Author
PTI or Powell?
A (Curious Mix Of A)
Little of What Was Said, And All That Wasn`t
Part 1
American
Secretary of State Colin Powell testified before the US Senate Committee on
Foreign Relations on February 5 making his pitch for his department`s 2002-03
budget. A PTI correspondent filed a copy on parts of the Foreign Policy
testimony that related to India. The report appeared on the front page of The
Times of India, Bangalore, on February 7. It was headlined Powell to Musharraf:
act, gain India`s trust. The report said:
Hours
after President Pervez Musharraf brushed aside international concerns over
cross-border terrorism, US Secretary of State Colin Powell asked the Pakistani
military ruler to take action in reducing the menace and crackdown on outfits
in a way that will give India confidence.
Powell
told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Tuesday that the US-led war on
terrorism had reshaped the entire South Asian region with a reinvigorated
US-India relationship.
Musharraf
should act to scale down "the incidents over the Line of Control and round
up terrorist organizations and do it in a way that will give India confidence
that they are both united in the coalition against terrorism and not let it
degenerate into a campaign against each other."
He
asked Musharraf to implement the promises made in his January 12 speech to end
terrorism.
Terming
the Indo-Pak border stand-off "dangerous," he said the US would
encourage both India and Pakistan to refrain from provocative rhetoric and move
to redeployment of their forces.
Describing
Musharraf`s January 12 speech as a "seminal event," Powell said, it
not only dealt with terrorism and extremism in a way I believe New Delhi found
constructive, but sent a clear message to Pakistanis that terror must end if
Pakistan is to enter the 21st centuy with expectations of progress and a decent
life for its people."
He
said since the terrorist attack on the US, "we have reshaped that whole
region - a new US-Pakistan relationship invigorated the US-India relationship,
…"
On
the border stand-off, he said, "Any situation where you have forces that
are mobilized and are in proximity to each other and are at something of a war
footing…is a dangerous situation, one where both sides have nuclear and missile
capability is dramatically more so."
But
from the start, India and Pakistan indicated that they wanted to avoid war, he
said. (PTI)
Now, take a look at what Powell actually said: