Musharraf the great makes another bold move for peace, which the Kashmiri’s have welcomed, but which the Indian’s are not willing to countenance.
It seems the hard-liners in India are once again in the ascendancy…
Musharraf calls for Kashmir cease-fire
Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has called for a cease-fire along the Line of Control (LoC) separating Indian- and Pakistani-administered Kashmir. He made his comments at a peace conference in Islamabad being attended by an Indian delegation as tensions ease between the two states. However, the suggestion got a cool reception in the Indian capital Delhi which accuses Pakistan of supporting cross-border terrorism. Police in Indian-administered Kashmir detained a prominent separatist leader, Shabir Shah, on Tuesday. He was leading a protest over the disappearance of two young men, allegedly while under police custody, in the town of Pattan. He was arrested along with a number of protesters when they marched close to the state chief minister’s residence.
Quid pro quo
Some participants in the conference in Islamabad were upbeat about the prospects of peace between India and Pakistan. “President Musharraf was very open, was very candid,” said Balbir Punj, an MP from India’s governing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). “The amount of time he gave, the amount of patience he showed to us, it gives an indication that somewhere the general wants peace with India.” President Musharraf told the peace conference that he was prepared to facilitate a cease-fire along the LoC, over which Indian and Pakistani troops often exchange artillery and mortar fire. He agreed with the Indian politicians that there needed to be an end to the violence associated with separatist militancy in Indian-administered Kashmir. But for this to happen, he said, India would need to reduce the strength of its troops in Kashmir and to end alleged human rights violations. He denied that the government in Pakistan had “a whistle which we blow from here and things start happening”.
Positive signs
India, however, accuses Pakistan of sponsoring terrorism in Indian-administered Kashmir. Navtej Sarna, Indian External Affairs Ministry spokesman, described President Musharraf’s comments as “nothing new”. “They [cease-fires] have not been found effective in the past because Pakistan has continued to sponsor terrorism directed against India and provided support to cross-border infiltration,” he said. But there have been some signs recently of a thawing of relations between India and Pakistan. The two countries broke off diplomatic relations and came close to military conflict following an attack on the Indian Parliament in December 2001 which India blamed on Pakistani-backed militants. But in April this year Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee held out a “hand of friendship” to Pakistan. The peace conference is the latest in a series of unofficial meetings between representatives of both sides. And the BBC’s Zaffar Abbas in Islamabad says that the event has raised fresh hopes of an early resumption of the official peace process.
