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Pakistan Formally Proposes Dialogue With India
By Shah Alam
ISLAMABAD (AFP)-Pakistan has formally proposed to India that the two countries resume stalled talks on resolving issues plaguing bilateral relations, official Pakistani sources said. The proposal was made by Foreign Secretary Inamul Haq during a meeting here Wednesday with Indian High Commissioner G. Parthasarathy.
It is the first time Pakistan has officially proposed resumption of dialogue since the military takeover here in October, though military ruler General Pervez Musharraf has repeatedly offered talks.
New Delhi generally refuses to negotiate the issue of Kashmir with Pakistan or anyone else, insisting that it is Indian territory. Relinquishing control over the area could open a Pandora’s box for India, which would have to contend with other separatist minorities.
The principal issue and source of two of the three wars between Pakistan and India since 1947 is their festering row over the Himalayan state of Kashmir, split between the two and claimed by both.
After the May 1998 nuclear tests by Pakistan in reaction to those carried out by India in the same month, Kashmir is widely seen as a potential nuclear flashpoint. Musharraf said last Saturday, after talks with U.S. President Bill Clinton in Islamabad, that Pakistan was "ready for a dialogue anywhere at any time and at any level."
He called on India to take "reciprocal action" to reduce tension. "They need to stop human rights violations there [Kashmir], they need to stop atrocities across the Line of Control [LoC] and then we can also use our influence to moderate the activities of the freedom fighters," he said.
The rival armies fought bitter battles in the Kargil Mountains on the LoC last year, a few months after a landmark summit between the Indian prime minister and his then Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif in Lahore, Pakistan.
Sharif, who defused the Kargil crisis by persuading Islamic fighters to withdraw from occupied Kashmir under U.S. advice – a decision widely resented in Pakistan – was overthrown in a military coup in October.
Since then tensions have been running high on the LoC, with almost daily violence in the Indian-administered part of Kashmir linked to a Muslim independence drive and exchanges of fire on the disputed border between the rival troops.
India accuses Pakistan of sponsoring cross-border terrorism in Kashmir, a charge denied by Islamabad. Indian leaders have frequently said talks could be held when Islamabad stopped its alleged involvement.
Musharraf has denied his government sponsored infiltration from the Pakistani side into the Indian zone of the disputed Himalayan state. Pakistan "is not sending anyone across the LoC. We are not involved. Whatever is happening is indigenous," Musharraf said after the talks with Clinton.
"I told President Clinton we have to understand the dynamics. There is people's involvement. It started with an uprising [in the Indian part], and the people in Azad Kashmir [in the Pakistani portion] and the people of Pakistan were emotionally involved.
"If there is any infiltration it is not government sponsored. Nobody is allowed to cross the LoC. When 700,000 Indian troops cannot block entry, how can 50,000 Pakistani troops be expected to do this? If someone infiltrates it is not with our knowledge," he said.
Pakistan is hopeful that Clinton would use his influence to "facilitate" the resumption of talks, despite the U.S. president's refusal to mediate and India's consistent rejection of any third-party role.
During his historic South Asian tour, Clinton called for the LoC to be respected and for the resumption of dialogue between Pakistan and India. "There is no military solution to Kashmir," he told Pakistanis in a televised address in Islamabad.
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