ISLAMABAD, 27 September 2003 — India has created “a recipe for continued tension” by rejecting Pakistan’s proposal for a cease-fire in disputed Kashmir, Pakistan said yesterday, after both countries traded charges at the United Nations this week.
The strongly worded reaction from Islamabad came after Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee dismissed Pakistani proposals to pursue an end to cross-border violence in Kashmir involving “reciprocal obligations and restraints.”
“The Indian Prime Minister has given a recipe for continued tension and estrangement,” Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Masood Khan told Reuters.
“At the UN, Prime Minister Vajpayee has made his remarks in bad faith.”
President Pervez Musharraf told the UN General Assembly on Wednesday that Pakistan would be prepared to “encourage a general cessation of violence” in Kashmir, and that Indian forces and Kashmiri rebels should show restraint.
But Vajpayee said Thursday that terrorism must not become a “tool of blackmail” and ruled out a resumption of talks without an end to intrusions by militants from Pakistani-controlled Kashmir.
“By rejecting the president’s offer... India is asking for a carte blanche for its state-sponsored terrorism in Kashmir,” the Pakistani spokesman said.
Relations between the nuclear-armed rivals, which came to the brink of war last year, have thawed since Vajpayee said in April he was ready for peace with Pakistan following intense US-led diplomatic efforts.
But a rise in separatist violence in Indian-ruled Kashmir in recent weeks and an ensuing war of words have eclipsed prospects for an early resumption of peace talks.
India this month discouraged Pakistani Foreign Minister Khursheed Mehmood Kasuri from delivering in person to Vajpayee an invitation to a regional summit, saying such a visit was not necessary.
India has indicated Vajpayee would visit the 12th summit of the seven-nation South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) due in Islamabad in January but said it did not necessarily provide a forum for two-way talks with Pakistan.
At a state dinner hosted by Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien, Musharraf on Thursday asked Canada to help persuade India to resume talks. He said: “We stand ready to revive dialogue with India (over Kashmir) through a sustained process of negotiations. “Unfortunately, we are denied the very forum of dialogue.”
Earlier, in an address to the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies, Musharraf said “there must be no (new) war. We must settle our dispute peacefully.”
Analysts were skeptical about any progress in negotiations between the two countries in the near future.
Kamal Matinuddin, a retired Pakistani general who is now a political analyst, said: “I do not see any forward movement in relations between the two countries. I do not see a possibility of negotiations between the two countries in the near future.”
Pakistani columnist Nasim Zehra saw panic among Indian leaders. “It is indeed hysterical behavior which cannot flow from calm and confidence. This helps no one. Above all, not the Indians,” he said.
