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ISLAMABAD, June 11: Pakistan on Monday declared that it would not unilaterally withdraw its troops from the Line of Control in the disputed territory of Kashmir. “Our position is very clear; there will be no unilateral demilitarisation,” Foreign Office spokesperson Tasnim Aslam told a weekly news briefing on Monday when asked to comment on President Musharraf’s statement that Pakistan was ready to withdraw its forces from the LoC.
Noting that there was nothing new in the statement, she reiterated that the president had talked about “certain ideas” in the context of resolving the Kashmir dispute which included identifying regions, demilitarisation, self-governance and joint management.
Regarding plea of visiting families of missing Indian prisoners of war, seeking access to ‘military detention camps’ or other detention centres in Pakistan, the spokesperson snapped back: “What other detention centres? We have done the maximum we could do, and again I would say this is unprecedented,” Ms Aslam observed, adding that Pakistan had not seen the same level of humanitarian gesture from India.
On the contrary, she said, there were around 500 Pakistani civilian prisoners still languishing in Indian jails although many of them had completed their sentences.
BOUCHER’S VISIT: The spokesperson described as “absolutely baseless” media reports that US Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher was coming to Pakistan to mediate between President Musharraf and the PPP. Ms Aslam confirmed that Mr Boucher was due here on Tuesday, insisting that it was a “normal, regular, periodic visit” to review bilateral relations. When asked whether a US government department had declared the MQM a terrorist outfit, her response was: “No, I have no information.”
Asked to comment on the US concern about restrictions on the media in Pakistan, the spokesperson said she was not aware of any such concern having been expressed.
Commenting on a statement of heads of the EU and EC Mission in Islamabad, expressing concern over curbs on media freedom, the spokesperson said: “We don’t need outsiders to come and tell us what to do because this is for our people, our media, our government to discuss, debate and decide.
MEDIATION: The spokesperson disagreed with the view that Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz’s statement about ruling out the third party mediation in the context of Pakistan-Afghanistan relations, was a contradiction in terms when in case of India the government had been advocating it and given that mediation by the US, Turkey and the G8 had been accepted as had been the Tripartite Commission.
Ms Aslam’s contention was that a comparison with India was totally out of place because the history of Pakistan’s relations with India was different.
She noted that as far as G8 and Tripartite Commission were concerned that was in the context of the war against terrorism or cooperation with Afghanistan from where this war was launched.
