The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

Saturday, September 22, 2001, Chandigarh, India

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50 YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE

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J A M M U & K A S H M I R

Guerrillas told to return to Afghanistan
Jammu, September 21
Pakistani agencies are said to have asked Kashmiri militants, under training or in camps across the border, to return to the valley in the wake of likelihood of a war against Afghanistan. Reports from across the border revealed that Kashmiri youths had already been pulled out of the camps and directed to go back to the valley. Afghan guerrillas operating in Jammu and Kashmir, have been asked to return to Afghanistan to fight American forces.

APHC plea against bandh goes unheeded
Jammu, September 21
Militant groups proposed and the Hurriyat Conference opposed. In the end, the former won the first round as far as the call for today’s Kashmir bandh was concerned. Several militant outfits had given a call for a Kashmir bandh for today in protest against Islamabad’s support to the USA in its proposed war against Afghanistan. The call was similar to the one given by the Jehadis in Pakistan.

YOUR TOWN

Jammu

EARLIER STORIES

	APHC annoys ‘jehadis’ in J&K September 21, 2001
	Five infiltrators killed September 20, 2001
	Ultras told to stay put in J&K September 19, 2001
	History repeats itself in Pak? September 18, 2001
	Five militants killed September 17, 2001
	Pak closes arms training camps temporarily September 16, 2001
	11 militants killed September 15, 2001
	Threat to shoot at ‘unveiled’ women September 14, 2001
	Cong rebels gun for Qureshi’s head September 13, 2001
	Bhat, too, has formula on J&K September 12, 2001

Guerrillas told to return to Afghanistan
Tribune News Service

Jammu, September 21
Pakistani agencies are said to have asked Kashmiri militants, under training or in camps across the border, to return to the valley in the wake of likelihood of a war against Afghanistan.

Reports from across the border revealed that Kashmiri youths had already been pulled out of the camps and directed to go back to the valley.

Afghan guerrillas operating in Jammu and Kashmir, have been asked to return to Afghanistan to fight American forces. Agencies in Pakistan and Afghanistan have received frantic requests from Afghan guerrillas for permission to return to Afghanistan.

At least over 20 Afghan youths detained in various jails have staged protest demonstrations within the jail premises, demanding immediate release so that they could go to Kabul. Some of them have pleaded for early release as they had spent between four and eight years in detention and the trial against them had not been initiated.

Reports said if the guerrillas were allowed to go to Afghanistan, Pakistani agencies would force Kashmiri youths to return to the valley to make up for the loss of men.

Meanwhile, Syed Salahuddin, chief of the Jehad Council in Pakistan, was stated to have conveyed to his lieutenants in Kashmir not to send children for arms training to Pakistan as they were too frail to handle guns.

Police sources said Salahuddin and others were keen to increase manpower in various militant groups by training local youths because Pakistan might not be able to send foreign mercenaries in large numbers to Kashmir.

APHC plea against bandh goes unheeded
M.L. Kak
Tribune News Service

Jammu, September 21
Militant groups proposed and the Hurriyat Conference opposed. In the end, the former won the first round as far as the call for today’s Kashmir bandh was concerned.

Several militant outfits had given a call for a Kashmir bandh for today in protest against Islamabad’s support to the USA in its proposed war against Afghanistan. The call was similar to the one given by the Jehadis in Pakistan.

After the end of yesterday’s Executive Committee meeting, the All-Party Hurriyat Conference had appealed to the people in Kashmir not to heed to the bandh call. The APHC Chairman, Prof Abdul Gani Bhat, had stated that the people should not observe a hartal. “We urge the people to observe hartal when the Hurriyat Conference give a call for it. They should not observe hartal on anyone else’s call,” he had said. But people in Kashmir today responded to the hartal call by the militant outfits which have cast their lot with the Taliban and Osama bin Laden.

What has surprised Kashmir watchers is that people ignored even Syed Ali Shah Geelani, a hardliner, who had also associated himself with the Hurriyat Conference stand.

Asked to comment on the failure of the APHC to enforce its decision, Prof Bhat said: “It is not a litmus test of Hurriyat popularity”.

He explained that some “groups’’ had given a call for the hartal more than four days ago and all preparations had been made. “We decided to go against the hartal call only yesterday and the people in Kashmir remained unaware of our decision,” he said.

Prof Bhat explained that a large number of traders and transporters had come out of their residences to carry out trade, but had to go back when there were some stone-throwing incidents.

He asserted that had the people been aware of “our stand”, they would “have supported us”. He did not want critics of the APHC to read deep meaning into it. He stated that “it is too early to draw a conclusion from peoples’” response to the call for banch for which the APHC was opposed to”.

Notwithstanding his claim of being in control of the situation, observers are of the opinion that the APHC has been placed in an embarrassing position in Kashmir as Gen Pervez Musharraf is in Pakistan where people’s response to the call for bandh was overwhelming with large groups of anti-Musharraf demonstrations in various parts of that country.

Meanwhile, Syed Ali Shah Geelani has undergone a change of mind. Two days ago he had fulminated against the Pakistan Government’s decision to support the American war against terrorism. Yesterday he reversed his stand. He explained that he was satisfied with the contents of General Musharraf’s broadcast to the nation and had come to realise that in the light of the grave complexities, the Pakistan President’s decision was the right one.