Musharraf advice on Siachen ploy to gain attention: Experts
By IANSFriday, October 8, 2010
NEW DELHI - Former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf’s advice to solve Siachen glacier dispute first and then to attempt Kashmir issue is “a desperate attempt to gain attention”, experts here said Friday.
“It is an unsolicited advice from a former dictator who has lost all his credibility,” Ajai Sahni, executive director of New Delhi-based Institute of Conflict Management, told IANS.
E.N. Rammohan, former director general of the Border Security Force(BSF) and a security expert, said: “Siachen is not a major dispute legally. Musharraf is attempting to exaggerate the issue and earn brownie points.”
Musharraf told the Hindustan Times in London Thursday that India-Pakistan ties could be improved immediately by focussing on the Siachen and Sir Creek disputes and dealing with Kashmir later.
Sahni said: “First of all, Musharaf has lost all credibility. He is making a desperate attempt to gain attention and support by launching a political party and making statements. He is not passing on any great wisdom.”
He said the former military ruler of Pakistan had driven his country to a infinitely worse condition. “His wrong policies worsened the situation in Pakistan and the entire South Asia.”
Sahni said India did no need advice from a self-confessed supporter of terrorism like Musharraf.
In an interview to Der Spiegel, Musharraf had said that Pakistan had helped in training militants, but he later clarified that the magazine drew the “wrong meaning of his statement”.
Rammohan, who had served in Jammu and Kashmir, said that the Siachen dispute was “manufactured and exaggerated by the Pakistani side”.
Siachen glacier is the highest battlefield in the world.
“When the United Nations demarcated the line of control (LOC) in late 1940s, the demarcation on the glacier was done without much dispute. However, Pakistan created confusion later and has involved China in the dispute too by including the Karakoram Pass issue,” he said.
Musharraf is trying to exaggerate several minor issues in the disguise of solving the Kashmir problem, he added.
