SRINAGAR, April 16 (News Agencies) - Kashmir's main alliance dismissed Monday the Indian government's announcement that it had begun a political dialogue on the future of the disputed Himalayan region.
"It is nothing more than an eyewash," said Abdul Gani Bhat, chairman of the All Party Hurriyat Conference - an amalgam of two-dozen political separatist groups in Kashmir.
India's new pointman on Kashmir, K.C. Pant, said Sunday that he had sent invitations for talks to several regional groups and had already held discussions with former Kashmir chief minister Mir Quasim.
Pant also said he had sent invitations to the Hurriyat leadership.
But Bhat responded by accusing Pant of turning the Kashmir dispute into an open "fish market" where any group, no matter how insignificant, could come along and negotiate.
"For me, the main parties to the talks are only India, Pakistan and the Hurriyat Conference," Bhat said.
The Hurriyat has said it would engage in a dialogue only if New Delhi issued travel documents allowing its leaders to visit Pakistan for talks with groups and officials there.
Pant said he had invited Kashmiri parliamentarians, regional legislators and an array of local leaders with "representative capacity" to participate in the first government-sponsored dialogue on Kashmir.
Political representatives from Kashmir's Buddhist-dominated Ladakh region as well as leaders from Kargil, the site of a 1999 India-Pakistan military conflict, were also sent invitations.
Two pro-Pakistan outfits operating in Kashmir said any group accepting the invitations would leave themselves open to retribution.
"All mediators will be dubbed as traitors and will only receive alienation and humiliation from the Kashmiri masses," the Jamiat-ul-Mujahideen said in a press release.
"Jihad [holy struggle] is the only way to achieve the freedom of Kashmir."
The Al-Umar Mujaihdeen issued a similar warning.
"The traitors will have to face death in Kashmir," the group said.
India supposedly suspended counter-insurgency operations against groups in Kashmir on November 28th. The alleged unilateral ceasefire has since been extended three times and is due to expire at the end of May.
Muslim-majority Kashmir was divided between India and Pakistan in 1947 but remains claimed by both.
The conflict in Kashmir has claimed more than 34,000 lives since 1989, according to Indian figures. Kashmiri leaders say the death toll is twice as high.
