Author:
Publication: The Daily Excelsior
Date: February 27, 2002
URL: http://www.dailyexcelsior.com/02feb27/national.htm#7
In a rebuff to those describing
terrorists as "freedom fighters", the US today said those killing innocent
people for political motives are terrorists and must be called "exactly
that".
Without naming Pakistan or its leaders
who repeatedly describe terrorists operating in Jammu and Kashmir as 'freedom
fighters', US Ambassador to India Robert D Blackwill said those "who murder
innocents for political motives and who seek to bring down the very pillars
of our democracy" must be named as "what they are".
"These people are not misunderstood
idealists. They are not disadvantaged dissidents. They are not religious
perfectionists. And they are not freedom fighters.
"They are terrorists and we should
always be sure to call them exactly that," he said in a lecture on `Indo-US
relations post September 11, 2001' here.
Citing President George W Bush's
commitment to fight terrorism, the Envoy said "those who harbour terrorists
will share their fate."
"Every nation has to decide if it
is with us - the community of civilised countries, including India and
America, that unambiguously condemns terror as a political, ideological
or religious instrument - or with the terrorists, the evil ones whose inhuman
acts separate them from the society of home sapiens," he said.
"In this global war against terrorism,
there can be no middle ground. No moral relativism. No policy equivocation.
No excuses," he stressed.
Citing the terrorist attacks in
Washington, in Srinagar and on Parliament, Blackwill said defeat of terrorism
was a "matter of survival for ourselves, for our democratic values, for
our religious freedom, for our children, for everything we hold dear."
He said India and the US shared
threat from terrorism and this "has hastened the redifinition of our relationship
in all its manifestations and catapulted our strategic collaboration to
unprecedented depth, breath and intensity".
India is central to the emphasis
that American foreign policy places on building a concert of democratic
states in response to problems of world order, Blackwill said.
He said India and the US were moving
in unison to strangle the financial assets of terrorists.
Referring to Afghanistan, he said
the "tragedy" of the country "will not be reversed overnight. At best,
it will take many, many years for the people of that blighted land to lead
something resembling normal lives."
Accomplishing this tremendous task
will be exceedingly difficult, he said, adding "without the closest possible
US-India collaboration, it may be impossible."
He pointed out that India and the
US had worked together in the UN to pass UNSC resolution 1373 and to promote
the India-sponsored comprehensive convention against terrorism. (PTI)
