/ 12 January 2007

India: Kashmir rebels still operating from Pakistan

Training camps for Muslim militants fighting Indian rule in Kashmir are still functioning across the border in Pakistan, the Indian army said on Friday, ahead of talks between the two sides.

Pakistan has long denied the existence of such camps and says it is doing all it can to stop the movement of militants into the Indian side of Kashmir, where a revolt has raged since 1989.

But a top Indian army commander said militants were continuing to operate from Pakistan.

”As per information, the terrorist camps are still there. They have not been wound up,” Lieutenant-General AS Sekhon told reporters in Srinagar, Indian Kashmir’s main city.

”Some militant communication hubs, located on their side of the Line of Control … are still functional,” he added, referring to the heavily militarised ceasefire line that divides Kashmir between India and Pakistan.

Sekhon’s comments came ahead of a visit by Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee to Pakistan to try and push forward a cautious three-year-old peace process between the nuclear-armed neighbours.

Though analysts do not expect any major breakthrough during Mukherjee’s two-day trip beginning on Saturday — the first by an Indian foreign minister in over 15 months — they say both sides are expected to discuss ways to resolve their dispute over Kashmir.

Indian officials say more than 40 000 people have been killed in the revolt against New Delhi’s rule in Jammu and Kashmir, mainly Hindu India’s only Muslim-majority state.

Human rights groups put the toll at around 60 000 dead or missing. – Reuters