Islamabad, January 21
Seen as a move to forge a united front of the moderates on both sides of the LoC to isolate the militants, the visiting moderate Hurriyat leader, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and the Pakistan Occupied Kashmir, (PoK) government have formed two working groups to facilitate the peace process between India and Pakistan.

The decision to set up the working groups was announced during a meeting between Farooq and PoK President Raja Zulqarnain and Prime Minister Sardar Atiq Ahmed Khan here yesterday. It is not clear, however, whether the initiative is from PoK government or the ruling Muslim Conference.

Without elaborating on the purpose of the working groups, a declaration said that they demanded the continuation of the India-Pak peace process and the inclusion of Kashmiris in the dialogue process.

"We have decided to establish two working groups to enhance the cooperation between the Kashmiri people living on both sides of the LoC", Zulqarnain said.

Political leaders on both sides of LoC would be included in these working groups, he said. PoK opposition parties were invited to the meeting but did not turn up.

APHC insiders say that the working groups, if supported by India and Pakistan governments, could emerge as a broad forum of moderates to drum up support for the peace process and President Pervez Musharraf's proposals of demilitarisation, self governance and joint management, which were opposed by the hardline Geelani faction.

The working groups could also emerge as a forum to endorse any India-Pakistan future agreement on Kashmir on behalf of the Kashmiris if the two countries manage to take their current round of peace process to their logical conclusion, they said.

The visit of the moderate APHC delegation of Farooq, Abdul Ghani Bhutt and Bilal Ghani Lone brought to the fore the divisions between the moderates and militants but the observers here said only future could tell whether the divisions were temporary or permanent.

For his part, Farooq termed the next few months important due to chances of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to Pakistan followed by possible visit of Musharraf to India.

Playing down the differences between moderates and militants, he said parties who had difference of opinion on the mode of resolution of Kashmir issue would also be taken on board and the consultation process could be widened.

The leader of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front, Amanullah Khan and some leaders of the political parties from PoK also attended the meeting.

Farooq said that he believed that progress has been made for the first time in history during last 60 years to resolve the issue. He said Musharraf's ideas to resolve Kashmir steered the process in a positive direction to work out an interim solution.

Farooq said the APHC and PoK were trying to hold an intra-Kashmiri dialogue and India and Pakistan should allow a visit of PoK leaders to Indian-administered Kashmir.

He said opponents of the current peace process had damaged the Kashmir cause and wanted all Kashmiris, including Syed Ali Shah Geelani, should be allowed to visit both parts of Kashmir.

He appealed to the 'mujahideens' to support the ongoing peace process, as militancy was no solution to the problem in the changed scenario.

He said tripartite dialogue, including Kashmiris besides India and Pakistan, was needed to make the peace process a success. It seems that tripartite dialogue will come in the last phase of this peace process, he said. — PTI

New York, January 21
Pakistani military intelligence agencies, particularly the powerful ISI, have been supporting a Taliban restoration, motivated not only by Islamic fervour but also by a longstanding view that Jihadist movement allows them to assert greater influence on the country's "vulnerable" western flank, a report said here today.

Though the Pakistani government vehemently rejects the allegation and insists that is it fully committed to help American and NATO forces prevail against Taliban, the New York Times reports that former Taliban who have refused to re-enlist have been jailed or have even disappeared.

The paper said that after more than two weeks of reporting along Pakistan-Afghanistan frontier, including dozens of interviews with residents on each side of the porous border, it leaves little doubt that Quetta is an important base for the Taliban, and found many signs that Pakistani authorities are encouraging the insurgents, if not sponsoring them. At Jamiya Islamiya, a religious school in Quetta, Taliban sympathies are on flagrant display. One former Taliban commander told the paper that he had been jailed by Pakistani intelligence officials because he would not go to Afghanistan to fight.

Former Taliban members who have refused to fight in Afghanistan have been arrested or even mysteriously killed after resisting pressure to re-enlist in the Taliban.

"The Pakistanis are actively supporting the Taliban," a Western diplomat told the paper in an interview in Kabul. He said he had seen an intelligence report of a recent meeting on the Afghan border between a senior Taliban commander and a retired colonel of the Pakistani ISI.

Pakistani military and ISI have for decades used religious parties as a convenient instrument to keep domestic political opponents at bay and for foreign policy adventures, said Husain Haqqani, a former adviser to several of Pakistan's prime ministers. — PTI

Washington, January 21
Pakistan is buying 500 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missiles (AMRAAM) and 200 AIM-9M Sidewinder missiles from the US at a cost of $284 million to add more firepower to its air force.

Delivery of the missiles will start in 2008 and continue through 2011, Raytheon Company said, announcing the first AMRAAM missile procurement by Pakistan, in what is its largest single international AMRAAM purchase.

Pakistan has signed a letter of offer and acceptance for the procurement that will augment its established inventory and provide the bulk of the air-to-air fire power of the Pakistan Air Force, the Massachusetts-based armament maker, which had $21.9 billion sales in 2005, said.

AMRAAM is a joint US Air Force and Navy programme and sets the global beyond-visual-range standard. It incorporates the latest digital technology and micro-miniaturised solid-state electronics, making this remarkable weapon more reliable and maintainable, resulting in the highest dependability at the lowest cost of ownership.

Thirty-two countries have procured AMRAAM based on its unprecedented air combat flexibility. The AIM-9M Sidewinder missile is a combat-proven, all-aspect, infrared-guided, short-range air-to-air missile employed by more than 20 countries worldwide, it said. — IANS

Istanbul, January 21
A teenager detained over the slaying of an ethnic Armenian journalist has confessed to the killing, state-run Anatolia news agency quoted a chief prosecutor as saying today.

The police captured the suspect, identified as Ogun Samast, in the Black Sea city of Samsun late yesterday, a day after Hrant Dink was gunned down in broad daylight outside his newspaper’s office in Istanbul.

The slaying stunned the nation and highlighted the precarious state of freedom of expression in a country that is vying for European Union membership.

The police said the youth was captured following a tip from his father after pictures were broadcast on Turkish television. Chief prosecutor Ahmet Cokcinar said the teenager had confessed to killing Dink during initial questioning in Samsun. Anatolia did not mention any possible motives and the prosecutor could not immediately be reached for comment.

Samast, who is 16 or 17 years old, was apparently on his way by bus from Istanbul back to his hometown of Trabzon when he was caught. — AP