Pakistan to back solution acceptable to Kashmiris

A Kashmiri woman mourns the death of former militant Aijaz Ahmed outside his home in Srinagar yesterday. Ahmed disappeared the previous night and relatives were notified by police early yesterday to fetch his body from the main police station in the city. PHOTO: AFP

"President (Pervez) Musharraf told me that any solution acceptable to the people of Kashmir will be acceptable to Pakistan," Mirwaiz Umar Farooq told thousands of Muslims at the main mosque in Indian Kashmir's summer capital Srinagar.

Farooq is chief religious leader at the mosque and heads the moderate faction of the region's main separatist alliance, the All Parties Hurriyat Conference.

He and eight other moderate separatists returned home Thursday from a two-week trip to Pakistan and the zone of Kashmir under Islamabad's control.

"President Musharraf has asked me to convey his country's support to the people of Kashmir," he said, to cheers from the crowd who chanted, "We want freedom" and "Kashmir is ours. We will decide its destiny."

"He (Musharraf) said people, government and the leadership of Pakistan will always support the people of Kashmir and back them until a resolution of the dispute is found as per the wishes of Kashmiris."

Pakistan also believes that no resolution to its decades-old dispute with India over Kashmir can be found unless Kashmiris are involved, he added.

During their visit, the Hurriyat leaders held talks with Musharraf, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, and other leaders including Syed Salahuddin, chief of a broad alliance of groups battling Indian rule in Muslim-majority Kashmir.

Farooq said Musharraf had informed him that India and Pakistan were not only talking at the official level but also through backdoor channels.

The two nuclear-rivals started a peace process about 18 months ago to resolve their outstanding disputes including Kashmir.

Farooq said Islamabad had give the assurance it would take the Kashmiri leadership into its confidence and urged India to show the "same kind of seriousness."

"The time has come to involve Kashmiris in the peace process," Farooq said.

His remarks came as police reported the deaths of 14 people in a fresh wave of violence in the Indian portion of Kashmir.

Indian troops shot dead six militant infiltrators during a nightlong clash in the Tangdar sector of northern Kupwara district, which borders Pakistan-administered Kashmir, army spokesman Vijay Batra told AFP.

Batra said the slain rebels had infiltrated Indian Kashmir from the Pakistani portion of the disputed region.

In further violence, Indian troops shot dead four militants in the southern district of Doda and Pulwama late Thursday in three separate gunbattles, a police spokesman said.

In the district of Doda, suspected rebels shot dead a civilian late Thursday, police said.