11/20/2004 5:00:00 PM GMT
India has pulled out 3,000 troops from Kashmir, part of a planned withdrawal of army units from the disputed region, officials said on Saturday.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh announced last week that New Delhi would withdraw troops from Kashmir, a region that has long been the cause of two out of three wars between the two nuclear rivals.
Singh said that a sharp drop in separatist guerrilla attacks in the Himalayan territory was the main reason for reducing his country’s troops in the region.
India has about 400,000 troops in Kashmir.
"Around 3,000 troops of three different army units involved in counter-terrorism operations have been de-inducted from the border district of Rajouri on Saturday," a defence official said on condition of anonymity.
Indian troops left their bases in convoys of trucks, jeeps and buses from the Hindu-dominated Jammu region of India's only Muslim-majority state of Jammu and Kashmir.
However, an army officer reported that troops were not pulled out from the military Line of Control that divides Indian and Pakistani Kashmir.
"The (withdrawing) troops were involved in counter-terrorism operations, patrolling and sanitisation and surveillance of the area," Brigadier D.K. Chowdhary told reporters.
Army officials refused to give further details.
Although India didn’t give the exact number of troops it plans to withdraw from Kashmir, some army officers have put the number at over 20,000.
India is planning to withdraw hundreds of troops from the Jammu region next week, officials said.
India has been accusing Islamabad of backing the revolt in Kashmir.
However, Pakistan denied the charges, saying that it was only supporting the "legitimate aspirations" of Kashmiris.
About 45,000 people have lost their lives in the revolt since 1989 .
Although both countries have been working on boosting diplomatic, sporting, cultural, economic and transport ties since they started a peace process last year, they have made little headway over Kashmir.
On Saturday, Pakistan described an Indian warning to the United States over proposed U.S. arms sales to Islamabad as incomprehensible.
Yesterday, India told the United states that a new U.S. arms sales to Pakistan, would jeopardize the improving New Delhi-Washington ties.
"It is incomprehensible that India, which has massive weaponisation and weapon acquisition programmes, should object to Pakistan's modest defence requirements," the Pakistani Foreign Ministry said on Friday.
On the other hand secretary General of the PML, Mushahid Hussain Sayed, dismissed the possibility of war as an option to resolve the Kashmir issue, saying that measures should be taken to reach a peaceful resolution of this issue.
"Measures should be taken for the peaceful resolution of the Kashmir issue, as disputes cannot be solved through wars. It would be resolved in accordance with the aspirations of Kashmiri people," a Pakistani TV channel quoted Sayed as saying.
Sayed, moreover, praised the way Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf was handling the Kashmir issue, describing him as a courageous leader. He added that both countries, India and Pakistan have to show flexibility for resolution of the longstanding issue.
"If Kashmir is integral part of India then why the Indian prime minister has asked for exploring different options for the solution to the dispute during his meeting with President Musharraf in New York," Sayed asked.
He, however, described Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's announcement of withdrawing troops from the held Valley as a positive gesture.