Former president Pervez Musharraf and former Indian foreign minister Jaswant Singh have made it clear that India and Pakistan had never entered into a nuclear brinkmanship even at the height of confrontation during the Kargil conflict.
Participating in an Indian TV programme on Saturday night, Musharraf said “there was no finger on the nuclear button because the nuclear assets were not mated with the delivery systems”, a view endorsed by Singh.
To a question on the 1999 Kargil conflict, Musharraf blamed then Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif of converting a military victory into a “political defeat”, when Islamabad decided to withdraw its troops from Kargil. He admitted that the decision was taken after the intervention of the United States. Singh said then prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had ordered the Indian forces against crossing the Line of Control when the intruders were being evicted. Musharraf emphatically stated that Pakistan’s nuclear assets were absolutely safe and “I know the military will guarantee their safety”.
“No foreigner was ever allowed to interfere with our nuclear or missile capability. We have ensured that no one can steal our nuclear weapons,” Musharraf added. “No, I don’t think so,” Musharraf said to a question on whether India had any territorial designs on Pakistan. He said India did not take over Bangladesh after the 1971 war. Musharraf reiterated his four-point formula to resolve the differences between India and Pakistan and noted that PM Manmohan Singh did not visit Islamabad in 2007 when he claimed there was progress in the peace talks.
“There was a general agreement that if he (Manmohan Singh) visited, we would sign some agreements,” Musharraf said, adding it was a time when his personal popularity had dipped in Pakistan. On the issue of alleged human rights violations in India and Pakistan and the two countries refusing to ratify certain international conventions, both Singh and Musharraf said developing countries had different ground realities and the West should not try to lecture them on such issues.
