NEW DELHI, Aug 2: French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin, starting a South Asian peace tour in New Delhi on Friday, has said that waiting for a complete halt in terrorist activity to resume talks between India and Pakistan was fraught with risks, including war.

This, when both should be looking for a “genuine solution” to Kashmir, he said.

De Villepin met Indian Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishan Advani at the start of his overnight visit which will take him to Islamabad on Saturday. He will have met senior officials led by Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee before his meeting with President Pervez Musharraf in Islamabad.

“To await the total cessation of all terrorist activities before a dialogue can be restored is to resign oneself to the maintenance of a high level of tension, keep the prospect of armed conflict open and, ultimately, run the risk of intensified violence,” the visitor said in an interview to the Times of India a day before his arrival.

In the remarks to the newspaper, de Villepin cautioned: “In situations of conflict, movement is imperative.”

He said he was confident of India’s ability to “continue progress along the path of wisdom which it has chosen since the beginning of the period of tension”.

Recalling examples from Europe, the French minister said: “Our own history allows us to understand the extremely sensitive nature of territorial disputes in which attachment to a land and a language, the idea of nationhood and a certain conception of political organization are at stake. But old enemies in the end must find a way to reconciliation. I am confident of your ability to face this challenge.”

France was easier on India than most western nations after the nuclear tests of May 1998.

The Indo-French strategic dialogue was initiated in the wake of the May 1998 nuclear tests that drew harsh responses from much of the world. France, however, played a key role in fending off the efforts by the international community to isolate India in the post-Pokhran phase.

Paris also opposed attempts to impose sweeping international sanctions and excessive arms control demands against New Delhi.

All this was part of conscious strategy in Paris that bet on India’s emergence as a major power and the immense potential of bilateral cooperation.

At the political level, India and France agree on the need to promote “multipolarity” in world affairs.

As part of its new outreach to the United States, India has welcomed the controversial missile defence initiative of the Bush Administration. In Europe, France has led the charge against the American attempts to change the rules of the nuclear game.

India and France have also begun to explore prospects for long-term cooperation in the production of weapons and military equipment.

France has also been keen on supplying nuclear reactors to meet India’s growing energy requirements. Despite the international restrictions on nuclear cooperation with India, France has opened a dialogue with India on atomic energy issues. Paris has also been supportive of India’s hopes of joining the global club of nuclear exporters.

“Our strategic partnership with India is based on many meetings and numerous forums for dialogue,” the French embassy here quoted the French foreign affairs spokesperson as saying in a statement.

Before his departure, French Foreign Ministry press communique described Kashmir as an issue of international concern but diplomats in Paris were later laying the accent on the “bilateral nature of the visit” — a change of tack not unrelated to the furore caused by the US Secretary of State Colin Powell’s remarks on the international nature of the issue, news reports said.—J.N