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US scuttled Indo-Pak peace efforts: Sinha

The US and India has a tacit understanding that neither will ‘surprise’ each other on sub-continental issues. But in March, 2004, when the George W Bush Administration designated Pakistan a ‘major non-NATO ally,’ it came as a complete surprise to the Atal Behari Vajpayee government.

The then foreign minister, Yashwant Sinha said this to Millennium Post in a conversation held in the wake of another statement made publicly at a book release programme recently. On that occasion, he had stated, “There have been occasions when the US has scuttled peace efforts between the two neighbours.”

He says that when he took over charge of the external affairs ministry in 2002, there was a bevy of foreign ministers from western countries who were desperately seeking time to visit New Delhi. The first to arrive was Colin Powel, then the secretary of state of the George W Bush’s first administration.

The UK foreign minister, Jack Straw went on banging on the door virtually even after he was told that Parliament was on and the minister may not be able to devote time in a way that is required. But Straw was insistent. And finally he had to be accommodated.

The main goal of the USA is merely to ‘contain’ Pakistan in terms of its attempt to make Afghanistan its so-called ‘strategic depth’ area. 

In fact, Sinha suggests that the Anglo-American combine is not interested in taking on Pakistan’s dysfunctional State in any other way other than a kid-glove treatment. He said: “They want to show it to the Muslim world that they wish expiate their guilt of creating Israel on Palestinian lands.”

He says that it is under his watch that the drawing of the Actual Ground Position Line (AGPL) in Siachen was done. And this has created the reason for a continuing ceasefire at what was then known as the world’s highest battle-ground.

He says he opposed the move of the BJP-led NDA government of Narendra Modi’s line of keeping the US happy. Sinha points out that just before the Foreign Secretary Dr S Jaishankar’s SAARC Yatra visit to Islamabad, the US President Barack Obama had called up Mian Nawaz Sharif saying that he would soon be hearing from the Indian prime minister. And Modi did call.

He talks of the impossibility of fulfilling any of the United Nations resolutions on Kashmir because Pakistan has settled people from the Punjab (West) in the POK. And then there is the ceding of some part of the territory to China.

On the other hand, India has disallowed all outsiders to even own land in Jammu and Kashmir including Ladakh.
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