July 26, 2002	Friday	Jamadi-ul-Awwal 15,1423

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JAMMU, July 25: Leading Kashmiri political leader Shabir Shah said on Thursday he was ready to participate in upcoming elections in held Kashmir if New Delhi began a dialogue with Kashmiri groups.

“I will take part in the polls to establish my representative character if the Indian government opens a dialogue for discussing the core issue of Kashmir with all separatist groups,” Shah told AFP in Jammu.

Shah is the first Kashmiri militant leader to express even a conditional readiness to participate in the polls scheduled for early October.

He said talks should include Kashmiri leaders from Azad Kashmir.

“Even the most free and fair election will not hammer out a solution to the Kashmir issue,” Shah said.

Members of Kashmir’s main political alliance, the All Party Hurriyat Conference, and various Islamic militant groups have rejected calls by New Delhi to take part in the elections, which Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has promised would be “free and fair.”

The APHC says Indian-held polls are no substitute for the right to self-determination — a goal for which it is striving.

10 wounded: At least 10 people were wounded in a grenade explosion in Srinagar while unidentified men also attacked afresh a Hindu pilgrimage route, police said on Thursday.

The 10 were wounded when Mujahideen hurled a grenade at an Indian army patrol in the Batamaloo area of Srinagar on Thursday morning, police said.

Batamaloo is the site of Srinagar’s main bus station and is constantly crowded.

Another grenade incident occurred at a telephone exchange at Ashmuqam, 75kms south of Srinagar, on Wednesday night.—AFP