Washington
Dr Ghulam Nabi Fai, Secretary General of Washington-based World Kashmir Awareness Forum (WKAF), has warmly welcomed Dr Moeed Yusuf, Special Advisor to Prime Minister of Pakistan on National Security and Strategic Policy, for stressing the need to include the genuine Kashmiri leadership in any future Pak-India talks on the Kashmir dispute.
Reacting positively to Dr Moeed’s interview with renowned Indian journalist, Karan Thapar, Dr Ghulam Nabi Fai in a statement said, “We whole-heatedly welcome the articulation of Dr Yusuf to include the Kashmiri leadership in the talks. The people of Kashmir will welcome any talks between India and Pakistan as long as the genuine leadership of the people of Jammu & Kashmir is the part of process of negotiations. They steadfastly maintain that tripartite talks are the only way to resolve the Kashmir issue that has dominated the South Asian region for over 73 years. They maintain this constructive position, despite the outrage caused and the indescribable suffering inflicted on them, by the barbarities of the Indian occupational forces.”
Dr Fai said this in response to the disclosure made by Dr Moeed during the interview that India sent a message to Pakistan for its desire to a conversation.
“The people of Kashmir want to emphasize that as the dispute involves three parties -Government of India, Government of Pakistan and the people of Kashmir who are the most directly affected – any attempt to strike a deal between two parties without the association of the third, will fail to yield a credible settlement. The contemporary history of South Asia is abundantly clear that bilateral efforts have never met with success,” Dr Fai added.
Referring to the futility of bilateral talks on the Kashmir dispute, he said, “It is a matter of record that during the 72 years history of dispute, India has merely used the façade of talks to evade settlement and ease internal or external pressure.” Dr Fai maintained that Dr Moeed’s approach is based on pragmatism when he said there can be no progress in talks if they are not accompanied by practical measures, like release all political prisoners, lifting of military siege, withdrawal of domicile law, end to human rights abuses and cessation of Indian state terrorism in IIOJK.
He said that in the past, India had not desisted from its human rights violations while announcing its intent to talk. “India has to be told in an understandable language that peace cannot be held, nor continued as long as terror reigns over Kashmir and India remains at war with Kashmiris,” he added.
Emphasizing the need for a third party mediation, Dr Fai hoped that the UN Secretary General would intensify his watch over the situation in IIOJK and initiate some mediatory initiatives.—KMS
