Musharraf seeks US facilitation in Kashmir troops reduction

Pakistan Times Foreign Desk

September 16, 2005

NEW YORK (US): President General Pervez Musharraf Tuesday sought US help in India’s overall troop reduction in the Occupied Kashmir, particularly from some specific areas to achieve some forward movement for the resolution of long-standing Jammu and Kashmir dispute.

He made this proposal during a 30-minute, one-on-one meeting with President George W Bush, a day ahead of his bilateral meeting with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the sidelines of the UN Summit.

President Bush held the meeting with President Musharraf before a reception hosted by him for world leaders, who are here to attend the Summit, marking the 60th anniversary of the world body.

President Musharraf said a pullout of troops from certain areas – later identified by Ambassador Jahangir Karamat as Baramula and Kupwara – would be a definite step towards meaningful progress on Kashmir.

The Pakistani leader pointed out that if there was no Indian reciprocity on the key Kashmir issue, all other confidence building measures would lose their impact.

“The proposal is a message for India and the United States as well,” Karamat said in reply to a question and added that Washington has all along been facilitating the peace process between the two South Asian neighbours.

Briefing newsmen, Ambassador Karamat described the meeting – one of the few, President Bush has had in view of his preoccupation with Hurricane Katrina – as “very important and one in which the two leaders reviewed a wide spectrum of bilateral ties including defence cooperation.”

President Musharraf expressed sympathies over colossal losses wrought by Hurricane Katrina. President Bush thanked Pakistan’s gesture in contributing to relief efforts.

On Afghanistan, President Musharraf reaffirmed Islamabad’s commitment to peace and stability in that country, especially during the upcoming parliamentary elections.

In this regard, he recounted Pakistan’s recent steps including beefing up of troops on its side of the border, increasing the number of border posts to 800 and called for a balance in troop deployment on the Afghan side for effective check on any incursions.

He said the relocation of refugee camps from the Pakistani side to the Afghan side of the border would help control any illegal movement across the border.

On Middle East, President Musharraf expressed satisfaction at Israeli pullout from Gaza and called for similar withdrawal from the West Bank and ultimately for moving towards settling the status of Jerusalem.

President Musharraf asked the American leader to expedite the process of free trade between the two countries, saying Pakistan looks forward to bolstering its exports to the robust US market. The two leaders felt that the bilateral relations were moving forward satisfactorily, especially in the defence field.

Deputy Chief of Mission Mohammad Sadiq flanked the Ambassador during the briefing.

'Pakistan Times' Editor and Special Correspondent Mumtaz Hamid Rao adds from New York:

President General Pervez Musharraf says that the recent contact between Pakistan and Israel does not mean recognition of the Jewish state.

In an interview with The New York Times published in Tuesday's edition, he said that the opening to Israelcould flourish "in case there is forward movement" on negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. But, he added, "this is by no means recognition of Israel."

President Musharraf said that his initiative had met little opposition in Pakistan. He is to address the American Jewish Congress (AJC) for the first time on September 17. "What is the harm if I interacted with the Jewish Congress, knowing their influence here?" he was quoted as saying.

In the wide-ranging interview, the president also spoke about Pakistan's efforts to track down al Qaeda leaders. He said it was possible that Osama bin Laden is still moving between remote parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan four years after the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States. "I will not negate entirely, with confidence, that he is not there," he said. "But I will never accept anybody who says with confidence that he is there." He said later that he often asks, "Do you have intelligence, have you heard him?"

The president rejected the charge that Pakistan was doing a lackluster job of pursuing al-Qaeda suspects, saying Osama bin Laden's power is reduced, no matter where he is.

"I do not think he can influence, because he is on the run, hiding," General Musharraf said. If Osama bin Laden is on the Pakistan-Afghan border, he is switching sides "wherever he sees danger," President Musharraf added.

The President also rejected arguments that Pakistan was halfhearted in its efforts to root out Al Qaeda and remnants of the Taliban, who ruled Afghanistan until the American-led invasion there in 2001. "We have almost eliminated them from our cities," he said.

"We have caught about 700 of them, and we have broken their back in the mountains." The groups no longer operate in the valleys of the Afghan border area, he said, "because we have occupied them."

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, also speaking to reporters Monday at The New York Times, praised President Musharraf for working in three areas, and said the United States would be supportive: helping to pursue members of Al Qaeda, creating "diplomatic space" for operating by reaching out to India and Israel, and working to improve education and the economy to discourage militancy. "There are parts of Pakistan that are extremely poor where you get breeding grounds for this kind of extremism," she said, and the United States would help him deal with those.

President Musharraf said that, in a meeting he had Monday with Ms. Rice, he asked her to move toward free-trade agreement with Pakistan. That is likely to meet some resistance in Congress, which derailed efforts by the Bush administration after the Sept. 11 attacks to aid Pakistan by lifting restrictions on textile imports, according to the Times.

But he said he made no demands for an agreement that would match the Bush administration's offer to help India develop a civilian nuclear power programme.

India and Pakistan have refused to sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, and that has prevented most forms of nuclear cooperation with the United States.

The President also said that he believed that the A.Q. Khan network exported "probably a dozen" centrifuges to North Korea to produce nuclear weapons fuel. He added, however, that after two years of interrogations there was still no evidence about whether the expert also gave North Korea a Chinese-origin design to build a nuclear weapon.

President Musharraf's comments were made a day before the United States was to reopen talks with North Korea about its nuclear programme in Beijing.

In his discussion of A.Q. Khan, President Musharraf said that two years of questioning of the scientist - which the Pakistanis insist they would do themselves, rather than allowing the United States to question him - a critical question had not been resolved: Did the scientist give the same bomb design to North Korea and Iran that investigators found in Libya, when it dismantled its uranium program. "I don't know," he said. "Whether he passed these bomb designs to others - there is no such evidence."