NEW DELHI, June 13 -- The two countries that share one of the longest land borders on earth spent four days in New Delhi this week agreeing how friendly they are. Border Guard Bangladesh and India's Border Security Force ended their director-general talks with a joint statement calling the relationship cordial, positive and forward-looking, full of intelligence sharing and coordinated patrols. The communique had a hole in the middle of it the size of the thing both sides actually argue about.

India has been quietly pushing people across that border, and Bangladesh has run out of polite ways to object.

The official agenda listed the contested matter in the gentlest available phrasing, as "illegal, inadvertent and forcible crossing at bor...