Pursuing peace: Zardari throws weight behind Kashmir issue

Says terrorism is a mindset that needs to be defeated both strategically and ideologically

The former president and co-chairman of Pakistan Peoples Party, Asif Ali Zardari, while speaking at a press conference after holding the meeting with party leaders in London, said that PPP has always intended to highlight the Kashmir issue at the international level, Express News reported.

“Our slain leader Benazir Bhutto had raised her voice for the cause of Kashmiri people and we will continue to do the same,” said Zardari while expressing his views over the instance when PPP was barred from holding a Kashmir rally in Birmingham due to security reasons.

Terrorism is not an issue but a mindset that needs to be defeated both strategically and ideologically, he said.



The PPP co-chairman said that the language used by Imran Khan depicts his personality and character, he prefers shortcut to power rather than believing in the spirit of democracy. Commenting on the recent rough patch in ties with Muttahida Qaumi Movement, he said that door of reconciliation is always open and efforts are underway to settle the issue.

He said Pakistan wants to have cordial relations with its neighbours for ensuring regional peace and stability, however, India is not willing to pay heed to our concerns. “Not only over the issue of Kashmir,” Zardari said, “India is not willing to budge on the glaciers standoff and the Sir Creek demarcation too.”

Both the countries are spending millions of rupees on daily basis to keep their troops on Siachen Glacier — the highest battle ground in the world. “We want to resolve the issue, but the other side is unwilling to negotiate,” the former president maintained.

He said the West needs to fulfil its responsibility towards Pakistan. “As president I tried to warn the world leaders on more than one occasion that we are losing the war against terrorism but the warning fell on deaf ears,” Zardari recalled, adding that “the actual war is with a terrorist mindset”.

The overly accepted notion that terrorism spawns due to poverty and illiteracy has been proven wrong, he asserted.

“Recently, young people from US and Europe have been joining the terrorist organisations – they are neither poor nor illiterate.”

The world needs to understand that the ground realities are different in Pakistan, the former president maintained. “For example, take polio.

For rest of the world the answer would be simple – vaccination – but in Pakistan it is a different situation, we need to defeat the terrorists so that our and your generation remain safe from the crippling disease,” he explained.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 18^th, 2014.