NEW DELHI/ISLAMABAD, 28 December — India and Pakistan announced tit-for-tat sanctions yesterday as India’s defense minister said the country’s ground forces would be ready to do battle in three days. New Delhi also rejected pressure from Washington for talks with Islamabad to defuse the crisis.
Accusing Pakistan of being "involved in espionage as well as direct dealings with terrorist organizations," Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh announced the decision of the Cabinet’s Security Committee to impose sanctions on Pakistan.
He said the government had decided to halve India’s diplomatic mission in Pakistan and Islamabad’s in New Delhi, restrict movement of Pakistani diplomats and halt Pakistan International Airlines’ rights to fly over India. Pakistan immediately responded in kind, accusing India of fuelling "the atmosphere of tension".
But Singh also moved to calm fears of war. "There is no need for anyone to worry," he said, adding military leaders from both countries were in regular contact.
The air space ban will take effect on Jan. 1, while the embassy downgrade will be implemented in 48 hours, Singh said, adding that all remaining Pakistani High Commission staff would be confined to the municipal limits of New Delhi. India and Pakistan each have an embassy staff of 110 in the other country.
"Such efforts will only increase tension and we are forced to take retaliatory actions," Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Aziz Ahmed Khan said.
The fresh sanctions, which followed last week’s recall of the Indian envoy to Pakistan and the cutting of cross-border bus and rail links, came amid rising military tensions between the nuclear rivals. The crisis stems from India’s accusation that Pakistani military intelligence sponsored attack on the parliament complex in New Delhi on Dec. 13 and its threat of possible military retaliation. India has also demanded that Islamabad shut down the two Pakistan-based Kashmiri groups blamed for the attack — Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Muhammad — seize their assets and arrest their leaders.
US Secretary of State Colin Powell announced Wednesday he had put the groups on a list of terrorist organizations, boosting Indian arguments that Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf should shut them down.
But both organizations remained defiant. "The American decision will make no difference to us. We do not need an American certificate to carry out jihad," Lashkar-e-Taiba spokesman Aftab Hussain said in a statement issued in Muzzaffarabad, the capital of Azad Kashmir.
He dismissed charges that the group was involved in activities that could be termed terrorist. "We are fighting Indian terrorism in Kashmir," he said.
A leader of Jaish-e-Muhammad, Hasan Burki, also questioned the US move, saying: "Who is America to call us terrorists? We have to prepare Muslims for jihad. We have to show the Americans and Indians the real power of Muslims."
Pakistani security officials on Tuesday detained Maulana Azhar Masood, leader of Jaish, and his followers warned of unspecified consequences if he was not released. Azhar has been operating his group since India freed him and two others from prison in exchange for passengers of an Indian Airlines plane hijacked to the Afghan city of Kandahar in December 1999.
Amid renewed appeals for restraint from the international community, Indian Defense Minister George Fernandes described the situation as "grave" but said diplomatic efforts should be given time even as fresh troops were being moved to the border. "In the next two to three days, the deployment process will be completed and the forces will be ready for any eventuality," Fernandes said.
In Islamabad, military spokesman Maj. Gen. Rashid Qureshi said Pakistan could retaliate in "all conceivable ways" to any Indian escalation of their dispute but described a nuclear war as unthinkable. "These (nuclear weapons) are deterrents which are not meant to be more than that. It’s something that I think one shouldn’t even consider," Qureshi said. He added Pakistan had implemented defensive measures. "We hope that better sense prevails and India does not escalate because I am sure the Indians know that we have the capacity to react or retaliate in all conceivable ways," he said.
Powell spoke twice Wednesday by phone with Singh and Pakistani President Musharraf. State Department deputy spokesman Philip Reeker did not divulge the contents of the phone calls, but warned it was "very important that there be a lessening of tension between India and Pakistan." "Any conflict between the two countries can have no good result for either country," he said. But Singh said talks were neither practical nor possible.
Indian civilians were evacuating their villages near the Pakistan border. The army said villagers in three districts of the western border state of Rajasthan — including Jaisalmer, Barmer and Bikaner — had started moving in their hundreds in bullock carts, hired jeeps and tractors.
The army said it had advised civilians to evacuate nine frontier villages, including Kishangarh and Karanpur which saw fierce tank battles in India’s 1965 war with Pakistan.
