Violence flares in Kashmir despite India's peace move
Violence flares in Kashmir despite India's peace move
NEW DELHI (Agencies): India prepared on Sunday for a month-
long truce in its offensive against separatist guerrillas in
Kashmir, undaunted by further bloodshed in the week since it
announced the cease-fire.
Frontline groups have been skeptical about the planned
suspension of the decade-long offensive for the Muslim holy month
Ramadhan, which is expected to start on Monday or Tuesday
depending on the sighting of the moon.
But while the Indian army set ground rules at the weekend for
its troops, instructing them to stop search and destroy missions
and retaliate only in self-defense, top officials met in New
Delhi to discuss possibly building on the peace gesture.
"Ground is being prepared for (peace) talks but no formal
initiative has been taken so far," Girish Saxena, governor of the
state of Jammu and Kashmir, was quoted by The Tribune newspaper
as saying after a meeting on internal security.
He told reporters the killing of 11 people in two separate
slaughters since Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's truce
announcement last Sunday was not unexpected, but the government
wanted peace.
At Gurgaon on the outskirts of the Indian capital, the
chairman of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), a
moderate separatist group, joined a U.S.-based mediator for a
round of "track two" diplomacy on Kashmir.
JKLF's Yasin Malik, describing Vajpayee as charismatic and
honest, told reporters the leader had the chance to emulate
assassinated Israeli premier Yitzhak Rabin's Middle East peace
initiative if he would involve Pakistan in the peace talks.
"We will have to take every party into confidence," he said.
The pro-Pakistan Hizbul Mujahideen group announced a two-week
unilateral cease-fire in July to consider a peace process but it
collapsed after India refused to include Islamabad in the talks.
India says it cannot talk to Pakistan unless it stops arming
and training separatists in "cross-border terrorism". Pakistan
denies Indian charges of fomenting violence in Kashmir.
Goodwill
Meanwhile, another Kashmiri separatist chief Abdul Gani Lone
has told Pakistani military ruler Gen. Pervez Musharraf that
India's cease-fire offer to militant groups should not be
rejected.
Speaking after a meeting with Musharraf here on Saturday, the
leader of the Srinagar-based All Party Hurriyat (freedom)
Conference (APHC) said Kashmiris believed the unprecedented offer
was a "goodwill gesture," The Dawn daily reported on Sunday.
"I told him (Musharraf) that Kashmiris have termed the offer
as a 'goodwill gesture' though they are of the opinion that this
will not defuse the explosive situation in Kashmir or help in the
holding of peace talks," he was quoted as saying by the daily.
Gani Lone's language contrasted with the belligerent rhetoric
of the main militant groups, who have dismissed the proposed
truce during the forthcoming Islamic holy month of Ramadhan as a
"mockery" of peace efforts.
Pakistan has also described it as a decoy in India's larger
plot to impose a military solution in Kashmir, a Himalayan state
divided between India and Pakistan and claimed by both.
Meanwhile, India's ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata
Party (BJP) said on Sunday the government should firmly counter
any violence by militants in Kashmir despite the month-long truce
which starts next week.
"There should be no slackening in preparedness to tackle any
violence," BJP party president Bangaru Laxman told a news
conference in Bangalore.
The Indian army said on Saturday it had asked troops in
Kashmir to resist provocations from guerrillas but maintain their
vigil and self-defense.
Security forces would continue patrols, but systematic hunting
of militants would be suspended, army officials said.