Powell seeks to allay India's Kashmir concerns
Powell seeks to allay India's Kashmir concerns
Reuters
New Delhi
U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell tried on Wednesday to smooth
ruffled feathers over remarks he made on disputed Kashmir which
irked India, already anxious about Washington's warming ties with
Pakistan.
Powell, holding talks in New Delhi after a visit to Islamabad,
said the United States and India were two great democracies and
natural allies.
He played down a remark made in Islamabad that disputed
Kashmir was central to the relationship between India and
Pakistan, saying it was more important to look at his other
comments calling for dialog between the nuclear rivals.
"I didn't say 'a central'," he said. "If you look at it
carefully I said central in the sense that it is an important
issue, and to suggest that it isn't wouldn't be accurate," he
told a news conference.
New Delhi denies the dispute over Kashmir, which both
countries claim, is central to its relationship with Islamabad.
Powell, declaring that the United States and India stand
"shoulder to shoulder against terrorism," strongly condemned on
Wednesday terrorist attacks by Islamic radicals in Indian-held
Kashmir.
Powell and India's Home Affairs Minister Lal Krishna Advani
signed a pact Wednesday to fight international crime and
terrorism.
The treaty will strengthen an extradition agreement signed by
the two countries in 1999 and regularize channels for law
enforcement cooperation between the two countries. It also allows
for the exchange of evidence for use in criminal trials.
Powell said Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee has
accepted an invitation to visit Washington on Nov. 9.
India was one of the first countries to condemn the Sept. 11
terrorist attacks in the United States and to offer generous
cooperation in the anti-terrorism struggle.
"The United States and India stand united against terrorism
and that includes terrorism directed against India as well,"
Powell said.
Tensions between India and Pakistan rose dramatically after an
Oct. 1 incident in which a car bomb killed about 40 people in the
Indian sector of Kashmir.
The political fallout from the incident was one of the reasons
Powell decided to visit the two South Asian rivals. He wants both
to focus their energies on the anti-terrorism struggle.
The Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Tayyaba has
threatened to launch new suicide attacks in India in retaliation
for the strikes against Pakistani posts, the Press Trust of India
reported Wednesday.