Violence hurts hopes for truce extension

By Narayanan Madhavan

NEW DELHI (Reuters): Spiraling violence has dimmed chances of India continuing its cease-fire in disputed Kashmir and achieving a diplomatic breakthrough with nuclear foe Pakistan, political analysts said on Tuesday.

Hopes were raised of an easing of tensions in the Himalayan region after Pakistan military ruler Pervez Musharraf and Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee held an unprecedented phone conversation about last month's devastating earthquake in western India.

The telephone call earlier this month was the first direct contact between the two leaders since Musharraf seized power in a coup in October 1999.

But a spate of bloody attacks by the most radical Pakistan- based guerrilla groups has fueled demands, including from Vajpayee's own Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), for India to review the nearly three-month-old cease-fire, which ends on Feb. 26.

Hardline groups, which want Kashmir to become independent or join Pakistan, have rejected the truce as a bid by India to win international support.

"Certainly the case for a further extension of the cease-fire ... has been considerably weakened by the continued attacks," analyst Pran Chopra, of the Center for Policy Research, said.

Last Friday, Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba militant group staged an assault on the police control room in Srinagar, Kashmir's main city, in which nine policemen and two attackers died.

Later during the weekend, 15 people including seven children were burnt to death in a militant attack on a village.

Earlier in the month, six members of the minority Sikh community were killed, triggering talk of a mass exodus of Sikhs from the valley.

India launched its unilateral cease-fire on Nov. 28 for the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadhan and has been extending it monthly.

Pakistan has responded to the cease-fire with a partial withdrawal of troops from a military control line dividing Kashmir.

"It is strange on the one hand that Pakistan is sticking to the cease-fire on the LoC (Line of Control) and international border but not allowing things to settle down in the valley," said Kuldip Nayar, former Indian High Commissioner to Britain.

"It means that it is very difficult for India to extend the cease-fire beyond Feb. 26 because a lot of internal pressures are building up," Nayar, now an upper house deputy, told Reuters.

Pakistan has long denied that it offers separatist militants anything beyond moral and political support.

Foreign affairs analyst Bhabani Sen Gupta, who returned on Monday from Islamabad as part of informal peace contacts, said Pakistan officials told him the country has no control over the violent groups.

"Their response is they are using maximum restraint on the LoC," Sen Gupta said. "There are two or three organizations in Kashmir who want to belong to Pakistan and they are carrying on their activities. The Pakistani position is that they have no control over them."

He said the Pakistanis say that if a government-to-government dialogue begins, "they (guerrillas) will lose steam. They say it will further strengthen the cease-fire."

India says Pakistan must show willingness to rein in hardline groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba for peace talks to take place. Talks between the two neighbors have been on hold since 1999 when they stood on the brink of their fourth war over Kashmir.

More than 30,000 people have been killed since 1990 in Jammu and Kashmir, mainly Hindu India's only Muslim majority state.

Sen Gupta said a planned trip by officials of the main separatist All Parties Hurriyat (freedom) Conference to Islamabad could make a key difference to the peace process.

"The Pakistani position is that there should be a dialogue now...It does not have to be a summit. They are also waiting impatiently for Hurriyat to go," he said.

In December, the Hurriyat said it would send a five-member delegation to Pakistan. But India has yet to issue passports to four members of the delegation.

Analysts also say the main hope for an extension of the cease-fire is in the desire for peace stated by many ordinary Kashmiris.

"The extension of the cease-fire is not for the sake of persuading the militants to do this or that but in recognition of widespread desire among the people of the state for doing whatever is possible to reduce the gun culture," said Chopra.

Nayar said relations between citizens of Pakistan and India could yield a way out.

"People-to-people efforts are forcing the governments to change their stance. They are not significant (enough) to influence events but they are influencing (them) in a small way."