams play.
Haunted by the failed bilateral summit of 2001 in the northern Indian city of Agra, Musharraf landed in the northwestern desert state of Rajasthan as the humble pilgrim, hands folded and dressed in a starched white traditional Pathani suit.
"At Agra there was tension and acrimony. Now there is harmony and cordiality," he commented later.
At the dargah or tomb of Sufi saint Khwaja Moinuddin Chisti in Ajmer city, he said a private prayer for peace and then emerged from the shrine in a resplendent pink-and-silver turban, raising both arms to restrain eager security personnel.
He turned to the cameras and stated grandly, "I have brought a message of peace from Pakistan. There can be no progress without peace. I hope my prayers are answered."
Hours later he arrived in New Delhi in a black suit and bright red tie to attend the banquet, where tables were named after rivers that flow through both countries. Unlike the understated Singh, the Pakistani leader made an apparently impromptu address, speaking eloquently without the use of prepared notes.
"Failure is no longer an option," Musharraf said. "I think in the 21st century, the period of conflict management is over. We have entered an area of conflict resolution."
If symbolism is anything to go by, the visit augurs well for India and Pakistan.
Both leaders used analogies of friendly hands reaching across decades of hatred, much like Vajpayee did on April 18, 2003, when he offered a "hand of friendship" to Pakistan.
"It needs two hands to clap. They say it takes two to tango. We may be too old to tango, but my hand is extended to clap," Musharraf told Singh.
However minor incidents serve to demonstrate how quickly fragile India-Pakistan relations can turn sour.
Musharraf's plane displayed the Indian flag upside down, sparking demands for an apology from Vajpayee's Bharatiya Janata Party for hurting "the sentiments of millions of patriotic Indians."
"India's flag will always fly high and its honor will remain intact," the alarmed pilot said in an apology.
When India and Pakistan shake hands, conspiracy theories abound. The latest surrounds Musharraf's birth certificate, which Singh gave him on Sunday.
Many have since been asking how old the general actually is. His Web site has his date of birth as Aug. 1
Musharraf, who seized power after a 1999 coup, has made promises to step down but can't seem to make way for meaningful democracy.
There is no fixed retirement age for the general, but the certificate would make him two years younger, at least on paper.
Could Asia be on the verge of a new wave of nuclear proliferation? A look back at the early history of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which recently celebrated its 75th anniversary, illuminates some reasons for concern in the Indo-Pacific today. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently described NATO as “the most powerful and successful alliance in history,” but the organization’s early years were not without challenges. At its inception, the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty marked a sea change in American strategic thinking. The United States had been intent on withdrawing from Europe in the years following
My wife and I spent the week in the interior of Taiwan where Shuyuan spent her childhood. In that town there is a street that functions as an open farmer’s market. Walk along that street, as Shuyuan did yesterday, and it is next to impossible to come home empty-handed. Some mangoes that looked vaguely like others we had seen around here ended up on our table. Shuyuan told how she had bought them from a little old farmer woman from the countryside who said the mangoes were from a very old tree she had on her property. The big surprise
The issue of China’s overcapacity has drawn greater global attention recently, with US Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen urging Beijing to address its excess production in key industries during her visit to China last week. Meanwhile in Brussels, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week said that Europe must have a tough talk with China on its perceived overcapacity and unfair trade practices. The remarks by Yellen and Von der Leyen come as China’s economy is undergoing a painful transition. Beijing is trying to steer the world’s second-largest economy out of a COVID-19 slump, the property crisis and
Ursula K. le Guin in The Ones Who Walked Away from Omelas proposed a thought experiment of a utopian city whose existence depended on one child held captive in a dungeon. When taken to extremes, Le Guin suggests, utilitarian logic violates some of our deepest moral intuitions. Even the greatest social goods — peace, harmony and prosperity — are not worth the sacrifice of an innocent person. Former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), since leaving office, has lived an odyssey that has brought him to lows like Le Guin’s dungeon. From late 2008 to 2015 he was imprisoned, much of this