In a clear message to US President Barack Obama and Richard Holbrooke, his special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, India has said that it will not accept US involvement in Kashmir.
National Security Advisor MK Narayanan said the government would adopt a wait-and-watch policy to gauge Obama’s reorientation of the US foreign policy in South Asia, especially regarding fighting the Taliban and the Al-Qaeda along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border and its “link” to the Kashmir dispute between India and Pakistan.
Speaking to Karan Thapar on CNBC TV18’s India Tonight programme, Narayanan said: “...references made by (US) President Obama, which seem to suggest that there is some kind of link between the settlement on Pakistan’s western border and the Kashmir issue, certainly have caused concern.”
In the event of Obama believing that there is a link between Pakistan’s eastern and western borders, he said, “I do think that we can make President Obama understand, if he does nurse any such view, that he is barking up the wrong tree. I think Kashmir today has become one of the quieter and safer places in this part of the world.”
He said some of Obama’s advisors could be “harking back to the pre-2000 era.” However, Narayanan said this would not be an issue and added he was confident that “...it should be possible for us to make him (Obama) understand or his advisors understand this problem. So we are not making this a big issue as of now.”
New Delhi has reacted cautiously to the appointment of Holbrooke, whose brief is to handle the terror threat along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. He is slated to visit New Delhi.
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Narayanan said India would discuss issues concerning the region with Holbrooke, but if he broached Kashmir he would be informed that India would not accept any third-party involvement.
Meanwhile, he said Pakistan had replied with queries to India’s dossier containing information relating to the Mumbai attacks.
However, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee and his ministry denied this claim. Speaking in West Bengal yesterday, Mukherjee said: “Islamabad has not replied to the dossier that India had officially given to that country.”