Cross-border terrorism will be defeated: Jaswant

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, AUG. 6. The Government today made it clear it had the ``will and the strength to fight and defeat cross-border terrorism and did not need the assistance of anybody''. The assertion came during the External Affairs Minister, Mr. Jaswant Singh's intervention in the Lok Sabha on the inconclusive debate on the Agra summit.

Mr. Singh's somewhat lengthy intervention saw him strike a tough posture on cross-border terrorism and Pakistan's fixation on Kashmir. In an attempt at damage limitation, he also sought to take the House into confidence on what transpired at the summit, even as he defended the Government from the charge that it was ill-prepared and had done little homework.

Jammu and Kashmir, Mr. Singh said, was not the cause of Pakistan's attitude but a ``consequence of Pakistan's compulsive approach and sustained hostility towards India which has its seeds in the two-nation theory''. The State was the core of India's nationhood and ``its division on grounds of religion was unacceptable, it exemplifies the creed of secular India.''

On cross-border terrorism, he said Pakistan was ``structuring fundamentalism and its hostility to India on a self-induced cult of false glory, which was a path of peril and would expose Pakistan to great social anarchy''. The Government was determined to meet the challenge to India's territory. ``The challenge will be met and defeated each and everytime.''

Mr. Singh said the Government not only included cross- border terrorism in the agenda for the summit, it had also, in the months leading to the summit, helped build international opinion against the menace. ``Never before has terrorism been placed Pakistan's doorstep as has been done today.''

Defending the Government's handling of the summit, the Minister said the preparations were ``unprecedented''. Despite being unwell, the Prime Minister, Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee, read every United Nations resolution and every document on India- Pakistan meetings of the past.

Mr. Singh said the Opposition was selective in talking about the preparations and pointed out that the genesis of India- China relations began during the Congress regime. The Tashkent agreement, he said, accepted the idea of third-party intervention and mediation in India-Pakistan affairs, while in Shimla, the nation gave away both its territory and the 93,000 POWs.

The decision to invite the Pakistan President, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, for talks was an attempt to give peace another chance despite Pakistan's track record and developments such as Kargil and Kandahar. What was set in motion at Agra was a process of peace which had to be carried to its logical end. Placing the onus on Pakistan to decide the kind of relations it wanted with India, he said, ``we do not covet an inch of that country. It is for them to decide, let the caravan of peace move forward.''

On the Government's failure to fix an agenda for the summit, he said by its very nature it was supposed to be a retreat yet despite ``our repeated suggestions that we had an agenda the other side refused''. India had insisted that the agreements reached at Shimla and Lahore form the basis of the talks and that the dialogue should include all important issues. ``For one reason or the other, the other side did not agree.''

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