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India opposes Hurriyat-Musharraf meeting

K J M Varma in Islamabad

India officially told Pakistan on Wednesday that it was unwilling to permit Hurriyat Conference leaders to meet President Pervez Musharraf on his forthcoming visit to India.

The Indian reservations on the Hurriyat leaders' efforts to resurrect themselves politically by meeting Musharraf in New Delhi has been conveyed at the highest level in Islamabad during consultations between the officials of the two countries to prepare the ground work for the forthcoming summit, official sources said.

The Indian stand of keeping the Hurriyat out of the broad parameters of the crucial summit assumed significance in the light of Tuesday's assertion by Musharraf that he would try his best to meet them during his stay in India.

Obviously, keeping the Indian reservations in mind, Musharraf, during his interaction with senior editors of Pakistani newspapers, said that while he continued to make efforts to meet the Hurriyat leaders, he did not want to force a confrontation with the Indian leadership on the issue.

After Hurriyat leaders failed to pressurise India to permit them to go to Islamabad for discussions with the Pakistani government, and were caught unawares by last month's move to invite Musharraf, they tried to regain lost ground by announcing their intention to meet the Pakistani leader in New Delhi.

Later, the Hurriyat leaders modified their stand by seeking a meeting with Musharraf and Vajpayee, sending similar letters to both. In response, Vajpayee has already repeated his suggestion to the Hurriyat leaders to meet the Centre's chief negotiator, Krishen Chandra Pant.

Knowing the Indian stand on the issue, the Pakistani mission in New Delhi tried to arrange a meeting in an 'innocuous' way by proposing to invite the Hurriyat leaders to a "high tea" to be hosted by the mission on July 14.

It has now been clarified that India has even turned down that suggestion, stating it was not acceptable.

The issue of the Hurriyat-Musharraf meeting was reportedly discussed at a meeting between Pakistan's Foreign Minister Abdul Sattar and former Hurriyat chairman Mirwaiz Umer Farooq in Mali at the foreign ministers' conference at the Organisation of Islamic Conference.

While it was officially confirmed in Islamabad that the two had a two-hour meeting, the details are not known.

Meanwhile, Pakistan's high commissioner in India, Ashraf Jehangir Qazi, has arrived in Islamabad for consultations with his government ahead of the summit.

Indo-Pak Summit 2001: The Complete Coverage

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