India ruled out on Tuesday a meeting between Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf at the Non Aligned Movement meet at Kuala Lumpur.
Foreign Secretary Kanwal Sibal said India views the NAM as a forum to discuss global issues. "Any attempt to steer NAM away from the global agenda cannot be good for the movement," he said, hinting at Pakistan's attempt to prop up the Kashmir issue at the NAM platform.
"The issue of terrorism has a large international consensus on which there is a clarity of interests. And therefore, they (Pakistan) tend to raise red herrings across the issue of terrorism by speaking about the root causes of terrorism," Sibal said, referring to Pakistan's intransigence in implementing its promise to curb terrorism.
He pointed out that there are many resolutions of the international community which clearly state that terrorism cannot be justified on any ground -- political, military, economic or ideological. "Now once we have that position, then you cannot seek to find some moral justification on terrorism by speaking about its root cause."
Sibal also said that even if Pakistan raised the Kashmir issue in NAM meet, it was not important, as "it was just one voice while there are 155 countries in the movement."
Asked about the relevance of the movement, Sibal said that NAM was geared towards reflecting "our own interests and policies." He added the Kuala Lumpur Declaration would focus on the revitalisation of NAM.