India - Pakistan Crisis

Top 56. Jan 13, 2002 10:51 PM

» Steven_Russell - Re: Amanullah Khan

In response to message posted by BPyles:

Good find Betty!

He must be one of the four Kashmir terrorists from the bottom of the top 20 list. I will add him in.

As far as all those other names in the major crackdown, I have all those groups on my list already, and some of the leaders mentioned in the article appear there also. I am only trying to focus on the big players, so I will copy that article, and it's going to take me some time to go through it and sort out and match up names.

-- posted by Steven_Russell

Top 57. Jan 13, 2002 11:27 PM

» Steven_Russell - Re: Musharraf snubs India on top 20 terrorist list handover

In response to message posted by sillyme101:

Steve, In the same manner referencing all your information from times of India would not be credible either.

---------------------------------------------

Noted. And I try to keep an eye out for any Indian spin on the stories. But the fact is that India has a top 20 terrorist list, and all indications are that these guys are the baddest of the bad.

WADR, a full and unbiased history of the Kashmir conflict is a tough challenge to present, or follow, without also having to research the credibility of the source. And it needs to be resolved in a way that satisfies all parties in the region to a reasonable degree.

But there are some 18 separatist groups operating in the Kashmir theater, and in Pakistan, all of them opposed to Indian control of the region, and all of them with a history of terrorist-style attacks. Simply calling them "freedom fighters" does not clarify the issue any, nor does it stop the terrorism, which all of them deny that they engage in. These groups with their uncontrolled and indiscriminate violence need to be stopped. Their methods are no longer tolerable to a civilized world.

What about the BJP terrorism against the Christens and the Muslims minorities in India. Numerous incidents of Church burning and lynching of clergy by Hindu extremist in India have occurred. I have yet to see condemnation of these groups. And a list of most wanted.

-----------------------------------------------

If true, then they need to be named, recorded, and tracked, and put on a list. It would be very helpful if you were willing to summarize and compile the good important data, especially with names and dates and locations, with just a bit of relevant background history, so it can be followed. So why is there no top most wanted list? Whose interest would it be in to have those people extradited somewhere to be brought to justice? Who is asking for it?

As far as India's top 20 list, we know India wants them, and Pakistan refuses to extradite. That signals to me a big problem with Pakistan, that they are going to have to be held accountable for.

Another issue may have to do with top American interests. If it does not affect us, it does not appear on the radar screen. Terrorism and war exists worldwide, and we have been ignoring it all for too long. But only recently the President froze the assets of 5 Northern Ireland groups and one Spanish group, even though they were not high on our list. But they were top priorities with Europeans, so we then reluctantly fell in line with Europe on the issue.

I predicted a while back that Kashmir was going to rise to the surface for us, even though we would rather focus on Iraq, Iran, Hezbollah, Somalia, Philippines, or even Palestinians before Kashmir. But the groups and madrassas out of Pakistan are related to the battles we fought in Afghanistan, so Kashmir and Pakistan have come up sooner as terrorist priorities for the US.

-- posted by Steven_Russell

Top 58. Jan 14, 2002 12:22 AM

» JenL_2 - Re: Musharraf snubs India on top 20 terrorist list handover

In response to message posted by sillyme101:

Sil - Thanks for your comments and I second Steven's comments. I've been trying to find something good to say about Pakistan, but it's been hard to find....maybe I have a pro-India bias? Musharraf had said he was going to crack down on Extremist groups and Islamic schools after Ramadan, but I really didn't think that he had enough control to follow through on his promises. But IMHO Musharraf's speech, this latest crackdown on Islamic Extremism, and the follow-up in-country meetings.....shows that he's really serious and by-hook-or-by-crook he's gonna turn that country 'round. This seems like an unprecedented bold move ...it's like racing down the road at 100 mph and then taking a hairpin turn in the other direction!....I wish 'em luck!

You said...

I think you need to look at the historical prospective of the struggle in Kashmir. Do you know why there is insurgency in Kashmir? If India is really in search of a solution to Kashmir problem, why has India not followed the multiple UN resolutions on Kashmir since 1954?

I've read on the net about the insurgency in Kashmir, and have wondered how much of the insurgency is due to actual grievances with the India gov and how much is due to instigation from the Pak Extremist groups. Please if you can find some credible links explaining the crisis in Kashmir.....would like to see them. I've been to Kashmir in more peaceful times, and it's very sad to see the death and destruction there now....Jen

-- posted by JenL_2

http://www.atimes.com/ind-pak/DA15Df03.h...

Top 59. Jan 14, 2002 1:41 PM

» sillyme101 - US will have its way in Kashmir

Note: Even though the author is an Indian, he does present a balanced view

Sil

By Achin Vanaik

(With permission from Foreign Policy In Focus http://www.fpif.org)

Since the December 13 attack on the Indian parliament, the Indian government has not been engaged in the politics of actually preparing to go to war but rather in the politics of brinksmanship.

The military risks (the uncertainty of military gains given a definite and strong Pakistan military response) and the political risks (alienating international opinion, especially the United States preoccupied with stabilizing the post-Taliban situations in Afghanistan and Pakistan) are too great for India actually to go to war. Of course, the high-risk strategy of brinksmanship carries the danger of matters getting out of hand and may lead to an actual war in any case. This has not happened yet, and increasingly looks unlikely, which comes as a relief. Since the nuclear weapons tests of 1998 conducted by India and Pakistan, there is always the potential for any military conflict between the two countries to escalate to the nuclear level.

The current crisis may simply be a prologue to future ones. The Indian government, and a very large section of elite opinion backing it, feels that the recent round of brinksmanship politics has actually paid substantial dividends, domestically and externally. Moreover, a growing section (albeit still a minority) of the Indian elite has become progressively more belligerent and believes that Indian security cannot be achieved through any strategy of co-existence with Pakistan but only through the dissolution of the Pakistani state.

The rise of such views is, of course, intimately connected to the growing spread of the ideology of Hindu nationalism and chauvinism espoused by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) (and its cohort organizations in Indian civil society), The BJP, which leads the current coalition government, has long been determined to transform the Indian polity and society into a more authoritarian and anti-secular direction.

This government has used the developments since September 11 and December 13 to curb civil liberties, harass its domestic opponents, further communalize the Indian education system, spread anti-Muslim and anti-Pakistan sentiments, and promote a more belligerent and aggressive elite nationalism in keeping with its general political ideology. What's more, it has diverted attention away from its political failure in Kashmir. The Kashmiri population has been alienated not only by the brutalities inflicted by Pakistan-supported terrorist groups but also by the terrorist repressions carried out by the Indian armed forces in the region.

Externally, the politics of brinksmanship has succeeded in getting the United States to do what it was reluctant to do before: namely, explicitly blacklist certain Pakistan-based terrorist groups for the first time, and put pressure on the Musharraf government to clamp down on these groups, which it has now done. Like Israel with regards to the Palestinians, the Indian government utilized American behavior after September 11 as a precedent to justify its own efforts to isolate Pakistan politically, even if it could not emulate the arrogance of Israel's military actions.

If the US could disregard international law and norms concerning presentation of evidence and proper procedures for the pursuit of retributive justice and simply claim that in the "war against global terrorism" it had the right to define who the world's terrorists are (and are not), and was justified in attacking Afghanistan as the country that harbors terrorists, then surely Israel and India could do the same. The US, therefore, formally acknowledged India's right to "self-defense" against terrorists but has acted behind the scenes to prevent an outbreak of war.

The US link with Pakistan has now become even more important - making the medium- and long-term perspectives regarding the India-Pakistan-US triangle more complicated and uncertain, irrespective of the current short-term gains made by New Delhi. The US has now for the first time established a military-political presence in the region with major ramifications for its perceived potential challengers: Russia, China, and Iran. This has to do not just with oil and gas politics, but also with larger geopolitical considerations now that the US is in Russia's traditional backyard and wooing, with some success, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan (and other central Asian states), where it would like to establish more permanent bases.

In Afghanistan and northern Pakistan, a significant US military presence has been secured. The challenge for President General Pervez Musharraf is whether he can use this US presence to outflank his opponents and reinforce his links with the US - or whether this will be a major handicap eventually playing into the hands of his more militant Islamist opponents. The US is now deeply involved in trying to shape Pakistan's internal politics to best suit its perceived interests. Currently, this involves keeping the Pakistan army united behind Musharraf through the disbursal of US economic largesse and weaponry. Pakistan's traditionally strong links with Saudi Arabia remain important, in that American strategic dominance in the Middle East requires maintaining the Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia tripod of client states.

What will be the direction of Indian foreign policy given this overall scenario? Earlier, New Delhi may have entertained hopes that the US would soon prefer India's replacement of Pakistan as its most "allied ally" in the region, and also as a strategic counterweight to China. This was always something of an illusion given the enormous asymmetry of power between the US and India. The US would prefer to pursue closer links with both India and Pakistan rather than play the Indian game. Moreover, Washington is not about to prioritize its relations with India over its relationship with China. The lure of a closer strategic relationship with India is not so important that it would be allowed to determine, or even seriously influence, the nature of US foreign policy perspectives with regard to China.

After September 11, India has forsaken the idea that a strategic US shift away from Pakistan should be the precondition for a sturdy India-US alliance. Now it is more than willing to pursue such an alliance in the mere hope that eventually Washington may come around to sharing New Delhi's views about Islamabad.

Kashmir will continue to bedevil India-Pakistan relations. The new American presence in South and Central Asia, and the emergence of Kashmir as a possible nuclear flashpoint, mean that Kashmir has now become internationalized, or more accurately, Americanized. The US has not yet established its range of strategic options concerning Kashmir or how these would fit into its wider geostrategic ambitions. But it will eventually get around to this. And it is these perceived self-interests that will guide US behavior, not the concerns of the Indian and Pakistani governments - and certainly not the deep desire for justice and peace that the long-suffering people of Kashmir on both sides of the border may have.

(Achin Vanaik is an independent journalist and fellow at the Center for Contemporary Studies, Nehru Memorial Museum and Library. Author of numerous books on Indian politics and India's nuclear policy, his most recent book, co-authored with Praful Bidwai, is New Nukes: India, Pakistan and Global Nuclear Disarmament (Interlink 1999).)

-- posted by sillyme101

http://www.miami.com/herald/content/news...

Top 60. Jan 14, 2002 5:39 PM

» Steven_Russell - Lashkar fighters in Kashmir tell story

Published Sunday, January 13, 2002

India shows off two prisoners to prove point

BY MARK McDONALD
Knight Ridder News Service

KHANABAL, Kashmir -- The Indian military rarely takes prisoners when it encounters Muslim militants in Kashmir. Most are killed in suicidal gun battles and quietly consigned to unmarked graves.

But last week the commander of the Indian army in southern Kashmir allowed two fighters from the extremist group Lashkar-e-Taibba to be taken alive. And on Thursday, in an unprecedented move, he permitted the two militants to be interviewed.

The Indian commander, Maj. Gen. R.S. Jamwal, said he was intent on showing that Pakistani-backed jihadis, or holy warriors, continue to infiltrate and terrorize the Indian portion of the disputed territory of Kashmir.

He also wanted to counter the Pakistani contention that the Kashmir insurgency is being conducted by local freedom fighters. One of his prisoners, a 16-year-old self-described jihadi, was born in Pakistan and attended an Islamic school in the Pakistani part of Kashmir.

India has accused Pakistan of training and funding the Muslim fanatics who stage
strikes against Indian security forces. Pakistan says the attacks are the work of heroic and duty-bound freedom fighters who want to liberate their land from Indian occupation.

``This is terrorism, not freedom fighting, and we're not going to tolerate it any more,'' Jamwal said in his compound in Khanabal, 35 miles south of the capital Srinigar. ``The world won't tolerate it anymore, either.''

ACTION DISMISSED

The general also dismissed the recent crackdown against Muslim extremists by Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf. Under growing international pressure to extend curbs on Muslim extremists, Musharraf is expected to deliver a strong anti-terrorism speech to his nation in the coming days.

``Musharraf is cornered now,'' said Jamwal, who directs all Indian Army forces in southern Kashmir. ``He will say he wants to counter terrorism with all his might, with this and that, but he'll continue to infiltrate.

``He'll give a dovish, apologetic speech. But no matter what he says, here on the ground things aren't changing. He's still fighting his proxy war.''

India and Pakistan both lay claim to Kashmir, a predominantly Muslim territory of 9.9 million farmers, weavers, lumberjacks and quarrymen. The nuclear-armed rivals have fought two wars and countless battles over helpless Kashmir, where a Muslim guerrilla insurgency has raged for the past dozen years.

In recent weeks there has been a massive military buildup by both countries along the de facto border known as the Line of Control.

JOINED GROUP

One of the captured Lashkar fighters, Murtaza Aqib, said in an interview Thursday that he's the eldest of seven children of a tailor from southern Pakistan. While attending a madrassa, an Islamic religious school, outside Lahore, Aqib joined Lashkar when the group's recruiters told him Kashmiri Muslim girls were being raped by Indian soldiers.

He spent three weeks in a Pakistani boot camp with 1,200 other trainees, then had another 45 days of specialized training with weapons and explosives. The camp, he said, was near Muzaffarabad, in the Pakistani portion of Kashmir.

When Aqib got the honored assignment to sneak into Indian Kashmir, he was given an automatic rifle with three clips, a pistol and a hand grenade. He said he was temporarily housed at a Pakistani Army garrison before being taken to the border by a major and another officer in the ISI, the Pakistani intelligence agency.

Wearing a ragged track suit, a dirty twill cloak and torn loafers, Aqib said he's worried he has brought shame upon his parents, who were not happy with his venture into radicalism.

``My parents wanted me to be a teacher,'' said Aqib, 16, sporting the thin beginnings of a teenage mustache. ``I wanted to get married and have children, but I've never had a girlfriend before.''

CAPTURED

He was captured Wednesday when 35 Indian troopers, acting on a tip, surrounded a house where he and his commander were staying. They surrendered after soldiers tossed tear gas and stun grenades inside the house. The soldiers also seized two Chinese-made AK-47s, three grenades and 150 rounds of ammunition.

Had he been tortured by the Indians? No, he said, but he expects to be.

The Lashkar commander captured with him was Mohammed Shafi Bhat, 24, a Kashmiri native. He said he was abducted two years ago by Lashkar agents and then forced -- under threat of execution -- to live and train in Pakistan.

On Thursday, Shafi disavowed any allegiance to Pakistan, holy war, Lashkar or al Qaeda. He called Osama bin Laden a terrorist and said he had not even seen a tape of the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. He also said he had been made a Lashkar commander just two weeks ago.

-- posted by Steven_Russell

Musharraf draws flak from Arab world

Top 61. Jan 16, 2002 11:01 PM

» JenL_2 - Musharraf draws flak from Arab world

In response to message posted by sillyme101:

Sil - Good article and thanks for the Asia Times link - it seems to be a good resource for balanced articles on the region. Here's one on Pakistan from 1/16....

By Syed Saleem Shahzad

KARACHI - President General Pervez Musharraf has backed down over Kashmir in an attempt to avoid a war with India, but Indian feedback as well as Pakistani intelligence reports confirm that Indian troops remain massed at the border and are prepared for a limited conventional war.

Under United States pressure, Pakistan has put the Kashmiri struggle into reverse gear, and Musharraf has attempted to strike at the root causes, such as imposing restrictions on Islamic seminaries that nurture the spirit of jihadi.

Musharraf's landmark speech at the weekend was a brave attempt to change the traditional dynamics of Pakistani society overnight by turing it into a progressive and pluralistic country, which was the vision of Pakistan's founder, Muhammed Ali Jinnah. The success of this will be measured by social scientists in time, but unfortunately, despite taking such bold steps in a traditional society like Pakistan, what Indian Defense Minister George Fernandes said on Monday shows that the US has exerted one-sided pressure and left Musharraf at the possible mercy of extremists.

Fernandes said that India's heightened military presence along the border with Pakistan will not be scaled down until Pakistan ends what he called cross-border terrorism. Mobilization is complete, he said, and any effort at de-escalation could only come if and when cross-border terrorism was effectively stopped Fernandes told journalists that he welcomed the commitment by Musharraf to crack down on militants, but he is waiting to see if Musharraf can translate words into real action.

In the past few days more than 1,500 militants have been arrested in Pakistan, and even the administration of Pakistani Kashmir has followed Islamabad's lead by closing down the offices of all jihadi organizations.

Speaking to Asia Times Online, former Pakistani diplomat, political analyst and advisor to many former premiers and head of states, Hussain Haqqani said that Pakistan had taken a U-turn in its policies, seemingly under US pressure.

According to sources, Musharraf ignored the most important US demand, that 60 prominent Koranic seminaries across the country be closed. The president did not mention this issue in his speech, and afterwards he resisted further pressure to make an announcement, arguing that he did not want to put himself in conflict with the schools until he saw the effects of what he had already announced in his speech.

Sources say that Musharraf's latest decision has not been greeted with respect in the Islamic world. In fact, countries such as Kuwait and Saudi Arabia have been big sponsors of Islamic seminaries in Pakistan. One of the recently banned militant organizations, Laskhar-i-Taiba, hails from the Sunni Wahabi school of thought and is the recipient of heavy Saudi donations.

Arab countries supported these organizations at Pakistan's insistence, as in the case of the Taliban where Islamabad urged Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to recognize the regime, yet it subsequently let them down by denouncing the Taliban. Now it is doing the same with the militant organizations, by cutting down on them after spending so much time and effort in building them up.

Sensing the dismay of many Arab countries over Pakistan's wayward approach in recent times, especially as Arab countries have been less then enthusiastic about the US war on terrorism and the resultant escalation of Israeli action in Palestine, Musharraf has sent a delegation to rally their support. The delegation included the Minister of Communications, retired lieutenant-general Javed Qazi, and Ejazul Haq, a former minister and son of former dictator, General Zia ul-Haq. General Zia, interestingly, laid the foundations of Islamic jihad in Afghanistan and Qazi was the director general of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) when the Taliban movement emerged in the mid-1990s with the ISI's support.

Ironically, the men are now on a mission to undo the work of Ejaz's father and the ventures of Javed Qazi himself, which until just a few months ago were considered heroic.

Even Iran views the latest developments in Pakistan with concern. This despite the fact that Pakistani extremists have targeted many Iranian diplomats, students and nationals on sectarian grounds, something that has caused tension between the two countries.

The government-controlled Tehran Times ran an editorial showing Iran's reservations on the situation. "Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf addressed his nation on Saturday night in a televised speech that has received much publicity, and has been described as 'very significant'. However, although Musharraf's address was expected to deal with exploring possible ways to defuse tension with neighboring India, he mostly focused on new government policies to suppress activities at theological schools and mosques and separating politics from religious instruction.

"Immediately after Musharraf's address, US President Bush, British Prime Minister Blair and other influential figures of Western diplomacy praised the Pakistani president for his new policies. Almost a month ago, some Western media reported that Washington is going to extend US$100 million to Islamabad annually to be spent on the management of theological schools and supervising religious instruction, theology students and their teachers, in cooperation with the United States. Other reports have said that a central control system has been installed at Islamabad Airport, which transmits information via satellite to CIA headquarters.

"Even before that, during its attacks on Afghanistan, the United States promised to cancel Pakistan's debts, extend more financial assistance and remove any limitations on Islamabad's nuclear programs. Considering this, it is unlikely that there is no connection between the US interventionist policy and Musharraf's remarks on Saturday night.

"Officials in Islamabad know better than anyone that Iran has suffered most from terrorist and extremist groups in Pakistan, which have assassinated Iranian diplomats, cultural officials and students on several occasions. Besides this, ever since the radical and reactionary thinking of the Taliban was transferred to Afghanistan from some religious schools in Pakistan, and ever since this Stone-Age militia took power in Kabul with the full support of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), it was the Islamic Republic that never recognized the reactionary militia for their oppression of the innocent Afghans.

"Pakistan and other Islamic nations should realize that the Zionist-conceived plan to undermine religious instruction in the Islamic world is high on the US agenda. Attempts are also being made by some Zionist circles to misrepresent and misinterpret Islamic tenets and principles.

"Among divine religions, Islam has the greatest respect for other religions, and a considerable portion of the Holy Koran deals with Christianity and the Prophet Jesus Christ. In other words, Islam is a religion of dialogue and promotes peaceful co-existence among followers of all religions.

"However, the rulers of Islamic countries should also realize that even if there is a need for reform in religious instruction, the task should be carried out by Islamic scholars, not Zionist circles and US strategists!

"Considering the remarks recently made by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who stressed the need to Westernize the world by imposing Western values on other nations, it seems that there is a carefully meditated plot behind US attempts to take control of religious schools in Pakistan, which aims to devoid Islam of its basic principles like jihad.

"Although jihad, a cornerstone of our religion, means legitimate resistance against aggression, by equaling it with terrorism these Western religious instructors aim to deprive the Islamic world of one of its major defenses against foreign aggression.

"Those Islamic countries who have invited aliens to take control of their religious schools should bear in mind that if they lose their religious and national identity, they will no longer have anything to be proud of."

Compare the Tehran Times editorial about Pakistan with this editorial about Malaysia in 12/17 New Straits Times...

Substance, not form, for Muslims’ greatness

THE truth can be bitter, but always better. Prime Minister Datuk Seri Dr Mahathir Mohamad, in his Hari Raya message to the nation, made a strong appeal for Muslims to return to the true teachings of Islam and strengthen their relationship among themselves. In his forthright style, the Prime Minister has called on Muslims to focus on the substance and core teachings of Islam rather than on its form. Religious teaching must ultimately improve and enrich our lives.

This is the underlying theme of any major religion. And Islam is no exception. Muslims, as Dr Mahathir has stressed, must attach importance to improving their lives in this world and the next.

Muslims must also make it a point to acquire knowledge for without it, they will not be able to compete with the non-Muslims. Whether we like it or not, the world is becoming increasingly competitive. And the people who do best in such an environment will be those who are best equipped with knowledge and skills, and are adaptable and competitive. It's about the survival of the fittest.

It is not true, as some short-sighted and obscurantist religious leaders would like us to believe, that acquiring scientific and technological knowledge would make Muslims less religious. Muslims who are knowledgeable, confident and able to compete with non-Muslims will bring renewed faith in Islam. Muslim scientists such as the late Nobel Prize winner for Physics, Prof Abdus Salam, remained a devout Muslim despite his brilliant scientific achievements in the West.

Muslims will be left further behind if they do not make conscious efforts to learn skills and knowledge to be on par with non-Muslims. Weak Muslim countries will not be respected, as evidenced in what is happening in the Middle East, in particular, and elsewhere. It is imperative that Muslim nations become developed for only then will the world take notice of them.

Somehow these countries Have to get to the point.... where living a productive life has more worth more than martyrdom..... where the tools of technology have more worth than a khalashnikov rifle.... where scientific knowledge has more value than memorizing the Koran.... where the production of goods for world trade has more value than growing opium....where there is more pride in world competion than in bombing the world's buildings....then they'll have pride of achievement while still keeping their Islamic and National Identity.....Jen

-- posted by JenL_2

Top 62. Jan 20, 2002 5:26 PM

» BPyles - Jehad against Pakistan

Pakistan catching it from all sides. Will be quite a feat if Musharraf survives.

PoK militants plot jehad against Musharraf

PTI [ SUNDAY, JANUARY 20, 2002 6:57:44 PM ] India Times
NEW DELHI: As the Pakistani regime continues its crackdown on militant outfits, militant groups have made it clear that they would continue their operations from Pak-occupied Kashmir as it did not fall within the ambit of Islamabad and warned they could wage jehad against President Pervez Musharraf, media reports said.

The Friday Times quoted intelligence agencies as indicating that the religious clerics may not go down without fighting and were making efforts to instigate students of seminaries they controlled into starting a 'holy war' against Gen Musharraf.

"The state erected this structure over a period of two decades. It will take at least three to four years before things calm down," the weekly quoted an analyst as saying.

The analyst pointed out that the government cannot hold the militants for long in jails and there was a need to change the climate in which this kind of intolerance bred.

India has been alleging that the arrested militants were quietly released, following which they went to PoK to start their operations from there. This would also help Pakistan in showing to the world that it no longer indulged in cross border terrorism.

Hizbul Mujahideen supremo Syed Sallahuddin had recently stated that banned outfits like Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Taiba could continue their activities from PoK.

Meanwhile, intelligence agencies in Pakistan were also worried that some of these fundamentalist groups could attempt to target the President.

"What is worrisome is their ability to resort to subversive activities. The government will now have to be careful about that .... We have seen this happen in Egypt, Algeria and even in India, so he (Musharraf) has to be careful," Friday Times quoted an intelligence official as saying.

The weekly said, however, two factors have been favouring President Musharraf - support to the reformist agenda by the moderate Muslims and rout of Taliban in Afghanistan which discredited the militants.

The weekly said the militant groups pushed several people into Afghanistan to fight the US-led allied forces but majority of them died while rest were in jails manned by the Northern Alliance.

-- posted by BPyles

Top 63. Jan 21, 2002 11:29 PM

» JenL_2 - Re: Kashmir

In response to message posted by BPyles:

Here are a couple articles on the India-Pakistan-Kashmir crisis in Asia Times:

1/19 - Pakistan's Kashmir offensive

By Mushahid Hussain

ISLAMABAD - If the world and the United States changed after September 11, the center of that change is the region where Pakistan is located.

Already, the attacks in the United States have impacted on Pakistan in several significant ways. Pakistan is again a pivotal player in a region vital to Western interests, it is undertaking a major reorientation in domestic policy priorities and, in the meantime, the Kashmir issue is being projected by India as involving "terrorism, extremism and militancy".

It is in this context that international visitors to Pakistan this month have included British Prime Minister Tony Blair and US Secretary of State Colin Powell. United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan arrives next week.

The US now has a political and military presence in the region that includes India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Central Asian republics.

Powell's visit this week was his second since October, although the current journey was specific to tensions between Pakistan and India, and shows the gravity of the crisis and the extent of US interest and involvement to defuse the situation.

Prior to the Powell visit, Pakistan was confident that it had regained the initiative after the December 13 attack on the Indian parliament had put Islamabad under pressure - India blames Pakistan-based groups for that attack.

After Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf's speech of January 12, which even India's hawkish Home Minister Lal Krishna Advani termed four days later as "path-breaking", India was caught on the back foot.

Instead of the immediate and expected negative reaction, India was forced to wait for 18 hours before giving it a "cautious welcome". But by that time, its friends in the West had already given a euphoric endorsement by lauding what they termed as Musharraf's "courage".

The speech has been a plus for Pakistan in various ways. First, it averted the threat of war by putting the onus on India to de-escalate and reciprocate Musharraf's measures.

Second, it drew international attention to disputed Kashmir as the root cause of subcontinental tension, which could spin out of control and even develop a nuclear dimension but for international intervention.

Third, the speech enabled the military regime to use a conducive international environment to off-load domestic political baggage that was a burden in Pakistan's quest for a 21st century role in the community of nations.

It is in this context that Pakistan launched a new political initiative on Kashmir to reaffirm its long-standing policy of supporting the right of self-determination for the people of Kashmir that is enshrined in United Nations resolutions, initially accepted even by India.

Musharraf announced the formation of a National Kashmir Committee headed by a veteran Kashmiri politician, and its charter made clear the purposes behind the initiative.

The challenge before the government is to promote confidence among the people in Pakistan and Kashmir regarding Pakistan's efforts to project the Kashmir cause as a popular and indigenous struggle internationally.

The new National Kashmir Committee has a threefold goal. First, it is to mobilize support for the attainment of the right of self-determination of the people of Jammu and Kashmir.

Second, it seeks to promote awareness of the plight of the Kashmiri people, particularly violations of human rights.

Third, it seeks to reinforce a national consensus on Kashmir policy through contact and cooperation with the political forces, opinion leaders and other segments of society in Pakistan.

Having addressed international concerns regarding terrorism and extremism in Musharraf's January 12 speech, Pakistan now feels it has the opportunity to pursue a proactive Kashmir policy that combines deft and imaginative diplomacy with an up-front approach aimed at altering the status quo in Kashmir.

As Powell's visit underlined, the United States is now more receptive to Pakistan's plea that an inextricable linkage exists between a Kashmir settlement woven around altering the status quo by meeting Kashmiri aspirations - India, Pakistan and the Kashmiris are the three parties in the dispute - and the quest for a durable peace between South Asia's two nuclear-armed adversarial neighbors.

At a news conference in New Delhi on Thursday with his Indian counterpart, Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh, Powell stated that "the question of Kashmir has to be resolved by direct dialogue between the two parties" (India and Pakistan) and that "the United States is anxious to see a dialogue on all these issues, including Kashmir".

The US strategy is also clear in this situation. Washington realizes that for the first time it has clout and a close bond with both Pakistan and India, hence its ability to apply pressure both to promote peace and dialogue has increased.

The United States is keen to use its linkages in South Asia to build a political presence in close proximity to China and the Persian Gulf, while concurrently nudging Pakistan to play a role as a modern and moderate Muslim state, hence its praise for Musharraf's recently announced measures.

A Kashmir settlement and defusion of Pakistan-India tensions helps in attainment of these US objectives. Otherwise, if both its key South Asian allies remain tangled in bilateral battles that could develop into a full-fledged military confrontation, the US focus would have to shift away from its war against terrorism.

Pakistan is well aware of this US predicament. Hence, Islamabad is keen that its emerging strategic partnership with the United States be harnessed to seeking a settlement in Kashmir, which would help stabilize the current situation.

While India is staunchly opposed to any third-party mediation on Kashmir, it does realize that recent tensions have sucked outside powers into the region and its stakes in peace preclude the pursuit of any war option by India.

Kashmir, like Palestine, is a major flashpoint, albeit with the significant difference that in South Asia, a million men under arms are facing each other in an eyeball-to-eyeball standoff that could spin out of control and develop a nuclear dimension.

It is this doomsday scenario in South Asia that Washington is very keen to prevent; thus its activist role in the region.

(Inter Press Service)

India eyes conversion of Line of Control in Kashmir

By Ranjit Devraj

NEW DELHI - As international pressure mounts on India to resume dialogue with Pakistan over Kashmir, Delhi is likely to push for a conversion of the Line of Control (LoC), which now divides the disputed territory, into an international border.

Pakistan's present leaders do not accept the LoC. Both Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf and Foreign Minister Abdus Sattar have said publicly that the LoC is the problem and not the solution to the 55-year-old dispute. India and Pakistan have uncompromisingly seen the merger of undivided Kashmir into their own countries as the only acceptable solution. In this context, the current military standoff on their common border is but the latest episode in a saga of decades-long hostility and suspicion.

In 1994, India's parliament passed a resolution reiterating that "all of Kashmir, including the region beyond the LoC, now occupied by Pakistan, is an integral part of India". Musharraf has publicly declared Kashmir to be the unfinished business of the partition. Despite such hardline attitudes, each of the several wars that the South Asian neighbors have fought over the territory, since partition and independence from British India in 1947, have only served to lend ever greater legitimacy to the LoC .

The LoC first took shape as the ceasefire line (CFL) drawn up after the armies of the two countries fought each other to a standstill in January 1949, in what was the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir. Although India's army was vastly superior, it deliberately stopped its advance along what became the CFL because it represented a natural divide between Kashmiri-speaking people and Mirpuris, who belong ethnically and linguistically to Punjabi stock.

According to journalist and historian Ajit Bhattacharya, India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, a Kashmiri himself, was keenly aware of the ethnic divide, which manifested itself politically in popular support for the secular National Conference party in the Srinagar valley, in contrast to the dominance of the Muslim Conference on the Pakistani side of the CFL. Nehru's military plan had the tacit support of Sheikh Abdullah, founder of the National Conference and father of the present Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah.

By November 1949, supervised by United Nations observers, the army commanders of the two countries had demarcated the CFL on the ground pending a plebiscite. The demarcation left little room for dispute except on the high Siachen glacier.

After the 1971 war that resulted in the creation of Bangladesh, the CFR was converted, with minor changes, into the LoC under the Shimla Agreement, signed between the two countries in July 1972. The signatories to the Shimla Agreement, prime ministers Indira Gandhi and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, were said to have a secret understanding to have the LoC gradually converted into an international border - and Gandhi's adviser and distinguished civil servant, P N Dhar, mentions this in his published memoirs.

Dhar writes that Bhutto asked for time and then reneged on the deal. But it took another 27 years before the validity of the LoC was challenged when armed intruders, heavily backed by the Pakistan army, crossed it into the Kargil sector of Kashmir, sparking off a bloody but undeclared war in the summer of 1999. Alarmed at the prospect of a full-scale war between the two neighbors, which had declared themselves nuclear-armed just a year before in May 1998, the United States intervened and prevailed on Pakistan to withdraw the infiltrators without preconditions.

Significantly, a joint statement issued by then US president Bill Clinton and prime minister Nawaz Sharif that brought the Kargil war to an end expressed respect for the LoC in accordance with the Shimla Agreement and pledged a bilateral framework for future negotiations on the issue. By carefully avoiding any violation of the LoC, and scrupulously sticking to its declared agenda of vacating the intrusion, India earned international approbation for itself while Pakistan was labeled the aggressor.

According to Professor Amitabh Mattoo, who teaches international relations at the Jawhaharlal Nehru University (JNU), converting the LoC into the international border is the most practical solution to the Kashmir issue because it is now impossible to reunify what once constituted the original princely state. Mattoo points out that the two regions have now lived as part of India and Pakistan for more than half a century and although they have grievances against their respective leaderships, there has been a "cumulative process of integration that will be extremely difficult to reverse".

"It is difficult to imagine how the existing political, economic and communication links can be done away with without causing a tremendous upheaval," Mattoo says.

Standing in the way of any reunification is the fact that Islamabad has ceded a large part of the old Kashmir to China and virtually converted the Northern Areas, consisting of Gilgit, Hunza and Baltistan, into its fifth province. On the Indian side, there is the question of Buddhist-dominated Ladakh and Hindu-dominated Jammu regions, whose people are unlikely to join Pakistan in any plebiscite.

Speaking on a television talk program last week, Chief Minister Abdullah said any attempt to alter the present boundaries of Kashmir could result in the displacement of vast numbers of people and a bloodbath such as the one that accompanied the partition that created Pakistan in 1947. "The solution lies in the conversion of the LoC into an international border, ease of movement across it and greater autonomy for both regions," Abdullah said.

(Inter Press Service)

....Jen

-- posted by JenL_2

Top 64. Jan 24, 2002 8:25 PM

» JenL_2 - Re: India's Top 20 Terrorist list?

Steve - Here's the whole India Top 20 Terrorist List at 1/13 Guardian:

India's demands

Muzamil Jaleel
The Observer

India has issued four major demands that it insists must be met before it will it will agree to reduce its military activity on the border and negotiate with Pakistan. The Indian demands are:

a) The closure of all terrorist facilities in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir

b) An end to the infiltration of arms and men into Indian-adminstered Kashmir

c) Categorical and unambigious renunciation of terrorism in all its manifestations and wherever it exists, irrespective of the cause it seeks to further

d) The handing over of 20 men wanted for alleged crimes in India.

Who are these twenty man?

1. Maulana Masood Azhar is the leader of Jaish-i-Mohammad (Army of the Prophet Muhammad), the group blamed for the attack on India's parliament on December 13, 2001 which pushed the two nuclear neighbours to the verge of war.

His group is also blamed for the suicide attack on the Jammu and Kashmir State Legislative Assembly in which 38 people were killed on October 1 last year. Azhar was arrested in Indian-adminstered Kashmir in 1994 and was released at Kandahar in exchange for the crew and passengers of an Indian airliner which was hijacked during a routine Kathmandu-New Delhi flight in December, 2000.

Azhar is believed to be very close to the Taliban. Jaish conducted three suicide attacks inside Kashmir before the Parliament attack. One of the suicide attacks launched by the group on the Kashmir headquarters of the Indian Army on the eve of Chrismas in 2000 involved a British Muslim - Mohammad Bilal.

Jaish is an offshoot of another Jihadi group, Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, which was alleged to be responsible for the kidnapping of five western tourists in 1995, one of whom was a Norwegian who was later killed. The fate of the other tourists is still not known. Jaish-e-Mohammad claims to be fighting to establish a puritan Islamic rule in the Muslim world and seeks an end to Indian rule in Muslim-dominated Kashmir.

2. Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, leader of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (Army of the Pious), is a university teacher. His group is the largest Jihadi (Islamic fundamentalist) group operating in Kashmir and was the first to introduce lethal suicide attacks in the region following the Kargil clash between India and Pakistan in 1999. Lashkar-e-Taiba is also blamed for the attack on the parliament in New Delhi. The group used to operate openly from Muridke town, near Lahore (Pakistan) until its offices were closed down by the Pakistani government under pressure from the United States and Britain. The group has a pan-Islamic agenda and is fighting to end Indian rule in Kashmir.

3. Dawood Ibrahim, an Indian underworld don, is accused of planning and financing 13 explosions in Mumbai in 1993 in which almost 300 people died. Ibrahim is wanted in connection with cases of supplying arms, counterfeiting, drug trading, funding alleged criminals, murder and smuggling. The Indian government claims that he is living in Karachi, Pakistan.

4. Chhota Shakeelis a key associate of Dawood Ibrahim. He is wanted for murder, extortion, kidnapping and blackmailing businessmen and film stars in India. The Indian government alleges that he also works for the Inter Sespy for the ISI, and lives in Karachi.

5. "Tiger" Ibrahim Memon, accused of carrying out the 1993 Mumbai blasts, is wanted in connection with murder, extortion, kidnapping, terrorism and smuggling arms and explosives. The Indian government believes he is also living in Karachi.

6. Ayub Memon, Ibrahim Memon's brother, is also accused of carrying out the 1993 Mumbai blasts. He is wanted on charges of terrorism and smuggling in India. The Indian govenment claims that he lives in Karachi.

7. Abdul Razzak is also accused of involvement in the Mumbai blasts. He is wanted in connection with terrorism and arms smuggling in India. The Indian government claims that he lives in Karachi.

8. Syed Salahuddin is the leader of Hizbul Mujahideen, an indigenous Kashmiri militant group which seeks Kashmir's accession to Pakistan. A resident of Soibug in central Kashmir, Salahudin's actual name is Mohammad Yousuf Shah. He is around 55 years old. He had contested assembly elections in Indian-adminstered Kashmir in 1987 and was disillusioned with democratic means after the polls were allegedly rigged by a pro-India political group - the National Conference. He lives in Pakistani-adminstered Kashmir and is also the head of the United Jihad Council - a conglomerate of all Kashmiri militant groups fighting Indian rule. The Indian govenment blames him for conducting dozens of attacks in Kashmir.

9. Ibrahim Atharis an associate of Maulana Masood Azhar and allegedly one of the hijackers of Indian Airlines flight IC-814 from Kathmandu to Delhi in 1999 which led to the release of Azhar and two others. He is a member of Jaish-i-Mohammad and is wanted for hijacking, kidnapping and murder. The Indian government claims he lives in Bahawalpur, Pakistan.

10. Zahoor Ibrahim Mistri is a member of Harkat-ul-Mujahideen. Jaish-e-Mohammad is in fact an off-shoot of Harkat-ul-Mujahideen. He is wanted in connection with the hijacking of IC-814 and for cases of kidnapping and murder. The Indian government claims that Mistri lives in Karachi.

11. Shahid Akhtar Sayed is also wanted by the government of India for his alleged involvement in the hijacking of Indian Airliner IC-814 to Kandahar in 1999. The Indian government claims that he too lives in Karachi.

12. Azhar Yusuf is also wanted for the hijacking of Indian Airliner IC-814 in 1999. The Indian government believes that he too lives in Karachi.

13. Abdul Karim is a Kashmiri militant blamed for more than 30 bomb blasts in Delhi and parts of northern India in 1996-97. The Indian government claims that he lives in Lahore.

14. Ishaq Atta Hussain, an associate of Dawood Ibrahim, is wanted in connection with a conspiracy to kill Indian Home Minister L.K. Advani. The Indian government claims that he too lives in Karachi.

15. Sagir Sabir Ali Shaikh, an associate of Dawood Ibrahim, is also wanted in connection with the conspiracy to kill Indian Home Minister L K Advani and is believed to be living in Karachi.

16. Wadhawan Singh Babbaris the leader of the Sikh militant group Babbar Khalsa International, which was involved in an armed insurgency in Indian Punjab during the 1980s. The Indian government blames him for the assasination of the then chief minister of Punjab Beant Singh. The government believes that he is hiding in Lahore.

17. Ranjit Singh Neeta is chief of the Khalistan Zindabad Force - another Sikh militant group. The Indian government blames him for a number of murders, bomb blasts and arms smuggling cases. He is believed to be living in Lahore.

18. Paramjit Singh Panjwar is a leader of the Sikh militant group Khalistan Commando Force. Accused of trying to revive the Sikh insurgency in Indian Punjab, he is wanted for more than a dozen cases of murder, treason, conspiracy and arms smuggling in India. The Indian government claims that he lives in Lahore.

19. Lakhbir Singh Rode, leader of the International Sikh Youth Federation, is wanted for cases of arms smuggling and conspiracy to attack government leaders in New Delhi and Indian Punjab. The Indian government claims that he too lives in Lahore.

20. Gajinder Singh, the leader of a Sikh organisation, is accused of hijacking an Indian Airlines plane from Srinagar to Delhi in 1981. He was arrested by Pakistan after he hijacked the plane to Lahore and later released. The government of India claims that he lives in Lahore.

....Jen

-- posted by JenL_2