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Jaswant rejects proposal to convert LoC into border

External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh today said Jammu and Kashmir is "not a core issue" with Pakistan and rejected the suggestion to convert the Line of Control into an international border to end the five-decade-long dispute with Islamabad.

"I refute that Jammu and Kashmir is a core issue with Pakistan," Singh told reporters at the Press Club of India.

He said that under the composite India-Pakistan dialogue, all bilateral issues, including Kashmir, could be discussed. The dialogue, he said, could be resumed at "an appropriate time".

On Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah's suggestion to formalise the LoC as the international border, Singh said: "I do not endorse this."

He said the government's stand is defined in a resolution of Parliament, which calls upon Pakistan to vacate the part of Kashmir it had grabbed in 1948.

He made it clear that India is not putting any pre-condition for talks with Pakistan. But Pakistan has to realise that it cannot have a meaningful dialogue with India even as it continues to encourage cross-border terrorism.

Singh said India would not approach the International Court of Justice to seek compensation from Pakistan for its misadventure in Kargil.

Pakistan has been punished by "our armed forces", he said.

The minister said Pakistan's claim for $60 million as compensation for the shooting down of its surveillance aircraft in the Kutch sector last month was but an attempt to cover up its airspace violation.

He said there were reports of Saudi fugitive Osama bin Laden's involvement in the Kargil conflict.

He did not agree with a reporter's contention that India's other neighbours had kept total silence on Kargil. He said he had had discussions with the leaders of Nepal and Bangladesh on the matter.

UNI

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Pakistan trying to turn LoC into border, says JKLF
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