India and Pakistan exchange threats in Kashmir border dispute

Greetings,

India and Pakistan exchange threats in Kashmir border dispute

By Sampath Perera
Source: www.wsws.org

Tensions between India and Pakistan along the Line of Control (LoC) in the disputed Kashmir region remain acute, with New Delhi and Islamabad charging one another with initiating the past eight days of intermittent border clashes.

A “flag meeting” yesterday between Indian and Pakistani military officers at the LoC reportedly ended in failure after just 15 minutes. According to a report in the Indian-based Hindu, the leader of the Indian delegation, Brigadier T.S. Sandhu, said India reserves the “right to retaliate” until Pakistan issues a public apology for an alleged cross-border raid on January 8 in which two Indian soldiers were reportedly killed, with one of them subsequently beheaded.

The Pakistani military delegation rejected all the Indian charges. It accused India of systematically violating the 2003 ceasefire agreement by building additional bunkers in recent months, then on January 6 crossing into Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, killing one Pakistani soldier and critically injuring another.

Earlier Monday, the head of the Indian Army, General Bickram Singh, gave a belligerent speech in which he leveled new charges against Pakistan and urged his subordinate officers in Kashmir “to be aggressive and offensive in face of provocation and fire… No passivity is expected of them.”

Speaking at a press conference at the annual India Army day ceremony, General Singh charged that Pakistan’s alleged January 8 cross-border raid had been a “premeditated and pre-planned” action. He amplified previous inflammatory Indian charges about the beheading of one its soldiers, calling it a “gruesome, most unpardonable act.” He then warned that the Indian Army reserved “the right to retaliate at a time and place of its choosing.”

In an article entitled, “Fight Pakistan fire with fire, Army chief orders commanders on LoC,” the Times of India reported: “Although Gen. Singh emphasized the current tension would not escalate into a conflagration, holding that several stages have to be crossed before the countries go to a full-scale war, he did admit that the first stage of the spiral has been reached.”

In other words, New Delhi is actively considering punitive military action, gambling that any subsequent escalation between the nuclear-armed states can be controlled and contained.

On Saturday, Indian Air Force head, Air Chief Marshal N.K. Browne, implicitly raised the possibility of military action against Pakistan beyond the current daily exchanges of artillery and gun fire. “We are monitoring the situation very carefully,” Browne said, “because if these things continue the way they are and the violations continue to take place, then perhaps we may have to look at some other options for compliance.”

On the same day, Indian Foreign Minister Salman Kurshid indicated that the Congress Party-led government was under huge pressure to strike at Pakistan diplomatically and militarily. Though he named no one, Kurshid was clearly pointing to sections of India’s military-national security apparatus and the Hindu supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party. “We’re not going to be pressurized by wild calls for revenge and reaction,” said Kurshid.

Speaking Monday, Kurshid reaffirmed the government’s support for continuing the comprehensive peace process that India and Pakistan initiated in 2003, but which has made little progress. “When you make an enormous investment in the peace process,” said Kurshid, “you don’t just do it because it sounds good.”

Pakistan’s government has also repeatedly reaffirmed its support for the peace process, which only resumed last February after an effective three-year suspension. But these affirmations have been coupled, as in the case of India, with threatening statements from Pakistan’s military leaders…..more here

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