Author:
Publication: www.indya.com
Date: February 28, 2001
Pakistan is of the view that a solution
to the Kashmir issue lay in India ''conceding'' more territory beyond
the Line of Control (LoC) and not by converting the LoC into an international
border.
This opinion was conveyed by the
ruling establishment in Pakistan to a US Congressional delegation
which visited that country recently.
"We have to tell the people that
there has been some gain after a 50 year struggle," Pakistan's Interior
Minister Gen. Moinuddin Haider, justifying his country's stand,
said, Congressional sources told UNI Wednesday.
Congressmen David Bonior, Jim Mcdermott
and Joseph Pitts called on Pakistan's Chief Executive Gen. Musharraf
last week.
Their meeting lasted for more than
an hour.
Gen. Musharraf told the visitors
his country, a long-time ally of the US, felt betrayed because of
the Pressler Amendment banning arms sale to Islamabad during the
1990s and also because of the visit of President Bill Clinton
to the subcontinent when he spent five days in India but only a few
hours in Pakistan.
Gen. Musharraf also told the delegation
that Pakistan did not give training to militants nor did it have
a hand in cross-border terrorism in the Kashmir valley, the sources
said.
He also said it was difficult to
enforce immigration controls on the Pakistan-Afghan border where
tribal people with similarities live on both sides of the border.
Asked by McDermott to explain what
caused the Kargil conflict, Foreign Minister Abdul Sattar told the
delegation at their 20-minute meeting that the intrusion was his
country's retaliation to Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's ''anti-Pakistan''
rhetoric after his Lahore visit.
Sattar also expressed concern over
the delay in the issuance of passports to Hurriyat leaders by India.
The delegation visited refugee camps
at Peshwar and Muzzafarabad.
