Mehbooba Mufti backs Musharraf’s Kashmir policy
By Mariana Baabar
In a strong and passionate plea the visiting Kashmiri politician, PDP’s Mehbooba Mufti, asked the new government in Pakistan to continue with Pervez Musharraf’s Kashmir policy as this was not a personal policy of Musharraf, rather it provided Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) to the people of Kashmir.
She also praised the government of former prime minister AB Vajpayee who had agreed to the ‘permit system’ for Kashmiris from IHK to travel to Azad Kashmir on the Srinagar -Muzaffarabad bus instead of the usual passports and visas that Kashmiris use.
Mehbooba says she was impressed with Asif Ali Zardari, especially his grasp of the complicated Kashmir issue. “I want to stress that Musharraf’s Kashmir policy should not be seen as his personal policy, but rather the one that tried to address the problems of the people of Kashmir and provided them CBMs.
“Musharraf followed Nawaz Sharif. It was easier for Musharraf to take these steps because he had full authority and the military people do not have problems that politicians face. He was able to cross many obstacles, which is not so easy for politicians. Politicians just cannot do that because they have their own limitations. This is not Musharraf’s policy. It is a necessity of the Kashmiris,” Mehbooba said in her address to a conference on ‘Peace Process and Kashmir’ at the auditorium of South Asia Free Media Association (Safma).
She said that though Musharraf might not be very popular but it has to be stressed that the CBMs he gave to the Kashmiris turned out to be great relief for them.
But she made it very clear that Musharaff’s Kashmir policy was not an end in itself and certainly not the solution. “Let us not look at the formulae as a solution. Kashmir is about meeting the aspirations of its people and all three parts of Kashmir have their own specific aspirations. I am very hopeful but I do not have a solution. But certainly we do not want another partition, especially a religious partition,” she said.
When it was pointed out to her that just to put the record straight, Musharraf had certainly not followed Sharif, rather the then COAS had initiated the Kargil operation, which had altered the entire bilateral relations gambit between India and Pakistan. Why was she not ready to condemn Kargil?
Careful not to comment on internal issues of Pakistan, the Kashmiri politician replied, “I am not an expert on Kargil. It has been condemned several times. We do not want to go to the past, we need to see ahead”.
Mehbooba made it very clear that while they waited for a final resolution of Kashmir the people of the area could not sit and wait doing nothing as the world goes ahead.
Stressing the importance of trade and the difference this would make to the ordinary Kashmiri, Mehbooba said that Kashmir has links with Pakistan, Iran, China and the Central Asian Republics. She demanded that the roads leading into these areas should be opened for Kashmiris so that they could have access to movement and trade with their neighbours.
“Sovereignty is not about who is guarding the borders but how to cross borders,” she said.
Criticising the manner in which Kashmiris are deprived of electricity in summers and winters while the Kashmiri waters are used by India and Pakistan she said, “The fields of India and Pakistan are green with our water so we also want to be compensated. We want compensation from the Indus Water Treaty when these two countries use our water”.
Dilating on the nature of autonomy the Kashmiris wanted, she said autonomy was something that had been given to the Kashmiris before as well. “But this did not stop the prime minister to be put in jail. If we are going to speak about autonomy we need guarantees from both countries. We want autonomy with guarantees,” she demanded.
A Tribute to President Musharraf 