Benazir govt had given nuke ultimatum to India in 1989-90:Book

New Delhi, Nov 30 (PTI) The Benazir Bhutto government in
Pakistan had "privately" issued a "nuclear ultimatum" to India
during the rule of V P Singh to deter New Delhi from using
excessive force to quell separatist violence in Jammu and
Kashmir, which was gradually gaining strength in 1989-90, a
foreign affairs expert has claimed.

"The Indian decision makers were getting concerned at the
whole situation particularly after Pakistan Foreign Minister
Yaqub Khan came to Delhi for a South Asian Association for
Regional Cooperation (SAARC) meeting and privately gave a
nuclear ultimatum to Foreign Minister (Inder Kumar) Gujral and
apparently did the same in his bilateral meeting with the
Prime Minister," says Prof Harish Kapur in his latest book
titled 'Foreign Policies of India's Prime Ministers'.

Kapur, who is currently Professor Emeritus at Institute
of International and Development Studies in Geneva, said "both
of them confirmed this to this author in separate
discussions".

"It seemed as if Pakistan was intentionally building up
tension, not so much to have a military showdown as to force V
P Singh to make concessions," Kapur, who was a legal advisor
in the office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, says.

As a militant movement built up in Kashmir during that
period with support not only from across the border but also
from expatriates settled in Europe and the US and
fundamentalist outfits started gaining ground in the valley,
Bhutto "openly challenged" Singh through her "rhetorical
outbursts" at rallies in Pak-occupied Kashmir.

The book, published by Lancer, said a leading Pakistani
army officer, Gen Aslam Beg had told the then US
Commander-in-Chief Gen Norman Schwarzkopf that "now we are in
good shape. With the support that Iran has promised me, we
will win in case of a war with India."

At the same time, the Pakistani Prime Minister sent
Ambassador Abdul Sattar as a special envoy to India "to warn
Prime Minister Singh that Indo-Pakistan relations would be
adversely affected if Delhi used force against the Kashmir
uprising," Kapur, who also heads the European Institute in
Switzerland, said.

"Convinced that a war-like situation was in the process
of developing, India decided to take a firm stand. More than
100,000 troops were moved from the Sino-Indian border to the
Indo-Pak border.

"The Chinese, according to Singh, were very cooperative.
They agreed to withdraw their missiles and gave their accord
not to create any tension on the frontier," Kapur said.

Then Foreign Secretary Muchkund Dubey went to Pakistan
making it clear to his counterpart that if Pakistan was
prepared to cooperate with India in stabilising the Kashmir
situation.

"India was prepared to give the Kashmiris anything short
of self-determination". But this was not acceptable to
Pakistan.

The author said though the United States' evaluation then
that India and Pakistan were close to a nuclear war was
"exaggerated, there does not appear to be any doubt that
vibrant American intervention did play a decisive role in
de-escalating the war-like situation that was developing on
the sub-continent."

Kapur also deals with the critical situation then
developing in Sri Lanka and the growing pressures to withdraw
the Indian Peace Keeping Force from there.

In the 445-page book, the author deals with the foreign
policies of governments headed right from Jawaharlal Nehru to
four years of Manmohan Singh's regime, analysing various major
issues and policy shifts undertaken at different times.PTI ARC
PMR