News, October 2003, www.aljazeerah.info
Human Price of the Israeli Occupation of Palestine
Israeli daily aggression on the Palestinian people
Mission and meaning of Al-Jazeerah
Cities, localities, and tourist attractions
India rejects Pak proposal for UN monitors for Kashmir bus service
Khaleej Times, (AFP, AP)
30 October 2003
NEW DELHI - India’s defense minister has rejected as “meaningless” Pakistan’s demand for a UN role in running a bus service between the Indian and Pakistani parts of Kashmir, which is claimed in full the two rival countries.
India last week suggested reopening the border for the first time in 56 years so families can visit each other by bus in Kashmir, a Himalayan territory which is the focus of daily hostility between the nuclear-armed neighbors.
Pakistan said on Wednesday that bus travel could only be allowed if the United Nations mans the checkpoints on the frontier and passengers carry U.N. documents, rather than their countries’ passports.
India rejected the idea.
“What is the UN going to do on the roads which are meant for the common people?” Indian Defense Minister George Fernandes said Wednesday night on Aaj Tak television. “What have they (the UN) got to do there? It is meaningless.”
Pakistan has repeatedly called for a greater UN role in Kashmir, which has triggered two wars between India and Pakistan since their independence from Britain in 1947. India rejects an increased UN role. There are fewer than 50 UN monitors along cease-fire line that divides Kashmir, and they can act only with permission from both governments.
Pakistan too small to be a threat to India
In an interview recorded for broadcast on Friday on the British Broadcasting Corp., Fernandes said Pakistan “can never be a threat to India,” the Press Trust of India news agency reported on Thursday.
“Pakistan is too small a country for us to be afraid of,” he was quoted as saying.
He also said there had been no meaningful changes in the number of militants crossing from Pakistani-controlled territory to wage terror attacks in India.
“There are ups and down but nothing that is meaningful,” he was quoted as saying.
Pakistan’s Foreign Secretary Riaz Khokar said his country has “done just about everything possible” to stop the infiltration.
“There is just no way any country can seal its borders 100 percent,” he said at a news conference.
Khokhar, however, said the movement of people between the two zones in the disputed territory should be “controlled” by the UN and that UN personnel should man checkpoints on the disputed border.
He also said people travelling on the bus should carry UN documents.
The two countries started a process of normalisation after Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee offered a symbolic hand of friendship to Pakistan during a visit to disputed Kashmir in April.
Khokhar’s remarks were in response to proposals put forward by India last week.
These included reviving severed sporting links, upgrading travel ties, increasing humanitarian aid, introducing a ferry service between the Indian city of Bombay and the Pakistan port of Karachi and free medical treatment for Pakistani children in Indian hospitals.
On Wednesday Pakistan also agreed to resume talks on air links severed after the December 2001 attack on India’s parliament, blamed by New Delhi on Pakistan-backed Kashmiri separatists.
Khokhar however urged New Delhi to resume talks to ease tensions over Kashmir.
India says it would not resume direct dialogue with Pakistan until “cross-border terrorism” -- it’s term for the insurgency in the region that has claimed at least 39,500 lives in the past 14 years -- ended.
A formal reaction to Khokhar’s response was expected later Thursday, a foreign ministry official said.
 |
| Earth, a planet hungry for peace |
 |
| The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03). |
 |
| The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03). |
 |