Suzanne Raine
Of all the misnomers, ‘frozen conflict’ signally falls short as a description of the situation in Kashmir since the partition of India in 1947. The UK, which bears historic responsibility for the unresolved division, is also uniquely close to the conflict since a significant number of Pakistani Kashmiris are UK citizens or dual nationals. This latest outbreak of hostilities was always going to happen; until a resolution is found, Kashmir will continue to inspire and foster terrorist acts and remain one of the core grievances in the Islamist narrative. It will define and disrupt not only the relationship between Pakistan and India but also between the other states of South Asia.
Shortly after 1am on the morning of Wednesday 7 May, India launched strikes on Bahawalpur and Muridke in Pakistani Punjab and on Kotli, Bagh and Muzaffarabad in Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK). Indian military statements have said they targeted bases linked to Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), and Hizb ul-Mujahideen (HuM), in response to the 22 April terrorist attack by five armed militants on tourists in Pahalgam which killed 26, and has been attributed to the Resistance Front, considered to be associated with LeT. It is worth looking in more detail at why these locations were chosen by India.
No comments:
Post a Comment