NEW DELHI (Islamweb & Agencies) - India said on Thursday that it was ready to discuss the disputed territory of Kashmir at this weekend's summit with Pakistan, but would not be making any new proposals on the matter.(Read photo caption below)
``India has not ever fought shy of talking to Pakistan on Jammu and Kashmir,'' External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh told a news conference. ``But we don't have any set proposal.''
Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has said several times that the focus of the July 15 summit must be on the Himalayan territory of Kashmir, of which Pakistan controls around a third and over which the neighbors have fought two wars.
But New Delhi -- which has been fighting an insurgency against its rule in Kashmir for the past 11 years -- says the whole of the territory belongs to India and has stressed that there will be no retreat from that position.
Underlining the intractability of the dispute, authorities in Indian-controlled Kashmir said on Thursday that that eleven people had been killed in blasts and gunbattles since Wednesday.
An army officer said four soldiers were among those killed by a dormant artillery shell or land mine in the Kargil district, where a bloody conflict on snow-capped peaks almost tipped India and Pakistan into a fourth war two years ago.
India says it wants to discuss a raft of issues with Pakistan to ease tensions between the two countries, both of which have nuclear weapons capability.
``Composite dialogue is something Pakistan agreed to also,'' Singh said when asked what he thought of Pakistan's insistence that Kashmir dominates the agenda. ``I am astonished at suggestions it should be abandoned now.''
But the row over the only Muslim-majority state in Hindu-dominated India continued to cast its shadow on the summit.
STORM IN A TEACUP
A storm over the guest list at a tea party for Musharraf at the Pakistani embassy in New Delhi has been the sourest note struck in the run-up to the talks.
Leaders of India's ruling coalition, led by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, say they will not attend the high tea -- a colonial tradition of drinks and polite conversation -- because Kashmiri nationalists had been invited.The main opposition Congress party, whose leader Sonia Gandhi was due to discuss the summit with Vajpayee on Thursday evening, also appeared to be planning a boycott of the reception.
Congress leader K. Natwar Singh said Musharraf was ``not taking into account the sensitivity of the host nation'' by insisting on making contact with the Kashmiri nationalists.
``This does not augur well for the visit,'' he said.
But foreign minister Singh said that despite the row, he was confident the summit would continue as planned.
Pakistan says the wishes of the state's people need to be taken into account. Since 1948 it has sought the implementation of a U.N.-resolution which called for plebiscite to determine whether the region should be folded into India or Pakistan.
PHOTO CAPTION:
Indian police stand on roof tops surrounding the ancestral home of the grandfather of Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf in New Delhi, July 12, 2001. Musharraf is due to visit the house during his trip to India this weekend when he will meet with Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee in Agra to discuss bilateral between the rival nations. (Pawel Kopczynski/Reuters)