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NEW DELHI, July 8: Indian Defence Minister George Fernandes said on Monday that a proposal made recently by New Delhi for a join patrolling of the Line of Control was still workable, although it could take some time to become feasible since Pakistan and India did not trust each other.
“We are still ready for joint surveillance” of the LoC, Fernandes, who is on a three-day visit to Japan, was quoted by the Press Trust of India as telling reporters in Tokyo.
But to realize it, Fernandes said, there would first have to be “a certain level of understanding” between the two sides as well as “confidence with each other on the borders”.
“It will take some time before confidence-building measures can be brought into action...because we have our troops on our side, they have their troops on the other side. They are looking at each other not as friends, not as people having trust in each other,” he said.
Pakistan has dismissed the suggestion as “unworkable”.
Fernandes said that after President Pervez Musharraf’s promise to rein in militants along the LoC there was a decrease in infiltration.
But “we discovered that in mid-June once again terrorism got on the upswing, and what we now have are ups and downs - there isn’t any complete end to terrorism and one never knows when it crops up again.”
Fernandes said that just ahead of his departure for Japan there were “a couple of incidents” in which alleged terrorists tried to sneak into Indian territory from Pakistan, but they were “shot down on the borders”.
“So we still have this kind of situation insofar as terrorist activity launched from Pakistani soil or by those who have already been pushed into our territory goes,” he said.
Fernandes asserted that there was little risk of a nuclear war breaking out in South Asia, saying India is “very clear” in its nuclear doctrine that stems from New Delhi’s pledge never to be the first to use nuclear weapons.
AFP adds: Three leaders of the All Party Hurriyat Conference (APHC) on Monday denied reports they had formed a new alliance to contest elections for occupied Kashmir’s assembly.
Local newspapers have reported that several leaders were working in the “Third Front”, a group outside the APHC.
The reports said Shabir Shah, who has spent more than 20 years in different Indian jails, would be the “main player” in the new alliance, while the former chief commander of the leading rebel group would also be an important member.
“I have nothing to do with the Third Front,” Shah said in Srinagar.
“I don’t believe in fronts and alliances,” said Shah, who heads the anti-India Democratic Freedom Party (DFP).
Shah was one of the seven executive members of the Hurriyat until 1996, when he was expelled after he met then US ambassador to India Frank Wisner against the decision by the Hurriyat body. Shah also ruled out contesting the polls, which are due before Oct 14.
