An article on the British Middle East Eye website stated that the Kashmir issue and the Covid-19 epidemic will lead India to overtake Pakistan in the strategic relationship with Saudi Arabia.
The writer Robert Stone said in an article on the site that Pakistan will remain an important security partner to Saudi Arabia, and economic cooperation between them will continue, but it will shrink, and in the long term, New Delhi could overtake Islamabad as Riyadh's main strategic ally in South Asia.
The writer added that Pakistan - for its part - may be increasingly attracted to the camp of "Turkey - Qatar - Iran - Malaysia", as it has close and long-term relations with Turkey, receives energy supplies from Qatar, and can make further progress in Kashmir by forming a united front. With those powers.
The facts of diminishing relationships
Stone cited a lot of information indicating the shrinking of relations between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, in exchange for their development between Saudi Arabia and India. In this, he indicated that Saudi Arabia did not criticize India's violation of Kashmir's autonomy, and that the Organization of Islamic Cooperation - which is dominated by Saudi Arabia - had rejected a request from Pakistan to convene a conference of foreign ministers of its member states.
He said that Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi criticized Saudi Arabia and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, unlike Pakistan, and pledged to hold a separate meeting. Pakistan also agreed to participate in an Islamic summit in Malaysia last December, which also included Turkey, Iran and Qatar. But it retreated at the last moment under pressure from Riyadh.
He stated that Saudi Arabia had requested a premature return of a $ 1 billion loan from Pakistan, and had not renewed an agreement to postpone the payment of $ 3 billion in Saudi oil imports.
He also indicated that Pakistan voted several times against Saudi draft resolutions at the United Nations criticizing Iran, and that Islamabad refused in 2015 to send troops to participate in Saudi Arabia's war in Yemen, even during the era of former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, whose relationship with Riyadh is considered stronger than that of the prime minister. Current Imran Khan.
Saudi-Indian rapprochement
On the other hand, Stone said that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman visited New Delhi in February 2019 and pledged major investments in several sectors in India, and an oil agreement worth $ 15 billion was announced between the two countries in August, just days after India’s declaration of abolishing the independence of Kashmir.
He added that India has increased oil imports from Saudi Arabia by 32% since the imposition of US sanctions on Iran, at a time when oil has become less important to Pakistan because of its reliance on liquefied gas from Qatar and the inland coal fields that China helps to develop.
At a time when the Pakistani economy depends heavily on remittances from workers in Saudi Arabia, remittance flows from Pakistani workers in the Kingdom have decreased, since the end of the global commodity boom in 2014, and it is expected to decline further this year due to the Coronavirus (Covid-19).