An attack by suspected Islamic rebels killed a dozen people in the Indian portion of Kashmir ahead of talks today between India and Pakistan on their dispute over the Himalayan region -- one of the world's most dangerous flashpoints and a key hurdle in their revived peace process.
India accuses Pakistan of collaborating with the rebels, who want independence for Indian Kashmir or its merger with Muslim-dominated Pakistan. Pakistan denies the allegation, which is a key source of rancor between the sides.
Reports of the attack boosted tension on the eve of the talks. Suspected rebels in Kashmir's Surankot region opened fire early yesterday, killing 12 sleeping people and wounding eight -- most of them from a military-trained village security force -- police said. No one immediately claimed responsibility.
Nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan have fought two full-scale wars over Kashmir as well as a brief border war in 1999, and narrowly avoided another conflict in 2002. Both claim the territory in its entirety.
The two days of talks between foreign secretaries starting today in New Delhi are the most recent peace initiatives launched with a summit in January. A week ago, the neighbors agreed to create a new nuclear hotline to reduce the risk of war and affirmed their commitment to a nuclear test ban.
The two countries haven't held substantive talks on resolving the Kashmir dispute since 1998, and this weekend's meeting was seen as a way to restart the negotiations -- without high expectations for an immediate breakthrough.
"This is an important round of talks," Pakistan Foreign Ministry spokesman Masood Khan told reporters.
India controls 46 percent of Kashmir, while Pakistan holds 35 percent. China controls the remaining 19 percent, some of which was captured from India in a 1962 war.
A dozen rebel groups have been fighting the government in India-controlled Kashmir since 1989 in a conflict that has killed more than 65,000 people, mostly civilians.
Pakistan Foreign Secretary Riaz Khokhar headed to India yesterday for the discussions with his Indian counterpart, Shashank, who goes by one name.
India is likely to propose a reduction in the number of troops along the Line of Control that divides Kashmir between the two neighbors, the Hindustan Times reported yesterday.
India and Pakistan have observed a ceasefire in Kashmir since November, but have jointly amassed nearly 1 million soldiers along the disputed border.
On Friday, Pakistan Foreign Minister Khursheed Kasuri said in a television interview that relations between the two countries were "inclined toward improvement," but urged the inclusion of Kashmiri leaders in negotiations.
"The earlier you involve them, the sooner a solution for the Kashmir issue can be found," he said.
The Indian government has been meeting since January with a moderate faction of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, an umbrella group of Kashmiri separatist political and religious groups.
Pakistan, however, recognizes a hardline faction led by Syed Ali Shah Geelani.
India is also expected to raise the issue of Islamic insurgents allegedly crossing from Pakistan-controlled Kashmir into Indian territory.
Pakistan says it doesn't allow terrorists on its soil but acknowledges giving political and diplomatic support to what it sees as the legitimate struggle of the Kashmiri people to end Indian occupation.
The foreign secretaries are also expected to discuss the resumption of bus services between their sections of Kashmir.
‘UNUSUAL EVENT’: The Australian defense minister said that the Chinese navy task group was entitled to be where it was, but Australia would be watching it closely The Australian and New Zealand militaries were monitoring three Chinese warships moving unusually far south along Australia’s east coast on an unknown mission, officials said yesterday. The Australian government a week ago said that the warships had traveled through Southeast Asia and the Coral Sea, and were approaching northeast Australia. Australian Minister for Defence Richard Marles yesterday said that the Chinese ships — the Hengyang naval frigate, the Zunyi cruiser and the Weishanhu replenishment vessel — were “off the east coast of Australia.” Defense officials did not respond to a request for comment on a Financial Times report that the task group from
Asian perspectives of the US have shifted from a country once perceived as a force of “moral legitimacy” to something akin to “a landlord seeking rent,” Singaporean Minister for Defence Ng Eng Hen (黃永宏) said on the sidelines of an international security meeting. Ng said in a round-table discussion at the Munich Security Conference in Germany that assumptions undertaken in the years after the end of World War II have fundamentally changed. One example is that from the time of former US president John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address more than 60 years ago, the image of the US was of a country
DEFENSE UPHEAVAL: Trump was also to remove the first woman to lead a military service, as well as the judge advocates general for the army, navy and air force US President Donald Trump on Friday fired the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General C.Q. Brown, and pushed out five other admirals and generals in an unprecedented shake-up of US military leadership. Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social that he would nominate former lieutenant general Dan “Razin” Caine to succeed Brown, breaking with tradition by pulling someone out of retirement for the first time to become the top military officer. The president would also replace the head of the US Navy, a position held by Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead a military service,
BLIND COST CUTTING: A DOGE push to lay off 2,000 energy department workers resulted in hundreds of staff at a nuclear security agency being fired — then ‘unfired’ US President Donald Trump’s administration has halted the firings of hundreds of federal employees who were tasked with working on the nation’s nuclear weapons programs, in an about-face that has left workers confused and experts cautioning that the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE’s) blind cost cutting would put communities at risk. Three US officials who spoke to The Associated Press said up to 350 employees at the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) were abruptly laid off late on Thursday, with some losing access to e-mail before they’d learned they were fired, only to try to enter their offices on Friday morning
RSS