Author: Sandhya Jain
Publication: Niticentral.com
Date: February 19, 2014
URL: http://www.niticentral.com/2014/02/19/separatist-ghulam-nabi-fai-back-to-dirty-tricks-191349.html

Ghulam Nabi Fai, the high profile US citizen of Kashmiri origin (born Badgam, India) who was prosecuted in December 2011 for working as an unregistered lobbyist for Pakistan, has re-emerged with a bang to demand self-determination for the people of the State, a euphemism for “independence”. He was speaking at a mega event organised by the Kashmir Forum in Washington, DC on Saturday, February 15, 2014, at the Holiday Inn Hotel. The resurrection of the Kashmir issue coincides with the cooling of strategic relations between New Delhi and Washington, with the latter erecting non-tariff barriers in information technology and pharmaceuticals, two areas where India is strong. Ghulam Nabi Fai’s Kashmiri American Council was one of the co-sponsors of the event.

India has fallen low in Washington’s priorities, with US Secretary of State John Kerry visiting Beijing but refusing to hold the East Asia dialogue with New Delhi since mid-2013 (this was the forum where the two countries discussed issues pertaining to China). Similar dialogues on Central Asia and Africa have floundered, and the India-US-Afghanistan trilateral seems dormant. The India-Japan-US trilateral has survived because of the energies expended by the former two nations.

The Kashmir event seems to have the covert backing of the US administration, and the Executive Director of Kashmiri American Council attended, thanks to an early release from jail. It may be recalled that after he pleaded guilty to conspiracy and tax evasion (charges for which he could have received five or more years in a Federal prison), Fai was given a light two-year sentence in March 2012, for “conspiracy to defraud the US” by concealing transfer of $3.5 million from Pakistan’s ISI for his illegal lobbying efforts on Kashmir. But he was suddenly released from jail on November 22, 2013 after the prosecution moved a motion urging a reduction in his sentence.

At the seminar, Norwegian Parliamentarian Lars Rise reportedly said, “I have visited Kashmir and met with the leadership of All Parties Hurriyat Conference. I have come to Washington and attended the International Peace Conferences organised by Fai at Capitol Hill. I am sure that given a chance, the people of Kashmir will be instrumental in building a bridge between India and Pakistan to settle the long-standing dispute over Kashmir through peaceful negotiations”.

It may be recalled that Norway was mediating between the Sri Lanka Government and the secessionist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) until President Mahinda Rajapakshe threw the mediators out and took the war to its logical conclusion, thereby saving the unity of his island-nation.

There is nothing earth-shattering in any of the reported speeches, but it is likely that some of the guests came in order to interact with American officials either at the event or some other venue. Fai projected his case for an independent Kashmir, saying, “Our efforts should be to persuade the world community including the United States to urge both India and Pakistan to include the leadership of the people of Jammu and Kashmir in the negotiations to peacefully resolve the dispute over Kashmir”.

He claimed that in the past 67 years, the Kashmiri people had made enormous sacrifices. Presumably these “sacrifices” include the armed militancy that has taken the lives of umpteen civilians, jawans and officers over the years, including the brutal stone-pelting at young policemen some years ago. Blithely ignoring the expulsion of Hindus, the virtual non-existence of Buddhists in the valley, and the sectarian killings of Shias, Fai claimed that the cause for which the people were fighting is “dear to all inhabitants, be they Muslims, Hindus, or Buddhists”. He urged India and Pakistan to realise that talks between the two countries will not reach any conclusion “until the Kashmiri leadership is included in the peace process”.

Upping the ante against India, Ghulam Nabi Mir, President of the World Kashmir Freedom Movement, said Kashmiris would not consent to rule by “a power that had visited death and destruction to brutalise them into submission from the very beginning when the first Indian trooper set his foot on the soil of Kashmir.” Of course, there is no mention in such a declamation that Kashmir was ruled by a Hindu monarchy when the Pakistani invasion triggered the series of events that resulted in the subsequent uneasy equilibrium.

Imtiaz Khan, vice-president of the Kashmiri American Council, demanded that the Government of India release all political prisoners (who?) and repeal all “black laws”, particularly the Public Safety Act, and Disturbed Areas Act, dismantle bunkers from villages and towns, and give Kashmiris freedom of expression and freedom of speech.

Peer Sahib Ali Raza Bukhari said the legality of the Kashmir cause was recognised by the United Nations. He said that India and Pakistan being nuclear states made the Kashmir dispute potentially the most dangerous in the world. Directly seeking US intervention in the issue, he said it was in American interest to prevent the dispute from exploding into a conflict which “can be catastrophic for a large proportion of the human race”. The host of the meeting, Sardar Tahir Iqbal (Kashmir Forum), said that the people of Kashmir should be allowed to demonstrate peacefully in favour of self-determination.

Sardar Sawar Khan, former Advisor to the Prime Minister of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, said that the world has tended to view the Jammu & Kashmir dispute from the perspective of India and Pakistan and never from the perspective of the people of Kashmir which is more important. Sardar Zubair Khan urged the US, Pakistan and India to recognise the All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC) as the genuine voice of the Kashmiri people.

Asad Choudhary of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) said that the Kashmir dispute must be decided in accordance with the resolutions of the UN Security Council. Mazhar Chughtai of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) wanted the US Administration to be involved in settling the dispute. All in all, it was a Pakistani show in Washington.