Terror to be core issue of talks between India and Pakistan: Krishna

May 20, 2010 By Leave a Comment

New Delhi, May 20 (ANI): External Affairs Minister S M Krishna has said that terror continues to be the core issue of talks between India and Pakistan, and it would be one of the most important issues that would be taken up between the two nations during his forthcoming visit to Pakistan beginning July 15.

“Terror will continue to be the core issue for us even when I go to Islamabad. I will be talking to Foreign Minister Qureshi on terror, on terror instrumentalities and how those terror instrumentalities are operating from the soil of Pakistan,” said Krishna.

“But at the same time, Pakistan also says they are afflicted by terror. The Taliban and other terrorist outfits are active even in Pakistan against the establishment. So, that has to be factored in while making an assessment of the impact of terror on India and Pakistan,” he added in an interview to Raj Chengappa, Editor-in-Chief, The Tribune.

On efforts by Pakistan to dismantle the terror apparatus and cut off link with it, Krishna said: “In the light of the terror attacks they have been experiencing in their own country, they are in a position to assess what terror is all about. Terrorists can strike any country, anywhere, and, they can do it at will.”

“That is what they have proved in Rawalpindi. That is what they have proved in Swat and various other areas. So, I am sure, Pakistan would be looking at terror perhaps in the same prism with which India views it in,” he added.

On the prosecution of Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Saeed, the suspected mastermind of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack, Krishna said India has the evidence and Pakistan should proceed against him.

“We have been telling them that we have given you enough evidence to prosecute Hafiz Sayeed, who is the mastermind behind the Mumbai attacks. We have the evidence and that evidence is provable in a court of law. So, I think, they should proceed against him.”

“But both the times it was the court of law which let him out of custody. But, we still insist that Hafiz Sayeed is the brain behind the Mumbai attacks and he has to be brought to justice,” he added.

Krishna said the main mission of his Pakistan visit would be to foster friendly relations between the two nations and eliminate the prevailing distrust.

“But our efforts will certainly be to eliminate the prevailing distrust. The central theme of my visit to Pakistan is to make an effort to eliminate the distrust among us. I think, if we succeed, something would have been achieved,” he added. (ANI)

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Pak plays old game; boosts troops on Indian border to mask failure of Taliban campaign

March 26, 2010 By Leave a Comment

London, Mar.26 (ANI): Pakistan has deployed more troops on the eastern border with India, saying the heightened tension with the neighbouring country has affected its efforts against the Taliban and other extremist organisations on the western border.

Confirming the report about reinforcement of troops on the Indian border, Pakistan’s High Commissioner to Britain, Wajid Shamsul Hasan, said that India had increased pressure on the border by building several new military cantonments close to the sensitive frontier, and Islamabad can not remain subservient to the move.

“The government has had to send some troops down there because we don”t want to leave ourselves exposed. This is taking away from our defence capabilities on the Afghan border. We really wish the international community would intervene, but nobody has said anything to the Indians,” The Financial Times quoted Hasan, as saying.

Experts and diplomats, however, have described the troops reinforcement as more of a political and diplomatic move rather than a strategic one.

“Every time Pakistan has to defend itself on criticism for gaps in its campaign, they bring up India. The campaigns in Waziristan cannot be expanded because of India, for example, is one issue,” the newspaper quoted a western diplomat, who is based in Islamabad, as saying.

Ashley Tellis, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said that the recent arrests of top Taliban leaders in Pakistan, including the Afghan Taliban’s second in-command Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, was primarily motivated by wanting to dent the negotiations between Kabul and the international community and the Taliban.

“Pakistan is motivated by the conviction that India, not the Afghan Taliban, is the main enemy to be neutralised in the Afghan endgame,” Tellis said.

Former Pakistan Foreign Minister Khurshid Kasuri also admitted that despite calls from the international community to reduce tension, Islamabad would continue to prioritise its eastern border to protect itself against a rival with which it had fought “three major wars and two minor ones”.

“We have enough problems of our own on our eastern border. We are concerned about India. Resolve the problems with India and then our security orientation could change,” Kasuri said. (ANI)

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Pak must weed out its ‘strategic asset’ extremist groups for survival: Editorial

March 13, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Islamabad, Mar.13 (ANI): Friday’s serial bomb blasts in Lahore was the second terrorist strike in the city within a week which clearly suggests that claims regarding inflicting a body blow to extremists organisations breeding on the country’s soil were premature.

Soon after militants struck in Lahore, the city’s top police official, in a knee-jerk reaction, blamed India for the bomb blasts , which were neither supported by any evidence nor had an iota of truth in them.

It is time Pakistan stops blaming others for the mess created by its own people, an editorial in one the country’s leading English dailies said.

“The enemy is here and has struck again and again, and our only hope of survival lies in driving the monster out before it is too late to do so,” The News editorial said.

It said that until Pakistan acts tough against militants thriving in terror safe havens situated inside the country’s boundaries, there is no possibility of peace returning to the nation and people would continue to suffer the way they are at present.

“Somehow we have to stop this horror. The stains of blood that have coloured countless streets must fade away forever. Until this happens we, as a nation, will know no peace,” editorial said.

It also pointed out that it is imperative for Pakistan to act against extremist groups such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), which it considers as its ‘strategic assests’.

“Pakistan may not have been willing to take out its ‘strategic assets’, but circumstances are increasingly compelling it to concede that if it does not, then these ‘assets’ will definitely take out the state and society of Pakistan,” the editorial concluded. (ANI)

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Govt. wants Pakistan to dismantle terror outfits from its soil

August 25, 2009 By Leave a Comment

New Delhi, Aug 24(ANI): Union External Affairs Minister S M Krishna on Monday expressed India’s concern over terrorism and said that it was high time Pakistan dismantled terror from its soil.

“India is willing to cooperate with Pakistan, including addressing each other’s security concerns. But, the biggest impediment is and continues to be that Pakistan side is being used by terrorists who have attacked India repeatedly and those terrorist infrastructure are not being dismantled,” Krishna said while speaking to media persons in the national capital.

“I think that is the cause of concern for us and we are still hoping that Pakistan would realise that is about time they should react favourably to India,” he added.

Earlier on Friday, Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao had given the sixth dossier to Pakistan’s High Commissioner Shahid Malik regarding last year’s Mumbai terror attack, which claimed at least 166 lives.

India has insisted that Pakistan has enough evidence to successfully prosecute leaders of the Lashkar-e-Taiba militant group, including Hafiz Saeed, who was detained in the wake of the Mumbai attacks after a UN Security Council resolution put him on a list of people and organisations supporting Al-Qaeda.

Saeed was later released by the Lahore High Court on grounds of insufficient evidence. (ANI)

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UN: Displacement situation in Pakistan worst since 1947

May 26, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Geneva – A United Nations official in Pakistan said Tuesday the ongoing military campaign in the north-west of the country has created the worst displacement problem since the country’s independence.

“The last time Pakistan faced such a displacement was during independence, in 1947,” said Khalif Bile Mohamed, the World Health Organization representative in the Asian country.

He was talking to journalists in Geneva via teleconference.

UN estimates say about 2.9 million people are displaced in the country, with about 550,000 having fled their homes last year and the rest since May 2. (dpa)

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Islamabad will give up nukes, if India does too, says Pakistani diplomat

May 23, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Washington, May 23 (IANS) Stating that Pakistan’s nuclear weapon is a “deterrent” against India, the country’s top diplomat to the US Saturday expressed willingness to enter into an agreement with New Delhi to phase out all nuclear arms possessed by the two countries.

Appearing on US television to make a public appeal to donate aid for the displaced people in the Swat valley, Pakistan’s ambassador to the US Hussein Haqqani insisted that the nuclear weapons of his country are safe and there should be no concern about their security.

“Everybody in the US government who knows anything about nuclear weapons knows that Pakistan has a very secure nuclear programme. It’s a very limited nuclear programme to maintain deterrence vis-a-vis our neighbour,” Geo TV quoted Haqqani as saying.

“At the same time, Pakistan is willing to engage with our neighbour for a comprehensive settlement in which the nuclear weapons can be phased out by both countries,” he said.

“Pakistan’s nuclear weapons are safe and Islamabad is not going to expand nuclear weapons capability to a point when it becomes a threat to any country in the world, including our neighbours,” he said, urging the US media not to divert attention from the real issue (minimum deterrence) by raising the question of safety of nuclear weapons of Pakistan.

Haqqani said the US should not be concerned about Pakistan’s nuclear weapons as this is not a threat to the US.

“I don’t think Pakistan’s nuclear weapons are a threat to the US. I think the threat to the US right now comes from terrorists that might be in Afghanistan or in parts of Pakistan. And Pakistan is doing a great job fighting those terrorists right now,” he said.

The Pakistani ambassador said his country is unlikely to give specific details of its nuclear weapons to the US, despite the fact that it has assured top US leaders that its atomic weapons are secure and there is no need to be concerned about it.

“I don’t think any country knows or tells the location of all its nuclear weapons to any (other) country in the world,” he said.

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Pak off the hook by US as far as terror goes

May 22, 2009 By Leave a Comment

New Delhi: Pakistan is off the hook on terrorism. The US Congress is no longer linking a $1.5 billion dollar aid package to Islamabad preventing terror strikes against India.

The US also dropped a condition requiring President Obama to certify every year that Pakistan was cooperating on terrorism.

And that’s not all. There are other clouds on the Indo-US horizon. Washington would like India to thin out its forces on the Line of Control to reassure Pakistan. On Monday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hinted that Washington would try and get Delhi and Islamabad to resume talking

“We hope there can be a resumption of discussions between the two countries that will perhaps give a little more confidence to each,” she stated.

India says talking to Pakistan is not the issue as there have already been five rounds of the composite dialogue, but terrorism is an issue and dialogue cannot go on when terror strikes are being planned and executed.

Former foreign secretary, Shashank says, “For us it is important to somehow engage America so that India’s points are taken fully on board in reference to South Asia.”

For now India has refrained from commenting on the action of the US Congress, preferring to look at the big picture where for the first time Pakistan is taking on the Taliban, however, halfheartedly it maybe.

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Pakistan presents ‘proof’ of Indian hand in terror acts

May 3, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Islamabad, April 24 (IANS) Interior Minister Rehman Malik has, during an in-camera session of the Senate, the upper house of parliament, presented what he termed evidence of the involvement of India, Afghanistan and Russia in terrorist activities in Pakistan, a media report Friday said.

‘It is the first time Pakistan has blamed these countries and cited evidence which, it is believed, will be shared with the international community, particularly the United States, which has expressed concern over growing militancy in the country,’ Dawn said.

During the Senate briefing Thursday, Malik claimed that all major incidents of terrorism and suicide attacks were linked to India and Afghanistan, saying terrorists were being trained in those countries and in North Waziristan.

After the briefing, some senators told Dawn that Malik had shown video clips and documentary evidence about the involvement of India and Afghanistan in incidents of terrorism in Pakistan.

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No Kargil without Musharraf: Gohar Ayub Khan

April 20, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Islamabad, April 18 (IANS) Had Gen. Pervez Musharraf not been appointed Pakistan’s army chief, the 1999 Kargil conflict wouldn’t have happened, former foreign minister Gohar Ayub Khan says in a new book.

‘There is no doubt that had there been some other army chief appointed, there would have been no Kargil and Nawaz Sharif would have continued to be the PM,’ Khan writes in ‘Testing Times as Foreign Minister’.

He also provides details of the manner in which Musharraf was appointed after General Jehangir Karamat abruptly resigned.

‘JK (Jehangir Karamat) was asked to go after making a suggestion for the establishment of a national security council. The army officers corps did not like the manner in which JK resigned. They were not going to tolerate a similar sacking in the future.

‘Now started the process to select a new army chief. Individuals close to the prime minister (Nawaz Sharif) convinced him that the precedent of appointing the senior-most as the army chief as was done for JK need not be followed but a Muhajir be selected.

‘This, they thought, would bring in an army chief who was not from the provinces from which the bulk of the army was recruited. Hence, he, in their view, would not be able to stage a coup at any future day because in their thinking he would not be supported for being a Muhajir.

‘These individuals did not know how the Army works,’ Khan writes and the net result was that Musharraf toppled Sharif in a bloodless coup Oct 12, 1999.

It was the second time Pakistan’s political establishment had got it wrong.

Earlier, then prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had appointed Gen. Ziaul Haq the army chief on the ground he was a Muhajir but found himself at the receiving end when he was toppled in a military coup July 5, 1977.

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Kandahar hijack exposed former PM Vajpayee says Rahul Gandhi

April 20, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Sangli (Maharashtra), Apr 20 (ANI): Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi alleged that former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee did not trust his deputy L.K Advani during the 1999 Kandhar hijack episode.

“How did the Home Minister did not come to know or what kind of a Home Minister was he? And if he doesn’t know about it, then it only means that the Prime Minister Vajpayee did not trust the Home Minister. It can also mean that they were weak and had to bow down in front of the terrorists,” Rahul said, in an obvious reference to Advani’s statements that the incumbent Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was a “weak” candidate for the top post.

Speaking at an election rally here on Sunday, he said there was a rift in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government during the 1999 Kandahar hijack episode.

Five armed men hijacked the Airbus A-300 carrying 189 passengers and crew between Kathmandu and New Delhi on Christmas Eve in 1999.

The plane touched down in western India, Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates before landing in Kandahar in Afghanistan.

The hijackers killed one passenger early in the week-long stand-off, but the remaining passengers and crew walked free after India released three Kashmir separatist militants from jail.

India said the hijackers, who were never caught, were all Pakistani and accused Pakistan’s Government of complicity in the hijacking, charges it denied.

Juxtaposing the Kandahar incident to last year’s Mumbai attack, he said the steps taken by Dr. Singh forced Islamabad acknowledge that the attack Mumbai was launched and partly planned from Pakistan,

“The Mumbai attacks made Prime Minister Manmohan Singh exert pressure on Pakistan. For the first time, Pakistan accepted that the terrorists had come from their soil,” Gandhi said. (ANI)

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Congress stronger than BJP in tackling militancy: Mukherjee

April 16, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Agartala, Apr.16 (ANI): Senior Congress leader and External Affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee on Thursday refuted the allegation of the BJP that the Congress was “soft” towards Pakistan and failed to contain terrorism in the country rather he claimed that his party is more strongly dealing with the militancy issue and particularly the Pakistan sponsored cross border terrorism than the BJP.

Talking to mediapersons here Mukherjee said that under the diplomatic pressure from India, “In the history of 62 years, for the first time Pakistan has admitted and no less a person then Home Secretary, they (Pakistan) are not calling Home Minister his adviser or something like that but his actual rank is of a cabinet minister of Home Interior, he has admitted, yes, the terrorist who attacked Mumbai they are from Pakistan. His admission we (India) got. International opinion has been created, diplomacy has won.”

Apparently responding to Opposition leader Lal Krishan Advani’s repeated charge that Congress is weakly dealing on the militancy issue, Mukherjee said: “Surely the cross border terrorism is the most complex problem and no body denies that but question is how could you define which action is appropriate. When Mr. Advani was Home Minister and Deputy Prime Minister of India our Parliament House was attacked, Red Fort in Delhi was attacked, Jammu Kashmir assembly was attacked, Raghunath temple was attacked and after attack and assault of Parliament which the citadel of the power, which is the symbol sovereignty, the then Prime Minister Vajpayeejee told that this time there will be aar-paar lorai (war), Mr. L K Advani as Home Minister said we will have hot persuade and what was the impact.”

“After attack on Parliament diplomatic relation was not snapped but ambassadors were with-drawned, it was downgraded, no dialogue, no talk, massive mobilization on the border, everybody was having betting blade war is imminent. Thousand and thousand acres of land were taken away from farmers of Jammu and Kashmir and land mines were laid. After ten months there was not even a whimper, not a question of bang” Mukherjee said.

He added, “In January 2004 Prime Minister Vajpayee visited Pakistan in connection with the SAARC summit he got an assurance from the then President Musharraf that land of Pakistan will not be allowed to be use by the extremist and all these things came to an end. Million and million of rupees were used for the mobilization and when mines are buried in a land they do not remain in the same place and after few months when one de-mine machine do not indicate there is any mine because sometime rats take away the mines to some distance away, high velocity wind on the hill top takes away the mine. Exactly that happened and what were the consequences farmers were dying in Jammu and Kashmir because of mine explosion and almost hundred of innocent farmers lost their life.”

Mukherjee said that in September 2008 Congress led UPA put diplomatic pressure on Pakistan had demanded fulfillment of three commitments made by them. Firstly Pakistan land be not allowed by the terrorist, returning of fugitive under Indian laws including who (Maulana Masood Azhar) was exchanged after the highjacking of India flight to Kandhar and dismantling of the infrastructure being used by the terrorist in the land under Pakistan control.

He said the UPA government would continue its efforts to isolate Pakistan in the international arena and the international community had been successfully convinced by India that the Mumbai attacks had originated from Pakistan which that nation had to but ultimately admit. By Pinaki Das (ANI)

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Zardari admits killed Mumbai attackers may have been born in Pakistan

April 8, 2009 By Leave a Comment

London, Apr.8 (ANI): For the first time Pakistan has admitted that nine terrorists who were killed in the commando operation during the November 26-29 siege in Mumbai last year may have been born in Pakistan.

In an interview to The Independent, Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari said that Islamabad is fully co-operating with New Delhi in the 26/11 investigations, which is still on.

When enquired about the nine militants whose bodies still lie in a morgue in Mumbai as Pakistan refused to accept them as its citizens, Zardari said: “Our investigation is continuing. Some of these terrorists may in fact have been born in Pakistan. But we believe that this operation was international, with significant support from within India itself.”

Commenting on the Swat peace deal, he said the deal was aimed to disengage public demand for swifter justice from support for the Taliban.

“I think it would be premature to call it a bad deal. It’s an evolving situation,” Zardari added. (ANI)

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Pakistan a thriving sanctuary for Afghan, al-Qaida militants’

April 7, 2009 By Leave a Comment

WASHINGTON: Noting that Pakistan “is a thriving sanctuary” for both Afghan and al-Qaida militants operating in Afghanistan, a leading US think
tank says Washington needs to get Pakistan on board with its new Af-Pak strategy, though progress is nowhere near assured.

To give its strategy of negotiating with Afghan Taliban even a remote chance of success, “involvement in Pakistan is both a headache and a necessity for the United States,” Stratfor, a global intelligence company, said in an analysis as two senior officials headed to the region.

This is so as Pakistan “is a thriving sanctuary for both Afghan and al-Qaida militants operating in Afghanistan,” the think tank noted. “At the same time, Pakistan contains the primary supply lines for US and NATO troops fighting those militants in Afghanistan.”

US special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen arrive in New Delhi on Tuesday for high-level talks on US Af-Pak strategy after visiting Islamabad and Kabul.

Pakistani Taliban and al-Qaida forces are now focusing much of their attention on attacking NATO supply convoys inside Pakistan, while at the same time the US is trying to beef up its military presence in Afghanistan by another 21,000 troops.

Unless something changes in Pakistan, the US plan for Afghanistan will be riddled with strategic flaws, the think tank said.

The Pakistani government is aware of the dangers posed to the country by the jihadist insurgency, particularly as attacks spread beyond the Pashtun borderlands and reach deeper into the Pakistani heartland of Punjab province, Stratfor said.

“Nonetheless, the Pakistanis do not appear to be any closer to seeing eye-to-eye with the Americans on how to manage the jihadist problem,” it said noting the US “strongly disapproves of Pakistani military and political leaders’ decision to strike deals with the Pakistani Taliban that aim to redirect the group’s focus from Pakistan back to Afghanistan.”

But the Pakistani intelligence apparatus has a history with these militants, and is not convinced that the United States, despite its promised commitment to Pakistani and Afghan development, will keep its troops in South Asia for the long haul, Stratfor said.

At the end of the day, Islamabad wants to keep its options open. That means not alienating these jihadist groups, as Islamabad fears US drone attacks in the tribal regions might do.

Thus, as the United States tries to convince allies and adversaries alike that negotiating with pragmatic Afghan Taliban is the key to winning the war, the Pakistanis will maintain that their own method of negotiating with the Pakistani Taliban and their jihadist allies is the only way to hold the Pakistani state together.

This is a major gap that Holbrooke and Mullen will attempt to bridge during their visit to Pakistan, though progress is nowhere near assured, Stratfor said.

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Pakistan a thriving sanctuary for Afghan, Al Qaeda militants: Stratfor

April 7, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Washington, April 7 (IANS) Noting that Pakistan ‘is a thriving sanctuary’ for both Afghan and Al Qaeda militants operating in Afghanistan, a leading US think tank says Washington needs to get Pakistan on board with its new Af-Pak strategy, though progress is nowhere near assured.

To give its strategy of negotiating with Afghan Taliban even a remote chance of success, ‘involvement in Pakistan is both a headache and a necessity for the United States,’ Stratfor, a global intelligence company, said in an analysis as two senior officials headed to the region.

This is so as Pakistan ‘is a thriving sanctuary for both Afghan and al Qaeda militants operating in Afghanistan,’ the think tank noted. ‘At the same time, Pakistan contains the primary supply lines for US and NATO troops fighting those militants in Afghanistan.’

US special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen arrive in New Delhi Tuesday for high-level talks on US Af-Pak strategy after visiting Islamabad and Kabul.

Pakistani Taliban and Al Qaeda forces are now focusing much of their attention on attacking NATO supply convoys inside Pakistan, while at the same time the US is trying to beef up its military presence in Afghanistan by another 21,000 troops.

Unless something changes in Pakistan, the US plan for Afghanistan will be riddled with strategic flaws, the think tank said.

The Pakistani government is aware of the dangers posed to the country by the jihadist insurgency, particularly as attacks spread beyond the Pashtun borderlands and reach deeper into the Pakistani heartland of Punjab province, Stratfor said.

‘Nonetheless, the Pakistanis do not appear to be any closer to seeing eye-to-eye with the Americans on how to manage the jihadist problem,’ it said noting the US ‘strongly disapproves of Pakistani military and political leaders’ decision to strike deals with the Pakistani Taliban that aim to redirect the group’s focus from Pakistan back to Afghanistan.’

But the Pakistani intelligence apparatus has a history with these militants, and is not convinced that the United States, despite its promised commitment to Pakistani and Afghan development, will keep its troops in South Asia for the long haul, Stratfor said.

At the end of the day, Islamabad wants to keep its options open. That means not alienating these jihadist groups, as Islamabad fears US drone attacks in the tribal regions might do.

Thus, as the United States tries to convince allies and adversaries alike that negotiating with pragmatic Afghan Taliban is the key to winning the war, the Pakistanis will maintain that their own method of negotiating with the Pakistani Taliban and their jihadist allies is the only way to hold the Pakistani state together.

This is a major gap that Holbrooke and Mullen will attempt to bridge during their visit to Pakistan, though progress is nowhere near assured, Stratfor said.

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Manmohan Singh asks Pakistan to take concrete steps to fight terrorism

March 24, 2009 By Leave a Comment

New Delhi, Mar 24 (ANI): Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Tuesday urged Pakistan to take concrete steps to fight terrorism and bring perpetrators of the Mumbai terror attacks to justice.

“We expect Pakistan to bring all the culprits to justice. We have made important diplomatic efforts, which have succeeded so far. For the first time, Pakistan has admitted that its own citizens have been involved in these horrible acts. We expect Islamabad to take the next sequential steps and ensure that justice is done and the culprits are punished. I can’t say that I am fully satisfied with the way the process is moving, but we still believe that diplomacy should be given a chance. No purpose is served by promoting war hysteria,” Singh told reporters here.

Earlier in March, India replied to the 30 questions raised by Pakistan over last November’s Mumbai attacks. Pakistan raised the questions in response to a dossier of evidence provided by India. ndia said the dossier pointed to Pakistan-based militants being behind the attacks that killed 166 people in Mumbai. (ANI)

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Omar Abdullah asks Pakistan to take a strict action against terror outfits

March 5, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Srinagar, Mar 4 (ANI): Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, on Wednesday said Pakistan needs to take a stringent action against perpetrators of the recent attack on touring Sri Lankan team, which visited that nation after Indian team opted not to visit Pakistan following Mumbai terror attacks.

Abdullah said that that had it been the Indian cricket team instead of Sri Lankan team, India and Pakistan could have felt drawn to a war-like situation.

“It was the Sri Lankan team. We were to play these matches. Had our team been there and had our team been targeted, God forbid any such situation, but in such a scenario, we would have been in a war like situation today,” said Abdullah visiting to the famous tulip gardens of Srinagar.

Omar also said that it was high time Pakistan took stock of the situation, and make a sincere effort to root out the problem.

“I have not seen anyone blaming India directly for the attacks. They are saying that there is a foreign hand involved. No one has said that India is involved. The fact is that Pakistan itself is a victim of the forces that are operating there. Now, the time has come that Pakistan understand the issue that has become a problem for everybody. It should understand the problem is grave enough for itself also and it should make a sincere effort to root out these forces,” said Abdullah.

The subcontinent should try to fight the menace of terrorism so that it sheds the image of instability that it has earned, Omar added.

“We want to fight these forces along with Pakistan so that Pakistan emerges as a stable, secure and safe country and that the bad effect that these attacks have had on the subcontinent are reduced,” he said.

On March 3, a dozen gunmen in Pakistan’s Lahore, attacked Sri Lanka’s cricket team using AK-47′s, rifles, grenades and rockets, wounding six players, a British coach and killing at least eight Pakistani security personnel in Lahore.

The attackers fired AK-47s and rockets and hurled grenades at Sri Lanka’s team bus when it was being driven to Lahore’s Gaddafi stadium for the third day of a match against Pakistan but they then escaped after getting into exchange of fire with police that lasted 30 minutes. (ANI)

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Mumbai attacks: US says Pak response on Indian dossier a ‘political decision’

February 13, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Islamabad, Feb.13 (ANI): Pakistan may have acknowledged for the first time on Thursday that parts of the Mumbai terrorist attacks were planned on its soil, but officials in Washington are seeing the development as a political salvo aimed at easing tensions with India.

The New York Times quoted an official of the US State Department as saying that the acknowledgement by Pakistan was a “political decision” to ease tensions with India.

While the paper says that Islamabad’s admission amounted to a significant about-face, a Pentagon spokesman, who did not want to be named, said the Pakistani decision may have been an effort by the civilian government to “poke a stick” at the Pakistani military and intelligence service, which helped set up Lashkar in the 1980s as a proxy force to challenge India’s control of Kashmir, the disputed border region.

In Washington, the State Department spokesman, Robert A. Wood, said, “I think it shows that Pakistan is serious about doing what it can to deal with the people that may have perpetrated these attacks.”

Sajjan M. Gohel, director for international security of the Asia Pacific Foundation in London, who has closely followed the Mumbai investigations, said there was no denying that Pakistan had been under pressure from the United States.

“This is unprecedented. It is the first time Pakistan has acknowledged an attack on India has originated on its soil,” the NYT quoted him, as saying.

According to the paper, both India and the United States have put strong pressure on Pakistan for some concession regarding the Mumbai attacks, which American officials feared were distracting Pakistan from the task of battling militants from the Taliban and Al Qaeda who have bases inside Pakistani territory.

Indian officials have previously blamed Lashkar for an attack in 2000 on the Red Fort in New Delhi, as well as involvement in an attack on the Indian Parliament in 2001. Pakistan never acknowledged any Lashkar role in those attacks. The group is officially banned, though it has continued to operate openly.

The Pakistan Government’s Interior Adviser Rehman Malik’s statements appear to vindicate many of India’s accusations of Pakistani involvement. (ANI)

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