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| India-Pakistan |
| India plans talks with Mujahideen |
| 2002-12-28 |
| Indian Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani said on Friday the government planned to hold talks with the new government in Srinagar and Mujahideen groups on ways to bring peace to occupied Kashmir. A new coalition government assumed power in the held state last month, saying it favoured talks with the All parties Hurriyat Conference, who boycotted last month's elections. "The dialogue will be held with the elected representatives of (held) Jammu and Kashmir for restoration of peace," Advani told reporters in Jammu. "The talks would not remain confined to elected representatives only and could be held with those also who could not either participate in the elections or get elected." The Hurriyat has in the past refused to meet the Indian government unless Pakistan was included in the dialogue. However, Advani ruled out talks with Islamabad, alleging "Pakistan has reactivated its training camps which it had temporarily closed. The recent spurt in violence...shows the intentions of Pakistan. Infiltration is continuing and the alarming thing is that the component of foreign militants of late has considerably increased and three-fourths are foreign militants." "Foreign militants" would also include Pakistanis. I'd be really interested in knowing what the proportion of Arabs and other riff-raff is. There hasn't been any result from similar talks in the past — at most an agreement with some of the groups, while the others go on ranting and killing at random. The groups who agreed get tired of sitting on the sidelines and then rejoin the festivities. |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |