SRINAGAR: Stating that Government of India should not have called off Indo-Pak foreign secretary level talks scheduled to take place in Islamabad on August 25, Prof Saif-u-Din Soz, former union minister and president Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) on Monday said Narendra Modi led government should not make pretexts for calling off such important meetings.
Talking to KNS, Soz said: What Manish Tewari commented was a reminder to Modi led government that BJP was criticizing Congress unnecessarily. He never demanded that foreign secretary level talks must be called off. Tewari had questioned the Modi led Government’s silence over Pakistan High Commissioner Abdul Basit’s invitation to Kashmiri separatist leaders for talks before the foreign secretaries of the two countries meet in Islamabad on August 25.
Soz said that Modi led government should not have used such pretexts to call off foreign secretary level talks. Yes we know that Hurriyat leaders have not achieved much by visiting Pakistan high commission but the government of India could have taken up this issue on the margins of foreign secretary level talks.
Earlier during the day, Pakistan High Commissioner Abdul Basit met separatist leader Shabir Shah in the first of a series of meetings planned over three days. Just after calling off the foreign secretary level talks, the foreign ministry spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin said India had asserted “in clear and unambiguous terms that Pakistan’s continued efforts to interfere in India’s internal affairs is unacceptable.”
The PCC president said that since Mr Modi has said that he wants to improve relations with Pakistan, he should have not made invitation to separatists or anything else a pretext to call of the meeting. The visit of Najma Helptulla and Ram Jethmalani to Kashmir indicated that government of India wanted to hold dialogue with separatists and these things keep on happening on a broader level. At least the foreign secretary level talks should have continued, Soz added.
Expressing disappointment at the cancellation of proposed foreign secretary level talks with Pakistan, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti today said it is a highly negative development that casts a shadow on the atmosphere of reconciliation generated by the invitation to Nawaz Shareef in swearing in ceremony of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
In a statement she said meeting between Pakistan high commissioner and Hurriyat leaders is nothing new and it is a very flimsy ground for shelving bold initiative that was taken by BJP government in resuming diplomatic talks with Pakistan.
Mehbooba said inspite of the realization that there is no alternative to dialogue between two countries, it is beyond comprehension as to what is achieved by such knee jerk reaction to the routine events like the Pakistan high commission invite to separatists which has been a tradition for many years. She said such meetings have taken place during Congress led government and also during the previous NDA government led by Vajpayee. If this could be tolerated then it makes hardly any sense for them now to be seen as provocative.
Mehbooba said the Indo-Pak relations have become cat and mouse game between BJP and Congress and both try to create hurdles in normalization process when they are in opposition. She said if Sharm-al-Shiekh was sabotaged by BJP, it is now the Congress which has taken it upon itself to subvert the Modi initiative for resumption of talks. In the process Jammu and Kashmir continues to suffer the hostility between the two countries and the people of the state obviously feel saddened.
The ruling National Conference has also questioned the cancellation of the talks. “It is not the question whether you condemn it or not, what we believe is that when the separatists had been meeting Pakistan in the past, why the questions are being raised over the process at present, NC general secretary Ali Mohammad Sagar said in a statement.
He maintained further that holding meeting is not a big issue at all and not this much serious that the foreign secretary talks have been called off all of a sudden. The separatists have often been meeting the Pakistan. They even go to Iftaar parties and Pakistan day. They have been meeting the pak high commissioner and the same was a routine, what they issue is turning out to be of a serious nature is beyond understanding, Sagar said.
He added that when the BJP is claiming to adopt the policy of the former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee vis-à-vis Kashmir, why is taking the steps in reluctance. He said that during Vajpayees tenure, separatists met Musharaf several times and also held meetings with Vajpayee over Kashmir. Our stand is that talks can take us further and open up the new horizons. We have to talk so that issues could be amicably resolved.
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