Rediff On The NeT: Better ties only after Pak gives up claim on Kashmir: Farooq

Better ties only after Pak gives up claim on Kashmir: Farooq

Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah on Monday said that unless Pakistan gave up its claim on the state, there was very little scope of normalising relations with Islamabad.

''We should not be optimistic about the coming Indo-Pak summit at Male on May 12. However, it will help break the ice between the neighbours,'' he said at a meet-the-press programme organised by the Press Club in New Delhi.

The chief minister said it took Pakistan 50 years to admit that areas like Gilgit, Skardu and Hunza did no belong to it. "So nothing much will happen when the two prime ministers meet at Male,'' he added.

Dr Abdullah cautioned the Gujral government against stopping investigation into various scams. ''If we try to hide anything, the people will throw us into the gutter. We should not opt for an attitude of witch-hunting, but at the same time we should allow probes into various scandals to reach to their logical conclusions,'' he said.

Asked whether Bihar Chief Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav should step down in the wake of the CBI decision to file a chargesheet against him in the Rs 9.5 billion fodder scam, Dr Abdullah said ''it is for him to decide.''

''I would have gone to the governor immediately and resigned temporarily and would have at the same time gone to court,'' he said, adding that law should take its own course and those involved in any scam should be brought to book.

Referring to the return of Kashmir migrants to the valley, he said, ''We should go slow. Whenever return of displaced persons to their homeland starts, the other side (militants) become active and make them soft targets.''

On his proposal that the Line of Control be converted into an international border, Abdullah said this agreed upon by then prime ministers of India and Pakistan, Indira Gandhi and Z A Bhutto.

''This is one of the practical solutions to end the dispute between India and Pakistan on the Kashmir problem. However, it is for the people of the two countries to take a final decision.''

He had his doors open for a dialogue with the Hurriyat leaders in Kashmir and had even made them an offer but they did not reciprocate.

UNI

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