Daily Excelsior....News Page

Opposition supports Govt’s steps against Pakistan

NEW DELHI, Dec 30: Major opposition parties today came out in full support of the measures taken by the Government against Pakistan following the December 13 terrorist strike on Parliament and sought maximum scope for diplomatic steps to force Islamabad to rein in terrorist outfits as no one wanted a war.

The refrain at the meeting of political parties convened by Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee was that "maximum scope" should be given to the use of diplomatic measures against Islamabad which has not given enough evidence so far to prove that it was really acting against terrorist groups.

Briefing reporters after a two-hour-long meeting, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pramod Mahajan said the meeting felt that it was very difficult to believe the steps Islamabad says it has taken against terrorists and their outfits operating on its soil.

A major highlight of the meeting was the decision by the Government to send high-level delegations of members of the Government as also political parties to key world capitals to mobilise opinion in favour of India in its fight against Pakistan-backed cross-border terrorism.

Mahajan said the delegations would start leaving by the second half of January and some of them would be led by senior opposition leaders.

He said a decision to this effect was taken following suggestions from some opposition leaders that India should send such delegations as part of its stepped up diplomatic initiatives.

Leader of the opposition in Lok Sabha Sonia Gandhi and senior Congress leader Manmohan Singh, CPI(M) general secretary Harkishan Singh Surjeet, CPI veteran A B Bardhan, his party collegue Ajay Chakravarty, Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee, P H Pandian (AIADMK), P A Sangma (NCP), Ramgopal Yadav (SP), Raghuvansh Prasad Singh (RJD) and Sushil Indora (INLD) participated in the meeting.

Union Ministers L K Advani, Jaswant Singh and Yashwant Sinha and National Security Adviser Brajash Mishra represented the Government.

All the leaders approved the action taken by the Government so far and were appreciative of the future diplomatic strategy unveiled by External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh at the meeting, Mahajan said.

"The approach of every leader at today’s meeting was very cooperative and highly constructive. It was an excellent show of Indian unity whenever the integrity is under threat," Mahajan said.

The meeting saw Singh emphasising that India’s military deployment on the boders was "purely a defensive deployment".

Mahajan quoted Singh as saying "one must understand that we are not a party which is aggressive and we are a party which is aggrieved before the international community".

Asserting that the military deployment by India was necessitated because there was deployment from Pakistan, Mahajan said Indian military deployment was "200 per cent defensive".

Mahajan said no one from the Government side or the opposition side raised the issue of military initiative.

Insisting that none in the Government or in the opposition was keen on a war, he said no sane person would go for a war.

Asked whether opposition leaders sought any information on military preparedness or whether Government briefed them on the issue, Mahajan said opposition leaders told the Prime Minister that they did not want any information about the deployment.

"It is for the Government to take a decision at the appropriate time", the opposition told the Government adding "if the war is thrust on us, we should face it unitedly", Mahajan said.

Speaking in similar vein, Bardhan said no one from the opposition asked for any military details. "Military details should be left to the military," he said.

Mahajan said the Government was also in the process of preparing a list of wanted terrorists who have at present found shelter in Pakistan.

He said Islamabad had so far not given any solid proof of its sincerity in acting against terrorists and their outfits.

Ramgopal Yadav of Samajwadi Party was of the view that the Government should concentrate on steps on the diplomatic front against Pakistan as world opinion has become "slightly softer" about Islamabad after its action against terrorists.

Bardhan said the steps taken by Islamabad were not enough and much more required to be done by it. (PTI)

Pak steps against terrorists ‘a joke’, says Advani

NEW DELHI, Dec 30: Describing Islamabad’s steps against terrorist outfits as "a joke", Home Minister L K Advani today said Pakistan can even now give "firm assurance" to the world community and India that it would stop aiding and abetting terrorism in order to prevent New Delhi from taking any measure at the non-diplomatic level.

"So far steps have been taken at the diplomatic level only, and even such strong measures have not been taken in the past. Any step at the non-diplomatic level can be taken only because our neighbour continues to support terrorism," Advani told `Hum Hazir Hain’ programme on Doordarshan’s national channel. "Even today it can give a firm assurance to US and the world community that it will stop aiding and abetting terrorism. Our real fight is not with Pakistan but with terrorism and those who support it." Stating that terrorism had crossed the "Lakshman Rekha" with the December 13 attack on Parliament, Advani said "no sovereign nation which is conscious of its right to security can sit silent. It has to think as to what steps need to be taken to check this menace".

Referring to Islamabad’s response to India’s demands for taking action against terrorist outfits Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad, the Home Minister said "to our demands for freezing of their assets or arresting their leaders, there is till now no sign of anything concrete. Their response to our demands is .... A joke.

"We are not going to be taken by this kind of deceptive cosmetics, but must make terrorism our prime target," he asserted.

"While terrorism is dangerous, the most dangerous is the state which sponsors terrorism, arms and finances terrorist groups. Therefore Taliban and Pakistani regime are most dangerous," Advani said, adding "if Islamabad stops aiding and abetting them, we can handle them. But there is no sign of that so far."

On similar lines, he said the United States had made Taliban their target, "displaced" them from power and installed a new Government in Kabul, though Osama bin Laden has not yet been caught and no one knows whether he is dead or alive.

Referring to India’s long years of suffering on account of terrorism, Advani said in reply to questions and remarks "the war is on, if not declared but definitely covert.

"We have to decide now as to what our response should be — whether we are going to respond as we have been doing so far or are we going to change our response to meet the new situation", he said.

Advani said while the people’s feelings have to be taken into account in a democracy, several other factors like the response of the armed forces and the inputs received from intelligence agencies have to be taken into account to decide on the response the Government should take.

"I can understand the people’s feelings in this regard. Soon after September 11 terror strikes in the US, people started asking what is (President) Bush doing or is he afraid of taking action. But now they (US) have removed Taliban. So the process takes time," the Home Minister said.

He said India has so far made "graded responses" at the diplomatic level like recalling Indian High Commissioner, downgrading of staff and stoppage of overflights. "These are parts of stage by stage diplomatic responses" and Government will have to decide whether to "escalate" it or not. "I will continue to talk to the opposition to convince them on the need for such a law ... One of the prime motives of which is to give legal safeguards to police and security personnel whose acts against terrorists are bonafide."

On the Kashmiri migrants issue, he said the issue needed to be raised at the international fora as "the world community simply doesn’t know that 3-4 lakh Kashmiri Pandits have been displaced from their homes. Like the Tibetan issue, this also needs to be highlighted." The State Government had formed a committee and was also involved in that process, he added. On his upcoming trip to the US, Advani said it was intended to "mould" the opinion in that country as the media and the people "know much less about India" and its fight against terrorism.

In reply to questions, he said though Washington’s move to make Islamabad a front-ranking ally in the fight in Afghanistan could have been prompted by "geographical compulsions" and ISI’s links with Taliban, "Indian people do not understand" how Pakistan became a front-runner in the international coalition against terrorism.

To a question on his formulation of a "proactive policy" against terrorists in J and K, Advani said the policy was to search, identify and eliminate or arrest the terrorists instead of reacting to their attacks.

"Hot pursuit is not the intention. The intention is not merely to react but to be proactive. That policy is continuing till date," he said. (PTI)