The Hindu : India cannot support U.S. war moves, says PM

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Feb 26, 2003

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India cannot support U.S. war moves, says PM

By Amit Baruah

KUALA LUMPUR Feb. 25. India cannot support the American war moves on Iraq and the United Nations is being severely tested on account of the continuing crisis, the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, said here today.

Addressing a press conference, he said: ``the U.S. role is such that it cannot be supported. We will decide what we have to do next after seeing what form the war will take.''

Asked whether NAM could do anything to deter the U.S. from going to war, Mr. Vajpayee said that people's opinions did count, especially in democratic countries. "The demonstrations against war have been so huge, I don't think it would have had no impact on the U.S. President, George W.Bush, and other leaders. But the strength that is required is not yet in evidence.''

Mr. Vajpayee said that the U.S. and those opposed to any unilateral action were still engaged in the U.N. Security Council.

Supporting these efforts, he said there could be no two views that a way out should be sought till the last moment, war averted and Iraq shown the correct path.

And if Iraq has weapons of mass destruction (WMD), there should be a ban on them, the Prime Minister said. But, the question arose why the WMD issue should be raised only in relation to Iraq.

``Don't others have such weapons?'' The attitude adopted towards North Korea did not reveal that world leaders had a clear path before them. ``There can be no differing standards''.

On the Pakistan President, Pervez Musharraf's statement that it needed two hands to clap, vis-à-vis Indo-Pak. relations, Mr. Vajpayee said: ``Tali nahin bajti to chutki baja lain'' (if we can't clap, then we can at least click our fingers). ``There should be some sound all the time.''

He said he did not know what had been the experience of Gen. Musharraf during his meetings with NAM leaders, but his talks were confined to Iraq.

There were talks on Pakistan as well and it was clear that other countries had ``no interest'' in Kashmir. All countries said that it was a bilateral matter and India and Pakistan should settle it.

The clear-cut statement from Malaysia against raising bilateral issues in NAM should open the eyes of the Pakistanis, Mr. Vajpayee said.

There was no link, no comparison between the Kashmir and Palestine issues. NAM would die if bilateral disputes were injected into it.

He admitted that because of the Iraq issue, there was considerable `jaan' (life) in this summit. NAM was formed with the objective of stopping a world war and prodding nations to move away from military blocs and adopt an independent foreign policy.

Pointing out that the world stood on the verge of war, Mr. Vajpayee was categorical that in this situation there was need for NAM.

Before coming to the summit, he felt that the organisation might be divided on Iraq, but now it appeared that this would not happen.

Many countries, he said, believed that Iraq should accept the NAM proposal and move forward. If NAM spoke out fearlessly then it would be in a position to put off war and strengthen the constituency of peace.

The Prime Minister preferred not to respond to a question on the Ayodhya issue.

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