NEW DELHI, Dec 4: The Lashkar-i-Taiba (LT) group, India’s best known bete noire, has declared a four-day ceasefire in Jammu and Kashmir in the run-up to Eid, news groups in Srinagar said on Wednesday.

The LT said it would not target officials and politicians on its hit list during the ceasefire.

The state’s deputy chief minister Mangat Ram Sharma welcomed the ceasefire which starts on Friday and was conveyed by the LT by phone to some selected news groups in Srinagar.

But there were indications that the right-wing federal government may not treat the move with matching indulgence.

The LT announcement appeared to have taken much of the Indian establishment by surprise and it got even the moderate former foreign secretary Muchkund Dubey to concede the argument in favour of a continued hard-line stance against the group.

“It is scandalous that a group like the LT which is not even Indian is declaring a ceasefire and expects the government to follow its will,” Dubey told a TV channel during a discussion on related issues.

Pakistani diplomats said the LT move should be welcomed as much as any other peace move is respected. Other diplomats recalled that both India and the United States were recently sitting with Sri Lanka’s LTTE at an Oslo meeting despite the fact that both have banned the group and in India at least its leader has been convicted of a capital crime.

The LT, banned in Pakistan but still regarded by the Indian media as “pro-Pakistan” stands implicated in several attacks in India, including one on the Mughal-built Red Fort. Eleven accused in that attack face charges of treason, according to some reports on Wednesday.

The LT was also blamed for the Dec 13 attack on parliament. Four accused in the case will hear the judgment in the trial on Dec 11, significantly one day before elections in Gujarat.

The group itself appeared to have simpler explanations for its decision to go for a ceasefire, something it had scoffed at in the past.

“The outfit will not attack Indian forces throughout the length and breadth of Jammu and Kashmir as a goodwill gesture in view of Eid-ul-Fitr,” LT spokesperson Abu Huzaifa told a local news agency in a faxed statement.

Huzaifa said the ceasefire would come into effect a day ahead of Eid and continue till the third day of the Muslim festivities.

He said even political leaders who are on the hit list of the outfit would be spared during the ceasefire.

Significantly, the LT announcement came during a visit to Kashmir by US Ambassador Robert Blackwill and the presence in New Delhi of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Both have spoken out against terrorism as a key issue between India and Pakistan.

“The global campaign against terrorism is incomplete unless the problem is addressed in Jammu and Kashmir,” Blackwill was quoted as saying on Tuesday.

Talking to reporters after a meeting with Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, Blackwill expressed his country’s interest in helping end terrorism and in aiding the economic development of the state.

However, Blackwill refrained from commenting on Sayeed’s ‘healing touch’ policy.

Sayeed’s deputy and Congress party leader in the state Sharma however said: “I wish the (LT) announcement had covered the entire period of Ramazan. But even the little that is on offer has to be welcomed.”—J.N.