Kashmir Militants Reject India, Pakistan Peace Statement

Sep 20,2006 00:00 by correspondent

Kashmir's largest militant group dismissed as meaningless an agreement to resume peace talks by the leaders of India and Pakistan, both of which claim the divided Himalayan territory, a news agency reported Tuesday.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Pakistan's President Gen. Pervez Musharraf at the weekend agreed to restart peace talks that have been stalled since July, when bombings in Mumbai killed more than 200 people.

India blamed Pakistan-based militants for the attacks.

In a statement Tuesday to a local news agency, Current News Service, the militant group Hezb-ul-Mujahedeen said the message of the two leaders carried "nothing new for people of Kashmir."

"The declaration uses old and traditional language and is meaningless for the people of Kashmir. Those who are clapping at the declaration are misleading the people," the news agency quoted Hezb spokesman Junaid-ul-Islam as saying.

One of more than a dozen Islamic militant groups in the region, Hezb has been fighting since 1989 for Kashmir's independence from mainly Hindu India or its merger with neighboring Muslim-majority Pakistan. In the last 17 years, the insurgencies have killed more than 68,000 people, most of them civilians.

"The only declaration acceptable to the people of Kashmir is one which gives a timeframe for resolving the Kashmir issue," Islam said.

Singh and Musharraf met on the sidelines of the Nonaligned Movement summit in Havana, Cuba,

Separately, a civilian and a policeman were wounded Tuesday when suspected Islamic rebels threw a hand grenade at a security post at a bus station in Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian Kashmir, said police officer Arvind Roy.

No militant group claimed responsibility for the attack.

Source: AP