Incursions have declined: Advani

Published August 1, 2002

NEW DELHI, July 31: India said on Wednesday rebel incursions into disputed Kashmir had fallen slightly in recent months after Pakistan promised to stop the flow.

New Delhi has set a permanent end to infiltration in the bloodied region as a condition to ending a seven-month military standoff with Pakistan.

“If we compare with the past years, this year the infiltration has somewhat reduced but has not stopped, it still continues,” Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani told parliament.

Advani, who also heads the home ministry, said security forces had prevented several intrusion attempts by either killing or arresting intruders along the 740-km Line of Control dividing mountainous Kashmir between India and Pakistan.

Advani said there were still enough rebels in Jammu and Kashmir, India’s only Muslim majority state, to cause violence.

“There are already so many infiltrators here that they can maintain the same level of violence for at least the next three to four months,” Advani told the upper house of parliament.

Indian opposition parties wanted the government to say how it would tackle militancy in Kashmir and relations with Pakistan.

“Can our armed forces remain in a state of mobilisation indefinitely?” Manmohan Singh, senior leader of the main opposition Congress party, asked in the upper house.—Reuters

Opinion

Editorial

What next?
Updated 21 Sep, 2023

What next?

One wonders that if administrative measures were all that were needed to arrest the rupee’s sorry slide, why were they not taken sooner?
Greater representation
21 Sep, 2023

Greater representation

PAKISTAN now stands at a significant juncture, with the names of 11.7m more women added to the voter list, ...
Lost generations
21 Sep, 2023

Lost generations

IF those who wield power in Pakistan think that the nation can progress when tens of millions of its children have...
Sikh activist’s murder
Updated 20 Sep, 2023

Sikh activist’s murder

Perhaps Indians have taken a page out of Mossad’s handbook in organising a hit on an individual they considered a ‘terrorist’.
ECP’s preparations
Updated 20 Sep, 2023

ECP’s preparations

The revision of the delimitation timeline still does not mean elections will be held according to the constitutional schedule.
Futures on hold
20 Sep, 2023

Futures on hold

IT is a sad turn of events when one is caught between choosing to fill their fuel tanks to get to work or paying the...