Posted on 05/31/2002 1:35:52 PM PDT by lyonesse
KARACHI - With even US President George W Bush joining the chorus of voices assailing Pakistan for not appearing to be doing enough to curb cross-border terrorism into Kashmir, the military leaders in Islamabad have launched a diplomatic offensive of their own.
Senior intelligence sources say that Pakistan will try to convince nations that the Kashmiri movement is not terrorism but a pure uprising on the part of the indigenous people seeking the right to self-determination.
Under rules guiding the 1947 partition of British India that gave birth to India and Pakistan, overwhelmingly Muslim Kashmir went to Indian control because its Hindu maharajah wanted it. The United Nations has been on record since the late 1940s as saying that the Indian-administered section of Kashmir's political status should be decided by its people and there have been a series of Security Council resolutions demanding plebiscites.
India has rejected the resolutions for reasons including that no test of the people's will was required in other British India principalities divided because of their leaders' wishes, and that Pakistan has not withdrawn from the territory in Kashmir that it controls
Pakistan's position has always been that the UN resolutions should be enforced and in its latest diplomatic flurry five special envoys have been sent to the US and selected European states to push this line. The Secretary of Information Anwer Mehmood has confirmed that the former president Farooq Ahmed Khan Leghari, the ex-chairman of the senate, Wasim Sajjad, the former chief of the army staff, Jehangir Karamat, the once secretary in the ministry of foreign affairs, Najamuddin Sheikh, and the recently recalled ambassador to India, Jehangir Ashraf Qazi, have been picked to spread the word for Islamabad.
On Thursday, Bush took a tough stance on its major ally in the war on terror, demanding that President General Pervez Musharraf "live up to his word" and crack down on extremists' cross-border attacks that could lead to war with India. He also pledged to send Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to the region to try to help ease tension on the subcontinent where more than a million troops have been mobilized and where artillery exchanges occur on a daily basis across the Line of Control that divides Kashmir.
The troubles in Indian-administered Kashmir, where even Kashmiris are bitterly divided over whether they want independence from India or to join with Pakistan, date back to partition, although the latest - and most sustained - round of unrest began in 1989.
Islamic fundamentalist groups have played the lead role in the agitation against Indian rule. Many of them participated in the US-sponsored Afghan jihadi against the former Soviet Union in the 1980s. For a long time few Western countries paid any attention, viewing the issue as a domestic Indian one even though international human right groups consistently blamed the Indian army for human rights abuses. Similarly, repeated Indian complaints about what they called terrorists based in Pakistan territory causing mayhem in Kashmir fell on deaf international ears.
After September 11, though, the Indian government exploited the outspoken statements of some Kashmiri leaders who voiced moral support for the Taliban, and once again Delhi raised the issue of cross-border terrorism emanating from Pakistan. In this context, though, the support given by the Kashmiris was not necessarily for terrorism, rather it was a rejection of the US attacks on Afghanistan.
However, the Pakistani propaganda machine proved incapable of countering the Indian position and most of the West concedes that the Kashmiri movement is just another example of international terrorism. Foreign Minister Abdul Sattar proved less than persuasive, and one senior information minister's background was in marketing computer hardware, not national policy.
US State Department spokesman Richard Boucher has warned Indian and Pakistan that they could find themselves in a situation in which "irresponsible elements" could set off a conflict against the wishes of the leaders of the two countries. "The climate is very charged and a serious conflagration could ensue if events spiral out of control," he said. He added that Musharraf needed to take concrete steps to prevent Pakistani territory from being used by terrorists for attacks. Earlier, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, while in Pakistan and India, took the same view, saying that Britain stood firmly behind India in its fight against terrorism - including cross-border terrorism.
Sources say that this international response shook the Pakistani leaders, who were expecting praise and support for assisting the US and its allies in their war on terror. However, realizing that positions had already hardened, Musharraf decided to fight back and push his Kashmir agenda. "Any incursion by Indian forces across the Line of Control, even by an inch, will unleash a storm that will sweep the enemy," he said in an address to air force men.
In other words, the general is saying that unless the US and other Western countries bring India around to accepting Islamabad's call for a plebiscite in Kashmir, the consequences could be dire indeed.
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It finally has focused the attention of the world, and especially that of the US, on the Kashmir jihad, and has forced Pakistan to formally renounce it, and to get nothing in exchange.
I'm not forgetting how India was provoked with a series of spectacular attacks, but India has taken full advantage of the backlash to achieve something it might not have otherwise been able to do. Ha ha.
Papal Rome got pissed off with their intrigues..and finally put an end to their machinations of Global rule.
India is a nation that has been raped and humiliated in its expression of following Hinduism.
Many Temples which are "Origen" sites for Hindu thinking and worship..have been overtaken by Islam... converted into Mosques..having the Islamic writ "Defile" the walls of these former Hindu sanctuaries.
Islam has been cruel and violent since its inception.
They have left a legacy....and due to it...they are despised by Billions.
Their time of reaping is coming..
They fool with things they do not understand..and mock powers which can obliterate them in a wink of an eye.
Islam will go the way of the Dodo!
This planet will eventually gather its corporate spirit together..and throw this Insanity off...for good!
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