NEW DELHI: India has the capability to face any challenge if Pakistan embarked on a nuclear misadventure Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar said
We don’t know about the nature of Pakistan’s nuclear programme but this does not mean we are scared the prime minister ‘told Parliament.
He said India hoped Islamabad would not embark on any nuclear misadventure but if it did we are not afraid. We have the capability 10 face the challenge.
Responding to clarifications on his statement on the recent SAARC summit in Male the Prime Minister said India would support any non-aggression treaty prohibiting both countries from attacking each other’s nuclear installations.
On Indo-Pak relations in general Mr Chandra Shekhar said there had been some positive developments of late He and the Pakistan prime minister had discussed talked with each other on telephone two or three times.
The military commanders of both the countries had also been on constant touch on the hotline and there was no apprehension in each country’s mind about what other was doing.
The prime minister said contacts had been established with Pakistan for the first time since March 1989 at various levels and characterised it as a positive development.
The Indo-Pak sub-commission would be convened very shortly said and added that a meeting the foreign secretaries was scheduled for February.
Clarifying a point on Kashmir the prime minister said India and Pakistan had differing perceptions.
There was no question of India accepting Pakistan’s stand on the whole question.
Chandra Shekhar said he did not believe the United States was interfering in Indo-Pak affairs. The IS on their own had decided not support Pakistan’s insistence on plebiscite in Kashmir he said.
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has reiterated that Pakistan would persist with its nuclear programme and not compromise ON it at any Cost.
In October last year the US administration suspended economic and military aid of more than 60 million dollars to Pakistan after president Bush failed to certify that Pakistan did not possess nuclear weapons
Addressing a public meeting in Toba Tek Singh in Pakistan’s Punjab province the premier said Pakistan would not bow before any Dower to get economic aid.
While Pakistan insists that its nuclear programme is being developed for peaceful purposes western intelligence reports say it has been busy making a nuclear bomb.
Laying emphasis on self-reliance to veer the country away from dependence on foreign assistance Sharif invited the private sector to play a leading role in industrial expansion.
Later responding to questions from reporters he said the Kashmir issue was very much alive internationally and repeated allegations of atrocities against inhabitants of the valley.
We have made it clear to India that peace in this region cannot be guaranteed unless the Kashmir dispute is resolved in accordance with the UN resolutions he said.
Meanwhile in the senate the foreign minister Sahabzada Yaqoub Khan said the Indian government had expressed regret over the harassment of Pakistani diplomats in New Delhi on Nov 29 and 30.
He said New Delhi had assured that Pakistan’s complaint would be duly investigated and measures taken for avoidance of such incidents in the future.
Khan said the Pakistan government had taken a serious view of the incidents and drawn the Indian government’s attention to the Vienna convention.
He said Pakistan had demanded that Indian authorities should take to task those responsible for the deplorable conduct against Pakistani diplomats.
WASHINGTON: In a major shift in US policy if his home government confirms that it does reflect US policy now U S ambassador to Pakistan Robert Oakley is quoted by Islamabad radio as saying in effect that it is all night for Pakistan to have nuclear weapons if India has them
According to the version given by Islamabad radio in its domestic service in Urdu at 0200 GMT on December 24 Ambassador Oakley said if India had acquired nuclear capability then Pakistan also had the right to do so for its own defence.
(The American monitor accustomed to monitoring sensitive broadcasts could hardly believe his ears so he added in brackets sentence as heard.)
PTI correspondent in Washington raised the issue at the noon briefing at the state department and asked whether the department would have any comment on the ambassador’s statement as reported by Islamabad radio. The department’s deputy spokesman Richard Boucher replied: I will see if Ambassador Oakley said anything like that.
What the ambassador did or did not say becomes highly relevant analysts here point out because the Bush administration 1s known to be keen on resuming military and economic aid to Pakistan which are barred under American law because of the nuclear issue. There is another issue of drugs but that can be finessed.
Any change in existing policy on the nuclear issue covered by the Presser amendment will require active administration lobbying to change the law as it stands. This is how Islamabad radio put it:
According to the Associated Press of Pakistan U.S ambassador Robert Oakley has said Pakistan’s nuclear programme should not be made an issue of controversy between Pakistan and the United States. It should be solved at a regional level. Talking to Qazi Hussain Ahmad Amir of Jamaat-Islami in Islamabad Friday Ambassador Oakley said if India had acquired nuclear capability then Pakistan also had the right to do so for its own defence. He stressed the need however to reduce tension in the region
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