Author: PTI
Publication: Rediff on Net
Date: June 23, 2004
URL: http://us.rediff.com/news/2004/jun/23bill.htm
Former US president Bill Clinton
had firmly rejected Pakistan's pleas to mediate on the Kashmir issue at
the height of the Kargil crisis because India objected to third party intervention.
The then Pakistani prime minister,
Nawaz Sharief, Clinton recalls, called him and asked if he could come to
Washington on July 4, the American independence day, to discuss the "dangerous
standoff" with India that had begun several weeks earlier when "Pakistani
forces under the command of General Pervez Musharraf crossed the Line of
Control".
"I told Sharief that he was always
welcome to Washington but if he wanted me to spend American independence
day with him, he had to come to the United States knowing two things, first
he had to agree to withdraw his troops back across the Line of Control,
and second, I would not agree to intervene in the Kashmir dispute, especially
under circumstances that appeared to reward Pakistan's wrongful incursion,"
Clinton says in his just released memoirs, My Life.
Clinton says Sharief's moves were
perplexing because earlier in February that year, then prime minister Atal
Bihari Vajpayee had travelled to Lahore to promote bilateral talks aimed
at resolving the Kashmir issue and other differences.
"By crossing the Line of Control,
Pakistan had wrecked the talks. I didn't know whether Sharief had authorised
the invasion to create a crisis he hoped would get America involved or
had simply allowed it in order to avoid a confrontation with Pakistan's
powerful military," Clinton writes.
"Regardless, he had gotten himself
into a bind with no easy way out," he adds.
Sharief, Clinton says, was concerned
that the situation Pakistan had created was getting out of control and
he hoped to use "my good offices" not only to resolve the crisis but also
to help mediate with Indians on the question of Kashmir itself.
"Even before the crisis, Sharief
had asked me to help in Kashmir, saying it was worthy of my attention as
the Middle East and Northern Ireland. I had explained to him then that
the United States was involved in those peace processes because both sides
wanted us. In this case, India had strongly refused the involvement of
any outside party," Clinton says.
The former president writes that
during the talks on July 4 in Washington, Sharief once again urged him
to intervene in Kashmir and once again Clinton explained to Sharief that
without India's consent, it would be "counterproductive".
But, Clinton says, he told the PM
that he would urge Vajpayee to resume the bilateral dialogue if the Pakistani
troops withdrew.
"He agreed, and we released a joint
statement saying that steps would be taken to restore the Line of Control
and that I would support and encourage the resumption and intensification
of bilateral talks once the violence has stopped." Clinton writes.
After the meeting, Clinton says,
he thought perhaps Sharief had come in order to use pressure from the US
to provide himself cover for ordering military to defuse the conflict.
"I knew he was on a shaky ground
at home and I hoped that he would survive because I needed his cooperation
in the fight against terrorism," the former president writes.
