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Pakistan looking ahead to Musharraf-Vajpayee meeting in NY

Despite India ruling out early resumption of a dialogue with Pakistan, the latter said it would welcome a meeting between President Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee at New York in September.

Pakistan also expressed its readiness to discuss with India the issue of terrorism at the level of foreign ministers.

"If Prime Minister Vajpayee wishes to meet President Musharraf, we will certainly welcome that," Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Inamul Haq told Indian reporters in Kathmandu when asked about the possibility of a meeting between the two leaders on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly session.

Haq's renewed offer for dialogue comes a day after India made it clear that appropriate conditions for talks did not exist and accused Pakistan of not delivering on its commitment to end infiltration and cross-border terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir.

Haq said that at the Agra summit it was agreed that the issue of terrorism in all its aspects would be discussed at the foreign minister's level. "We are ready to engage in these discussions."

He reiterated Pakistan's demand for an international neutral mechanism to monitor the Line of Control to see whether infiltration is taking place, a proposal rejected outright by India.

On India's proposal for joint patrolling, Haq said, "In a situation where more than one million men are staring at each other across the LoC fully armed, it is rather difficult to imagine a situation where they will have sufficient confidence in each other to start joint patrolling."

Asserting that the election in Jammu & Kashmir could not be a substitute for a solution to the problem or a plebiscite, he said, "Pakistan cannot accept the legality of such elections because they are contrary to UN Security Council resolutions." India considers these resolutions outdated.

Haq is attending the meeting of foreign ministers of the South Asian Association for Regional Co-operation in the Nepalese capital.

As the war of words continued, Haq said whatever was happening across the LoC on the Indian side was the responsibility of the Indian government. "In today's world no country should be allowed to be the accuser as well as the judge of a situation."

Elaborating on Pakistan's proposal for an international mechanism to be put in place on the LoC, he said this could be done either by strengthening the existing UN group stationed there or another force could be brought in.

Asked about the Pakistan minister's suggestion for a Musharraf-Vajpayee meeting and a neutral mechanism at the LoC, External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha shot back: "I am here for attending the meeting of SAARC. It is a multilateral forum. Yesterday, I stated India's position. I would not like to misuse the host facilities provided by the Nepalese government to discuss Indo-Pak relations."

Sinha said he would not respond to Inamul Haq's statements. "This is not the place or the time for it. Whatever I say now will have an impact on SAARC. We don't want the SAARC process to be affected adversely," he said.

"If someone else is doing it," he continued, "it is a bad thing. I do not want to follow that bad example."

Pressed further, he retorted, "If Inamul Haq has chosen to make some statements, let him make them. I will choose another time and another territory to respond.

"In any case, I am not having bilateral discussions. So why should I have bilateral discussions with him through the media?"

PTI

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