The Hindu : Musharraf wants Western arms embargo on India

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jun 20, 2003

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Musharraf wants Western arms embargo on India

By Hasan Suroor

LONDON JUNE 19. The Pakistan President, Pervez Musharraf, today called for a Western arms "embargo" on India, and ratcheted up the rhetoric over Kashmir, saying that he "cannot guarantee (that) nothing happens" there.

Portraying an alarming picture of India's growing defence capability in an interview to The Times, Gen. Musharraf urged Britain and America not to allow New Delhi to develop a military superiority over Pakistan, and reportedly warned that otherwise his country would be forced to rely on its nuclear weapons as the only real deterrent. He demanded restrictions on arms exports to India to prevent a "dangerous" military imbalance between the two countries.

On Kashmir and India's accusations of continuing Pakistan-backed cross-border terrorism, Gen. Musharraf said: "if they think I am going to stop even a bird from flying across the Line of Control, I will not. I cannot guarantee nothing happens in Kashmir". But he insisted that at present "nothing" was happening and that there was "not one terrorist camp in Kashmir".

A day after he warned that the "lull on the LoC" could not be sustained indefinitely without progress, Gen. Musharraf said that Kashmir was the "prime dispute to be resolved before any other topics could be discussed". "I am for resolving all possible disputes, but Kashmir is a part of all those disputes... What are the other issues? People don't even know what they are, that is their triviality," he said.

Gen. Musharraf, who met the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, on Tuesday and is on his way to Washington to meet the U.S. President, George W. Bush, complained that while the Indian defence spending was rising, Pakistan faced restrictions on buying arms and indicated that he intended to tell Mr. Bush: "There's an imbalance which is being created. Don't let it be created."

Nuclear option

He reportedly warned that Indian military superiority would leave Pakistan dependent on its nuclear arsenal. "Every country has to survive. Any country which wants to live in honour and dignity wants to preserve sovereign equality and its sovereignty. Nobody will compromise with that," Gen. Musharraf said.

Even as he tried to play down fears of a nuclear confrontation saying that "no sane person in normal conditions can ever even contemplate going into a non-conventional war", Gen. Musharraf said that "basically the best guarantee is to avoid conflict". He explained that "when a war starts (you don't know) what direction it will take because there are a lot of intangibles which then come in the way..."

Gen. Musharraf's remarks were seen as an attempt to pressure America into lifting the restrictions on arms sales to Pakistan ahead of his meeting with Mr. Bush as well as a warning to India not to ignore Islamabad's nuclear option.

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