NEW DELHI, December 11 (IslamOnline) - There are growing apprehensions in India now about an imminent international intervention in the Kashmir issue. The stage is already set for such an intervention with the proposed visit of former U.S. president Jimmy Carter to India and Pakistan some time next year.

Carter’s planned visit was disclosed by Srinagar-based daily Greater Kashmir Tuesday, December 10.

Carter is famous for his successful diplomatic initiatives in some of the crisis spots around the world. Credit for the Camp David accord which ultimately thawed relations between Egypt and Israel goes to Carter. The United Nations had appointed Carter as the roving ambassador for peace in war-torn nations. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace Tuesday.

According to the report, former Pakistani army chief Jahangir Karamat, India’s Kashmir Committee chairman and former law minister Ram Jethmalani and U.S.-based Kashmiri businessman Farooq Kathwari are the prominent figures behind the Carter mission. “A consolidated report containing suggestions would be placed before Washington, Islamabad and New Delhi,” the Greater Kashmir report said.

The report claimed that U.S. experts favor an independent Kashmir and that ceaseless moves are afoot in this regard.

Robert D Blackwill, U.S. ambassador to India, visited the state of Jammu and Kashmir December 2. The visit which followed on the heels of the recently-concluded elections assumed a great significance in Delhi political circles.

“Kathwari ‘secretly visited Kashmir’ along with Blackwill,” the report claimed. It was significant that Blackwill chose not to meet Hurriyat Conference leaders this time round.

Blackwill is better known for his strong advocacy of an independent Kashmir. He is also believed to enjoy immense clout in the U.S. administration.

The report failed to say whether Carter’s initiative was being backed by the Bush administration. In the absence of a clear hint about Bush administration’s blessings to Carter’s endeavor, the report said, “Carter is convinced that the nuclear-capable troubled area needs his attention.

Carter’s relationship with the White House has been quite adverse on domestic issues and Middle East policies.” Driven by his penchant for undertaking initiatives in trouble-prone areas, Carter has decided to visit the Subcontinent, the report said.

In its report, the Pakistan-based Weekly Independent observed that “either Carter is taking up the mission on his own or the Bush administration has asked for his help,” adding that “either way, it suits the Bush administration’s agenda and State Department’s diplomatic help may be forthcoming.”

For quite sometime now, Jimmy Carter had been taking keen interest in the Kashmir issue. Carter Center held a seminar at Washington recently in which several scholars and retired diplomats presented their viewpoints for resolving the Kashmir issue. Salman Haider, former Indian foreign secretary, Usman Ahmed, a prominent U.S.-based JKLF leader, and Hasan Abbas, a South Asian expert from Pakistan, were major participants from the Subcontinent.

Making his presentation, Haider talked about the official line of the Indian government while referring to “cross-border terrorism”. “If cross-border terrorism was eliminated Kashmir will be a peaceful state within India,” he said.

“General Pervez Musharraf did not control jihadi outfits and would not be able to stop infiltration,” Pakistani experts felt. “In order to control the militant outfits Pakistan needed more time on the part of India. However, if appropriate measures were not taken, India and Pakistan faced a bigger chaos and prospects of disintegration,” they argued.

JKLF representative, Usman Ahmed, reiterated his organization’s stand, and went on to accuse both India and Pakistan of derailing a solution in order to suit their own ends. “Both India and Pakistan have been duplicitous about Kashmir,” he claimed.

“Neither India nor Pakistan would give up their respective positions, and so the only solution is to establish a process by which Kashmir emerges as an independent state,” the JKLF representative said. Most American experts supported his views, the report claimed.

“Many American experts have been working on devising such a mechanism which can disentangle India and Pakistan establishing an enduring peace in the region.

Most American experts do not believe that the U.N. resolutions are relevant any more or that they can yield any solution. For starters, Americans do not trust any international law and maintain that solutions to the international problems can be enforced by the U.S. and not by the U.N.,” said the Weekly Independent report.

To give fillip to his idea of an independent state out of the Muslim-majority areas of Jammu and Kashmir, Kathwari had presented a report on behalf of his Kashmir Study Group (KSG) in February 2000. Interestingly, the KSG report, ‘Kashmir A Way Forward’, received support from prominent American experts.

The report specified five proposals for the creation of a sovereign Muslim-majority Kashmir with its own constitution, citizenship, flag and a legislature which would deal with all matters except defense and foreign affairs.

On the face of it, in the earlier greater autonomy proposal for Jammu and Kashmir, the Indian government had outlined similar provisions wherein it would have control over currency, foreign affairs and defense matters for an autonomous Jammu and Kashmir. Despite assurances, the federal government, however, has so far refused to even discuss autonomy of the state.

New Delhi sees the Kashmir issue as a bilateral one between India and Pakistan. It has always advocated that the issue should be sorted out only after negotiations between the two countries alone without the intervention of any third party.