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Surendra Phuyal in Kathmandu
Pakistan on Thursday called on India to play a part in checking militants from crossing the Line of Control in Kashmir, on the sidelines of the SAARC foreign ministers' meet, to which India refused to respond saying it would not 'misuse' the regional forum for holding bilateral negotiations.
"Whatever is happening across the LoC is the responsibility of the Indian government," Pakistan's Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Inamul Haq said. "We have taken a position that we will not allow anybody across the border."
"Why doesn't India arrest infiltrators when they cross over?" he asked.
Haq also ruled out the possibility of joint patrolling along the LoC. "In a situation where there are more than a million men staring at each other across the LoC, there is not sufficient confidence in each other to start joint patrolling."
"We do not consider ourselves to be at war with India. War is not going to resolve any problems in the region," he said.
Foreign Minister Yashwant Sinha said after the meet that he didn't come to Kathmandu to hold bilateral negotiations with Pakistan and emphasised that the regional forum should not be 'misused' for bilateral negotiations.
"I did not come here to hold bilateral talks with Pakistan," he said, "and I don't want to misuse the Nepali soil [for that]."
He pointed out the need to give the much-needed boost to the SAARC process for the welfare of the South Asians, who constitute one-fifth of humanity and who are among the world's poorest people.
The meet, besides pledging to fight terrorism in the region and putting SAARC's common agenda on various international forums, decided to hold the next (12th) summit in January in Pakistan.
Formed in 1985, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka constitute the SAARC.
During the two-day meet, held through August 21-22, the SAARC nations earlier agreed to amend their domestic anti-terrorism laws and make them compatible with the international anti-terrorism laws in the changed global context after September 11.
The meet, which was preceded by another meeting of SAARC foreign secretaries on August 19-20, has also decided to hold a meeting of the police chiefs of the SAARC members states in late August in Kathmandu.
They have also agreed to go ahead with South Asian Preferential Trading Arrangement and the South Asian Free Trade Area and take other measures to boost economic cooperation in the region, according to Nepalese foreign ministry spokesman Pushkar Rajbhandari.
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