JAMMU - KashmirÂ’s main separatist alliance on Monday rejected an invitation by Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to attend a conference to boost a peace process in the restive Himalayan region.The conference, scheduled for Saturday, has been called by New Delhi to widen the dialogue in Jammu and Kashmir where a revolt against Indian rule by Islamist militants has killed more than 45,000 people since 1989. Singh has called minority Hindu groups in the region, pro-India political parties as well as separatist groups for the peace conference but has not invited nuclear rival Pakistan with which New Delhi has a separate peace process.
The All Party Hurriyat Conference (APHC), a conglomerate of separatist political groups, said it will not attend as New Delhi had not taken measures in Kashmir to ease the ground situation for Kashmiris that would have built trust ahead of dialogue. “The Hurriyat has decided not to participate in the conference as it opines that it would harm the peace process rather than benefit it,” Hurriyat chief Mirwaiz Umar Farooq said in a statement from Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian Kashmir.
| "We might get whacked on the road, and you can't tell me that wouldn't harm dialogue, especially my end of it!" |