Peace and Justice Post

By Dion Nissenbaum | McClatchy Newspapers,  Nov 4, 2010

Syed Ali Shah Geelani, the influential Kashmiri separatist leader, discusses the situation in Srinagar, Inida. Geelani, is under house arrest. | Dion Nissenbaum / MCT

View larger image

SRINAGAR, India — Shortly before winning the presidency in 2008, Barack Obama said that as part of his drive to end the Afghanistan conflict, he’d take on one of South Asia’s most intractable issues — competing claims to Kashmir by nuclear-armed rivals Pakistan and India — even if it meant wading into a “tar pit” with little chance of quick resolution.

Two years later, although Kashmir is simmering after months of destabilizing violence, the conflict is all but off the agenda as Obama arrives this weekend for his first presidential trip to India.

A humbling Election Day for the president and his Democratic Party over domestic economic discontent leaves little room for him to embark on another risky foreign peace initiative. India’s rejection of outside mediation also makes it difficult for Obama to push the issue as he tries to woo leaders of the economic powerhouse.

But Kashmiri leaders are warning the president that it would be a strategic mistake to ignore the most dangerous spiral of violence to consume the picturesque valley in years.

“We are not asking the Americans to take a position against India or for Kashmir,” said Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, the spiritual leader who heads Kashmir’s umbrella group of secessionist politicians. “We are just saying that there is a general realization that India and Pakistan need to be pushed in terms of a dialogue.”

More than 700,000 Indian forces keep a tight grip on the predominantly Muslim population that launched a revolt in 1989 and rose up again this summer in a protracted series of stone-throwing protests that left more than 110 people dead. Though the worst of the violence has subsided, Indian forces regularly arrest protest leaders and impose curfews on activist strongholds in Srinagar, Kashmir’s summer capital, and its surrounding villages.

Continues >>

This entry was posted on November 5, 2010 at 5:09 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.