LAHORE, June 2: Army governments have more often than not been close to war, says PML(Q) leader Begum Abida Husain.

Speaking at a ‘Countering Terrorism in South Asia’ seminar organized by the International Peace Forum here on Sunday, she said the incumbent war cabinet had no independent opinion as it was not free of the president’s influence.

“Musharraf was alone in taking all important decisions and he himself must realize the fact,” she added.

Hoping that the Almatay conference and US officials’ visits to the region would de-escalate the border tension, she said: “We cannot repeat Kargil or Agra and will have to capitulate (on the disputes with India) and find some way to come out of the current crisis.”

National Workers party chief Abid Hasan Minto said the Kashmir issue was the unfinished agenda of the 1947 partition and Kashmiris would have to resolve it by themselves.

He regretted that Pakistan did not allow Kashmiri leadership to come on the forefront and fight their freedom war for themselves due to which the world was taking the problem as a territorial issue between New Delhi and Islamabad.

Denying the impression that the US was launching a religious or cultural war, he said it was a war between the haves and the have-nots and it was for this reason that Catholic Christians of Vietnam had been a target of bombing by the United States.

Dr Mubashar Hasan said the powerful and not the weak used to indulge in terrorism. He said human beings were fighting against each other for two reasons — religion and nationalism.

Barrister Taj Muhammad Langah said Americans were the founders of terrorism who declared that all was fair to eliminate communism during the Cold War.

He said no peace could be guaranteed until all players of terror, whether they were governments or organizations or individuals, resolve to come to negotiation table for solving the issues through political means.

Durriyab Yusuf said a war in South Asia would be fought only after America would give a green signal for the purpose.

He said the seminar should have been organized in India for it was the Indian leadership which was escalating tension on borders while the Pakistan government was continuously taking steps to avert the outbreak of war.

A paper of Dr Tariq Rahman of the Quaid-i-Azam University was read to the audience for he himself could not attend the seminar. According to him, making demands for justice or even separation from a state was justified as long as force was not used for the purpose.

However, if the state suppressed this struggle for autonomy or rights then the state became the terrorist and the freedom fighters could target the military forces of the state but not ordinary men, women and children, he added.

Dr Iqbal Wahla said political and religious terrorism was introduced by Gen Ziaul Haq. He criticized the government for failing to unearth the corruption by Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif.

He said billions of dollars of public money were embezzled and deposited in a foreign bank also operating in Pakistan and Finance Minister Shaukat Aziz who was well aware of the fact should try to recover the money for the nation.

Agriculturist Chaudhry Sultan Ali, Farooq Azam, Zulfiqar Ali Khan and others also spoke on the occasion.