ISLAMABAD, 14 September 2003 — President Pervez Musharraf has asked India to initiate a dialogue with Pakistan “without delay” to resolve all outstanding disputes between the two nuclear rivals, a report said yesterday.
“The ball is in India’s court, and it is up to them to sit across the table for resolving all outstanding issues including the core Kashmir problem,” local English language daily, The News, quoted Musharraf as saying in an interview.
“Pakistan has always given positive response to any call for dialogue, and I believe the talks must start without any delay,” Gen. Musharraf, who is also army chief, said.
Musharraf warned India against any military misadventure saying if it dared it would have to repent, the daily said.
India has linked resumption of bilateral dialogue to normalcy in divided Kashmir but Pakistan insists talks should go ahead without any preconditions to address all problems between the two countries.
The dispute over Himalayan state of Kashmir, which is claimed by both countries, has been a catalyst for two of the three wars they have fought since independence in 1947.
Also, Musharraf has dismissed reports that extremist elements have contacts inside the country’s powerful army. Musharraf said he was in the army for the last 40 years and knew it better than anyone else.
“There may be some elements with extremist views at the lower ranks, but they only sympathize with religious elements,” Musharraf said.
Musharraf said only three army officers were currently under interrogation for “abetting Al-Qaeda elements and it is like nothing when one talked about an army of 550,000 soldiers.”
Officials have said the three army officers, including one lieutenant colonel and one major, were detained after the arrest of keyAl-Qaeda leader Khalid Sheikh Mohammad.
Mohammad was sheltered in the house of the major in the nearby garrison city of Rawalpindi when he was arrested during a predawn raid on March 1.
Pakistani intelligence agencies working closely with US experts from the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the FBI since late 2001 have captured some 500 Al-Qaeda suspects, including alleged Sept. 11 masterminds Mohammed and Ramzi bin Al-Shaiba. The majority have been handed over to the United States.
In another development, ajudge in the southern city of Karachi yesterday threw out a petition that sought to call Musharraf as a witness in a trial against four militants and a former soldier accused of plotting to assassinate him.
“The president is immune under the constitution from being called in the court,” said Ale Maqbool Rizvi, the judge in the trial.
But the court allowed the defense counsel to call five other witnesses it had requested at the next hearing on Sept. 20. The trial started in April.
The five defendants are accused of plotting to kill Musharraf when the president visited Karachi on April 26, 2002. Police say the alleged plot failed because an explosive-laden car parked along Musharraf’s route failed to explode as a remote controlled detonator malfunctioned.
Defense lawyer Abdul Waheed Katpar said he would challenge the court ruling.
Pakistan Says Some Clerics
Could Be Helping Taleban
Pakistan said yesterday some of its Islamic clerics could be assisting the Taleban but they should not be held solely responsible and Afghanistan had to take action against the hard-line militia.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai called on Pakistani clerics on Friday to stop backing the ousted Taleban, which initially emerged from Pakistani seminaries in the 1990s and has been blamed for a spate of attacks in recent months in Afghanistan. Karzai said Pakistani clerics were involved in recruiting and sending Taleban guerrillas to destabilize his country.
Pakistani Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat said Karzai might be right. “There is no denying the fact that certain elements within the clergy have been engaged in activities which have been leading the world to believe that the clergy are involved in terrorism,” Hayat told reporters.
“President Hamid Karzai’s assertion does have some logic, but at the same time it is not only the clergy in Pakistan,” he said. “They would certainly have some sympathizers within Afghanistan.
“So it would also be in Mr. Karzai’s own interest that he takes complete and positive steps to tackle the situation within Afghanistan itself,” he said. Hayat was speaking after signing an agreement with his Sri Lankan counterpart John Amaratunga on cooperation in the fight against terrorism, drug smuggling and human trafficking.
He said Pakistan would continue to hunt for Osama Bin Laden, other Al-Qaeda members, and their Taleban allies in its tribal region bordering Afghanistan. “The operational strategies that we have and which are going on, I am quite optimistic that time is running out for the top leadership of Al-Qaeda,” he said.
The Taleban movement, which sheltered Osama Bin Laden and his Al-Qaeda network, has declared a holy war against foreign and government forces and aid workers in Afghanistan.
