Date:10/10/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/10/10/stories/2008101060321600.htm

National

Moderate Hurriyat faction joins chorus for tripartite talks

Shujaat Bukhari

SRINAGAR: A day after the moderate faction of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC) led by Mirwaiz Umar Farooq offered to restart dialogue with New Delhi, the Co-ordination Committee sponsored by both the Hurriyat factions and the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) put a spanner on it saying that only tripartite talks will resolve the Kashmir issue.

After a meeting of committee attended by the Mirwaiz and representatives of Hurriyat’s faction led by Syed Ali Geelani and JKLF chairman Yasin Malik, it was stated that there was no change in the stand vis-À-vis the resolution of Kashmir issue which “is possible through tripartite talks only.”

“All the constituent members of Committee are with this stand,” said the Mirwaiz, whose faction is part of the newly-floated committee. “We do not reject the talks in principle but atrocities, arrests and killings cannot go hand in hand with dialogue,” he said after the meeting.

He said the committee had called for a Valley-wide strike from Friday afternoon till Saturday evening in protest against Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Kashmir for inauguration of Baghliar power project and railway line. “Economic and development packages are no answer to the problem of Kashmir,” he said.

The Mirwaiz asked government not to interfere in the matters related to trade across LoC and “leave it to the Kashmir Chamber which is hosting the delegation from across the border.”

Sources said that Mirwaiz faction was forced to toe the hardline stand in the committee, dominated by those supporting the stand adopted by Geelani.

On Wednesday, the APHC (Mirwaiz faction) said it was ready for talks in case the Union government withdrew what it called “black laws,” released political detenues and opened the traditional routes Kashmir had with Central Asia and other neighbouring countries. The statement termed the situation favourable for dialogue, but insisted that elections were not a substitute to dialogue and both India and Pakistan should engage in a meaningful and durable process to find an amicable solution to Kashmir issue.