SYDNEY, June 16: President Gen Pervez Musharraf said on Thursday that Pakistan’s military had ‘broken the back’ of Al Qaeda and reduced the organization to small isolated bands hiding in the mountains on the Pakistan-Afghan border. Speaking at a function of the Asia Society here, the president called on the United States to help undermine root causes of extremism by resolving political disputes like Palestine and Kashmir facing the Muslim world.

“The US should lead efforts to resolve political disputes afflicting the Muslim countries with justice, because it is the long-running disputes that give rise to powerlessness, hopelessness, extremism and terrorism, which endanger world peace,” he said in his address on ‘Pakistan — challenges, response and opportunities’.

President Musharraf said there was ‘light at the end of the tunnel’ in the long-standing dispute with India over Kashmir but warned that flexibility was needed on both sides to resolve the issue.

“I am optimistic, I see light at the end of the tunnel, I only feel that if we show sincerity in our approach and show flexibility ... we can come to a central point of agreement,” he stated.

“That means flexibility, giving up set positions, giving up fast, cemented positions of the past 50 years.

“There are extremists on both sides who would derail the process, whatever’s decided, we need to be bold enough to stand up to them.”

The president said a process of rapprochement was under way and there was a genuine desire for peace among the peoples of India, Pakistan and Kashmir.

The president said he was suited to the role of peacemaker having had the ‘dubious distinction’ of serving in two of the three wars between Pakistan and India over Kashmir.

“I am eminently qualified to bring peace because I understand the ravages of war,” he said.

He said he valued Pakistan’s role as a leading moderate Islamic state and added that he was determined to stamp out terrorism and extremism.

“Terrorism will be confronted with force, we have done that and we have been successful,” the president added.

The president said undermining the root causes of terrorism demanded a two-pronged strategy which needed Washington’s involvement.

“One prong is the Muslim world rejecting terrorism ... the other prong should be executed by the West, especially the United States — resolve all political disputes, the indirect strategy to counter Al Qaeda, the indirect strategy to pacify Iraq or Afghanistan is solution of the Palestinian dispute and the Kashmiri dispute, as far as we are concerned.

“This is the strategy of enlightened moderation which we in Pakistan are trying to project to the world.”

The West must also step up efforts to help development in the Third World if it wanted to combat terrorism effectively, the president added.

ECONOMIC TURNAROUND: President Musharraf informed the gathering that Pakistan had been put on the path of high economic growth through reforms and continuity of fiscal policies in the past five years.