'Confidential' talks on Kashmir
(BBC-Thursday, September 16, 1999 Published at 16:28 GMT 17:28 UK )
By Islamabad correspondent Owen Bennett-Jones
A senior Pakistani diplomat, Mr Niaz Naik, has said that, during the Lahore summit last February, the Indian and Pakistani prime ministers agreed to try to identify by the end of 1999 means by which the Kashmir dispute could be resolved.
The disclosure indicates that the Lahore summit was more significant than many people believed at the time.
According to Mr Naik, the two prime ministers committed themselves to making substantive progress on Kashmir by the end of 1999 and they agreed that, in order to make that progress, they would have to avoid working through their Foreign Offices and set up a private channel of communication.
Mr Naik became Nawaz Sharif's confidential envoy. His counterpart in India was the newspaper editor, RK Mishra.
The two men then met with a single agenda item - Kashmir - and they discussed possible compromises, with a view to reaching a final and not partial settlement of the dispute.
The back channel diplomacy, however, was exposed during the Kargil crisis and the two men have not met since.
The clear implication of Mr Naik's remarks is that the presence of Pakistani-backed forces on the Indian side of the Line of Control did undermine a genuine attempt by the two prime ministers to move towards a settlement on Kashmir.
Mr Naik has said that if Atal Behari Vajpayee is re-elected, then he is confident that the peace initiative can be revived. |
