Published: November 27, 2006
Op-Ed Contributor
Crossfire War - Kashmir Leader Announces New Uprising in Center of Srinagar
By Willard Payne
Crossfire War - TEHRAN WATCH - South Asia Theatre: Tehran - Kabul - Islamabad - Srinagar/Delhi; "The Spirit of the Times is Alive..." - New Wave of Islamic Uprising 'Intifada' in Jammu - Kashmir - JKLF to Concentrate on Center of Srinagar
Night Watch: SRINAGAR - "The spirit of the times is alive and it only needs to be tabbed on to the right direction." That was the warning and message from Yasin Malik, head of the Jammu-Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), at the opening of their office in the center of old Srinagar, nerve center of the state capital. AKI reports that Malik was warning of a new uprising by Kashmiri's patterned after the Palestinian 'Intifada', the uprising against Israel's occupation that first began in 1987 and surfaced again in 2000. [
AKI]
Malik states the Kashmiri uprising will be launched from the heart of old Srinagar, what he called the center of Kashmiri resistance since 1931. He added, "Our intifada will be a peaceful political resistance movement." Malik knows that is just public posturing. He is aware Delhi's response will not be peaceful. Malik and JKLF supporters around the Islamic world are preparing to blame the new wave of violence on India's continued oppression of the population, which is almost entirely Muslim and was never satisfied under Hindu rule from Delhi.
That is why Kashmir has been the main flashpoint for the wars between Pakistan/India since their independence in 1947. The new Srinagar office of the JKLF is named Maqbool Center after Maqbool Butt, a Kashmiri leader who was hanged in 1984 in Delhi's Tihar jail after being sentenced to death for murder by a Srinagar judge in 1968. Malik says that former Islamic militants and their families in the area are still harassed by Indian authorities and that a lot of Kashmir leaders had been killed over the years in the streets of Srinagar.
Crossfirewar.com mentioned a 24-hour engagement early last month, started by a suicide unit, with an attack on a municipal building in the state capital. The demonstrations, planned by Malik, are a parallel to the low level armed conflict that still happens daily all over Jammu-Kashmir. But it will not take long before the demonstrations result in serious rioting and armed incidents between demonstrators and Indian security - police units. Delhi has indicated, at least for the past year, that its response will not always be limited to attacking and searching for Islamic militants in Kashmir, but will eventually use its "hot pursuit" policy and attack the bases in Pakistan's part of Kashmir that train and supply the Islamic liberation groups, which have long been based there.
The current uprising actually began in November 1989 and since then there have been several occasions when (f)allout war nearly began. What kept the fourth major war between India/Pakistan from occurring was Iran not yet being ready to enter it, but it was no secret they were definitely preparing to do so. With the massive war games Tehran has conducted all this year it seems they are now ready to take advantage of the next series of incidents Malik, Islamabad and Tehran have planned to cause the fourth war. Pakistan recently stated how wonderful it is that a powerful Iran is their neighbor. Tehran - Islamabad have security-military agreements on the same order as Tehran has with Damascus. Iran will enter the South Asia theatre in the name of establishing stability.
In the meantime there is an ongoing firefight right now in southern Kashmir in the district of Anantnag. There was also another engagement Sunday in northern Kashmir at Baramulla. [KASHMIROBSERVER]
Night Watch Information Service
www.crossfirewar.com
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