On Saturday, the country's leading newspapers published the transcript of an interview the head of state had given to Pakistan's private TV channel ARV.
Pervez Musharaff spoke highly of the positive statements made by three Indian political leaders during their recent telephone contacts with him (Indian National Congress leader Sonia Gandhi, new Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee).
The Pakistani President believes that such statements by India's leading politicians demonstrate their determination to carry on with the negotiations aimed at restoring lasting peace in the region through joint search of a political solution to all contentious issues, the Kashmir settlement remaining on top of the agenda.
The President emphasized the need for taking a pragmatic approach to the Kashmir problem. India "is not able to seize our part of Kashmir by force, just like we are not able to seize their part of Kashmir; both parties are fully aware of this status quo," Pervez Musharaff stressed.
The Pakistani President confirmed that he was firmly determined to clear the areas of the country's Northwestern Province bordering on Afghanistan of the terrorists linked to the Al Qaeda. These lands are better known by their historical name of Pushtunistan or as Afghans choose to call them, a zone of independent Pushtun tribes (at the end of the 19th century when Afghanistan was ruled by Emir Abdurahman, this territory was annexed by the United Kingdom and made part of India, then a British colony).
Following the ouster of the fundamentalist Islamic regime in Afghanistan in September-November 2001 (marking the start of the anti-terrorist operation under the auspices of the US-led coalition), the top leadership of the Taliban and Al-Qaeda, including, according to US intelligence sources, Taliban's spiritual leader Mullah Omar and terrorist No. 1 Osama ben-Laden, allegedly found refuge in the hard-to-access Suleiman Mountains on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border (this reminds us of a previous bombardment, albeit futile, of the Tora Bora cave system in southern Afghanistan by the US aviation). From there, the terrorists, who enjoy support of the local population, particularly among the numerous Pushtu wasir tribes, undertake regular military sallies against the new Afghani authorities and international peacekeepers - ISAF).
"Wide sections of the Pakistani people are demanding it," Pervez Musharaff underlined.
According to him, it is the Al Qaeda that is behind a recent series of terrorist acts in Pakistan, including an assassination attempt on his own life.
In his Friday interview to the Al Arabia TV channel, the Pakistani President announced that Islamabad was ready to cut down on its nuclear arsenal in case India takes the first step in this direction. He also confirmed his commitment to the concept of making South Asia a nuclear-free zone.
"We have no military ambitions. Our army is just a deterrence force," Pervez Musharaff pointed out.
On June 19-20, as previously agreed, Indian and Pakistani experts are to hold consultations in Delhi to discuss development of new mutual trust-building measures in the nuclear sector. On June 27-28, the Indian capital city will host a meeting of the two countries' deputy foreign ministers who are going to discuss various security-related issues and development of mutually-acceptable approaches to the Kashmir settlement.
Of the three wars India has led to date, two were with Pakistan over Kashmir, an area predominantly populated by Muslims. On the whole, India won but had to pay a dear price for the victory. A part of the long-suffering Indian state was, on the sly, eventually seized by China. Pakistan made a gift of nearly 5,000 sq. kilometers of the Shaksgam valley (then under India's control) to its great neighbor. China immediately sent its troops to the area. As a result, Beijing became if not an open ally but at least a friendly neutral side for Islamabad in the conflict. Kashmir, however, eventually turned into a loose patchwork of territories. One part of it, with the capital city of Srinagar, remained under India's control. It is subject, however, to continuous raids of terrorists who undertake their inroads into India from their bases in the so-called Kashmir Territories Occupied by Pakistan (this term is current in India whereas Islamabad refers to these lands as its North Territories). In turn, the narrow strip of land (captured by Pakistan during the latest Kashmir war) is referred to by Islamabad as the Free Kashmir (Azad Kashmir). Today, it is fully ruled by Pakistani military and civilian authorities. As things stand now, India controls 45 percent of the rebellious state, Pakistan - about 33 percent, with the rest remaining under the Chinese administration.
After both India and Pakistan got hold of own nuclear weapons, many political observers began to talk about a possibility of the forth, this time atomic, war between India and Pakistan.
