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| Salahuddin attacks some Kashmiri separatist leaders | | India 'only trying' to divide Kashmiris: Hizbul chief | | BL KAK
NEW DELHI, JAN 13
Should Maulvi Umar Farooq, chairman of the moderate faction of the All Party Hurriyat Conference (APHC), decide to meet Syed Salahuddin, supremo of the Hizbul Mujahideen, during his upcoming visit to Pakistan, he will have to answer some awkward questions by the latter. Any doubts in this regard have been set at rest by Salahuddin himself by launching an attack on some separatist leaders from Kashmir for their unnecessary contact or interaction with New Delhi.
These leaders also include Maulvi Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik, chief of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF). That Salahuddin does not favour direct talks a group of Kashmiri separatisat leaders, including Maulvi Umar Farooq and Yasin Malilk, had with the government of India recently is borne out by his observation in the course of a media interview: "With all due respect I must say that these people are not serving any interest of their people by talking directly to India. They say India does notg consider it (Kashmir) a tripartite issue, so they turned into a trilateral issue".
Who will represent the Kashmirs if India agreed to allow tripartite talks on Kashmir problem? Pat came Salahuddin's reply: "Thoise who ask for the right of self-determination for the Kashmiris will go for talks. In the first round of talks, the UN resolution should be implemented. Under this resolution whatever mechanism is adopted will be acceptable to us". Emphasizing that it is a matter of millions of people's destiny, Salahuddin was quoted as asserting: "It cannot be decided by the talks of only a few personalites like Mirwaiz (Umar Farooq) or any other person".
At a time when Indian leadership highlighted the need and relevance of bilateralism to settle all outstanding issues between India and Pakistan, the supremo of the Hizbul Mujahideen let it be known that while Kashmir "is not a border dispute which can be resolved" by Gen. Parvez Musharraf talking to Indian Premier, Manmohan Singh, the Kashmiris "have to be included in the talks". And Salahuddin lamented: "Some Kashmiri leaders tried to solve this issue through bilateral talks, which is again negating the tripartite level".
Tripartite talks, involving India, Pakistan and representatives from Kashmir, will, according to Salahuddin, give "equal rights" to the Kashmiris along with India and Pakistan. His warning: "Trilateral is a useless exerciuse which will yield no fruit in the future". His allegation: India is only trying to divide the Kashmiris by talking to some people belonging to our region". His finding: Those (from the Hurriyat Conference) who started talks with India got nothing.
Salahuddin alia Yousaf Shah tops the list of 20 "most wanted" people which India provided to Pakistan and Interpol not long ago. Salahuddin was found bitter after Indian External Affairs Ministry spokesman, Navtej Sarna, on July 22 last year, formally demanded that Pakistan arrest Salahuddin and hand him over to India. That Salahuddin is confident of Islamabad's continuing support to him is borne out by the reiteration of his oneliner: "The question of Pakistan handing me over to India just does not arise".
Salahuddin, who obtained a master's degree in political science from Kashmir University in 1971, joined the Jamaat-e-Islami party after his education and contested the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly election in 1987. After he lost the election amidst allegations of widespread rigging, he abandoned politics, took up arms and became a founder member of the dreaded Hizbul Mujahideen in 1989.
He is now the 'supreme commander' of the Hizbul Mujahideen and the United Jihad Council (UJC), an umbrella organisation of 19 terror groups involved in Jammu and Kashmir. His reaction to Gen. Musharraf's recent proposals in relation to Kashmir's future ran thus: "Unfortunately, India has never demonstrated sincerity in resolving the Kashmir dispute through peaceful means. We don't have any doubts about the sincerity of President Musharraf who is adamant to solve this issue, but his recent proposals are a big shift in Pakistan's Kashmir policy". Adds the Hizbul Mujahideen chief: "These proposals are also a shift from the views of the people of Kashmir, who have demanded liberation, self determination and a solution according to United Nations resolutions".
Even as New Delhi is known for its peace plans in relation to Pakistan and the troubled State of Jammu and Kashmir, Salahuddin has, for obvious political and strategic reasons, chosen to extol the stand taken by Gen. Musharraf vis-a-vis Kashmir problem. "This kind of flexible approach or shift in the policy of Pakistan has always been viewed as weakness by India. Even now India is not ready to consider Kashmir a dispute", Salahuddin said and added: "Pakistan has initiated to solve this issue through a unilateral ceasefire and different CBMs (Confidence Building Measures), but all these measures have not led to a decline in the atrocities committed by Indian security forces in Kashmir. Rather, this has increased day by day".
On Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh's desire for a peace treaty between India and Pakistan, Salahuddin had this to say: "There have been 131 rounds of talks between India and Pakistan in the past and the Simla, Tashkent and Lahore declarations, but we had zero outcome out of them. Unless you are going to discuss the core issue of Kashmir, any treaty will be futile because the same issue has caused three wars between these two countries and the threat of a fourth war is again hanging on our heads.... Any new peace treaty between India and Pakistan will be fruitless if it is not about the resolution of the basic dispute, which is Kashmir".
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