Indian army officers at Siachen. Pakistan and India began talks on a military stand-off over a Kashmir glacier, with Islamabad expected to push for a troop withdrawal to positions both sides held more than three decades ago.(AFP/HO)
Posted on 05/25/2005 11:16:48 PM PDT by Righty_McRight
ISLAMABAD (AFP) - Pakistan and India began talks on a military stand-off over a Kashmir glacier, with Islamabad expected to push for a troop withdrawal to positions both sides held more than three decades ago.
The neighbours' defence secretaries were to discuss the 21,000-foot (6,363-metre) Siachen glacier, dubbed the world's highest battlefield, during a two-day meeting in the Pakistani capital as part of an ongoing peace process.
The dispute over Siachen, which towers above India, Pakistan and China, has left more soldiers dead from extreme cold than from bullets.
Analysts say the ice field lost its strategic value when India and Pakistan became nuclear powers in 1998.
When Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf met Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh last month, the two sides pledged to find a solution to the festering row, which is bound up in the long-running dispute over Kashmir.
Pakistan wants to see implemented what it says was an understanding reached in 1989, under which soldiers from both sides should pull back to where they were at the time of the signing of a historic 1972 agreement.
Musharraf said in an interview published this week that India "backtracked" on the deal when both countries' defence secretaries met in New Delhi in 1992.
"Our secretary of defence went from here to India for a signing ceremony," Musharraf told Pakistan's Daily Times newspaper on Tuesday. "They (the Indians) backtracked. I think it is a habit with them to backtrack at the last moment."
He told the newspaper he believed there would be no problem ending the stand-off when Pakistan's defence secretary, Tariq Waseem Ghazi, and India's Aji Vikram Singh meet Thursday.
However, according to officials here, India, which occupied most of the ice field in 1984, wants to maintain its troops' position.
"This will not be acceptable to Pakistan in any case," a senior foreign ministry official told AFP.
India and Pakistan have rowed over Siachen since 1948 and the first of their three wars, when a ceasefire line was drawn in Kashmir up until a reference point known as NJ 9842.
However, the inhospitable area beyond the point, which stretches to the Chinese border, where temperatures plunge below minus 40 degrees Celsius (minus 40 Fahrenheit) in winter, was left undelineated. Both sides now say it is theirs.
Six rounds of talks between India and Pakistan since 1984 have failed to resolve the row, which erupted into a bloody clash in 1987 when the two armies fought on the icy wasteland to establish military supremacy.
The rival armies remain deployed eyeball to eyeball, with India holding the vantage points on the glacier. Hostilities have decreased since both sides began a universal ceasefire in Kashmir in November 2003.
India and Pakistan continue to seek a solution to their dispute over the Himalayan state of Kashmir, which both lay claim to in full. Kashmir has sparked two of the rivals' three major wars since independence in 1947.
"They (the Indians) backtracked. I think it is a habit with them to backtrack at the last moment."
Just like its a habit of the terrorist nation to break promises and agreements again again.. Gee I wonder why the Indians dont trust Pakis!
Having lived near glaciers for 30 years I can tell you this is the dumbest piece of realestate to fight over in the world.
The smartest thing would be for india pull their troops off and let their airforce take care of makeing it any more un-livable than it already is.
The dude in the dark suit & with the long,grey hair is the Indian President,dr APJ Abdul Kalam,paying a visit to Indian forces in the region.
Airpower has more limitations than uses at that altitude.Delivery of PGMs have been found to be difficult & most helicopters have had a rough time up there.Besides it's proximity to China makes the use of offensive airpower inadvisable as the last thing you want is Pakistan to be aided by it's best friend.
A New York Times article about 2 years ago contained someones description of the Siachen Glacier situation
as " TWO BALD GUYS FIGHTING OVER A COMB."
Siachen is a place of strategic importance for India especially because it over looks the only road which connects some parts of Kashmir to India. If Pakistan take it they have huge strategic advantage
However it is a hell hole and infact troops have to be rotated out of Siachen with two - three weeks because of the damage to the soldiers health. If a soldier stays there long enough he will not be fit again to return to active duty.
More soldiers in both sides have been killed due to weather than due to enemy fire. Also from what I remember the air is too thin to have the airforce deal with it. Choppers cannot reach the spot where Indians are entrenched, you have a drop off point and then from there it is good ole legs to do it.
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