POLITICS-SOUTH ASIA: India Presses Ahead with Kashmir Diplomatic Gains

By Ranjit Devraj Reprint | | Print |

Ranjit Devraj

NEW DELHI, Apr 8 2001 (IPS) - Following up on international diplomatic gains on the Kashmir issue, India has taken another bold step to push forward efforts to bring peace to its troubled province.

The government’s Apr. 5 offer to hold talks with Kashmiri militant groups and separatist leaders, is the biggest step toward peace in the Himalayan region, since Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s announcement of a unilateral ceasefire there, four months ago.

Though both Pakistan and Kashmiri separatists were quick to reject the offer, political analysts said that New Delhi’s latest initiative had again put pressure on Islamabad and the militants to respond positively.

Islamabad declared that New Delhi was not being “sincere” in trying to resolve the dispute. India and Pakistan have fought two of their three wars over Kashmir, a third of which is controlled by Pakistan.

The former princely province joined India soon after the subcontinent’s partition into Pakistan and India by departing colonial British rulers in 1947.

More than 30,000 people have been killed in violence unleashed by armed Kashmiri secessionists since the late 1980s. New Delhi accuses Islamabad of arming and backing the militants. Pakistan accuses Indian troops of rights abuses in Kashmir.

“The very fact that the Indian government is going ahead with its effort even after the Hurriyat had made it clear that it could respond to any invitation for talks only after it is allowed to travel to Pakistan, shows that the Indian government is not sincere,” a Pakistani government spokesman was quoted as saying.

Abdul Ghani Bhat, chairman of the All-Party Hurriyat Committee — an umbrella grouping of separatist groups in Kashmir — said there could be no talks until New Delhi allowed a Hurriyat delegation to travel to Pakistan.

In keeping with the Kashmir peace bid, New Delhi has allowed the Hurriyat leaders to travel to Pakistan for the first time, to persuade leaders of Pakistan-based Kashmiri militant groups to accept the Kashmir ceasefire.

But Home Minister L.K. Advani has refused to issue travel documents to Hurriyat leaders who advocate Kashmir’s merger with Pakistan.

Vajpayee’s Kashmir peace initiative found quick support in Washington where Indian External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh was holding talks with top U.S. leaders.

“Certainly, we have welcomed the recent Indian offer of talks. I would add that we would encourage all groups to take advantage of the offer and to enter into talks to reduce violence, to foster process and dialogue,” a White House spokesman was quoted as saying.

According to news reports from Washington, Kashmir was a key issue in Singh’s talks with U.S. President George W. Bush, Secretary of State Colin Powell and National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice.

India’s stand on the Kashmir dispute also found tacit support from U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, when he toured South Asia in March.

Annan then disappointed Islamabad by turning down suggestions for U.N. involvement and asserting that the Kashmir dispute had to be resolved in accordance with bilateral New Delhi-Islamabad agreements, like the 1972 Shimla Accord and the February 1999 Lahore Declaration.

The U.N. chief also said that the world body’s over 50-year-old resolutions on Kashmir were unenforceable.

Pakistan protested at Annan’s remarks during the late March session of the U.N.’s Commission on Human Rights at Geneva.

“It is the duty of the U.N. to devise means to implement these resolutions (on Kashmir),” Pakistan’s delegate Akram Munir was quoted as telling the commission.

Pakistan’s military ruler Pervez Musharraf has, on several occasions, rejected the Lahore Declaration, signed by Vajpayee and former Pakistani premier Nawaz Sharief, who was ousted by Musharraf in an October 1999 coup.

In an interview with leading Indian journalist M.J. Akbar, Musharraf declared: “Anybody who thinks that India and Pakistan can get very chummy and friendly and co-operate without a resolution of the Kashmir issue, is not a practical and realistic individual.”

Akbar’s ‘Asian Age’ newspaper, which published the interview Saturday, commented in an editorial that New Delhi should not expect too much from the foreign minister’s trip to Washington.

According to the daily, the Bush administration did not “appear overly interested in the resolution of the Kashmir issue and expectations are that Washington will stop leaning on Pakistan”.

However, leading Indian foreign policy analyst C. Raja Mohan of ‘The Hindu’ newspaper said that the new administration in Washington suited New Delhi better on the Kashmir issue.

Mohan noted that the new U.S. government favoured a policy of non- intervention in regional conflicts, which worked to India’s advantage where the Kashmir issue was concerned.

“Where Clinton saw South Asia as the most dangerous spot on earth, the Bush administration was looking at India as a democratic country which was capable of maintaining regional stability,” he said.