LAHORE, Oct 28: Bar leaders on Thursday rejected what they said "the Musharraf formula" on Kashmir saying that this would negate the right of Kashmiri people for self-determination and Pakistan's old principled stand on the core issue.

Lahore High Court Bar Association president Ahmad Awais and Pakistan Bar Council members Hamid Khan and Kazim Khan said at a news conference the proposal of dividing the disputed territory into seven regions on ethnic and linguistic basis was a part of an international conspiracy which the regime was promoting to divide the people of Kashmir against their will and by mutilating the history and geography of the region which had always been a compact territorial unit.

"No ruler in the past dared to present such a proposal on the Kashmir issue which goes against the aspirations of the people and Gen Musharraf does neither have a mandate nor a representative status to make such proposals," Mr Awais said.

Hamid Khan said the governments of Pakistan and India had no right to take a decision on Kashmir like their personal fiefdom and by ignoring the right of the people of Kashmir to decide their future themselves.

The UN resolutions for a plebiscite to resolve the dispute was the only way to resolve the issue, he added.

According to the LHCBA president, the "Musharraf formula" set no timeframe for a plebiscite in Kashmir after the withdrawal of troops and "this part of the formula sounds dangerous to the extent of undermining the sovereignty and solidarity of Pakistan."

He said the absence of a timeframe meant maintaining a status quo that had already kept the entire region in a constant conflict.

He was of the view that the new formula was a negation of Pakistan ideology and the Two-Nation Theory and a compromise on the blood of Kashmiris. He warned the government of a nation-wide agitation on the disputed formula.