Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR) Director General Major General Shaukat Sultan on Thursday made it clear that President General Pervez Musharraf neither gave any proposal or option nor made any decision regarding resolution of the Kashmir issue.
Talking to reporters at an Iftar-cum-dinner, he hosted for newspaper editors and senior journalists at the Corps Officers Mess, General Shaukat Sultan said that President Musharraf has basically pointed out the seven geographic regions of Kashmir and suggested that there are a few parameters within which the options need to be worked out.
He said that President Musharraf has given three parameters in this respect within which more than a dozen options can come.
He said that the president has asked that the options should be worked out, carry out an objective debate in the country, discuss and come up with the options and help the government in basically developing a consensus on an option, which is favoured in the country by maximum number of people.
The ISPR chief said that there was a need for carrying out an objective debate in this respect.
He said that in order to resolve the Kashmir issue both the countries would have to show flexibility in their respective positions and then find a solution, which is acceptable to Pakistan, India and the Kashmiris.
The ISPR director general said that the recent meeting between President Musharraf and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in New York should be taken positively because at the end of this meeting a joint communiqué was issued, which read that the options to resolve the issue would be worked out in a purposeful manner.
To a question, General Sultan said that the issue cannot be resolved without taking into consideration the aspirations and wishes of the Kashmiris and that Pakistan and India are clear about that.
He said that the United States is positively engaged in bringing down tension between Pakistan and India and has played a positive role.
He said there is a need for setting up military cantonments in Balochistan.
To a question, he said that a decision to this effect, which was made earlier, was based on logic.
Such a logic was very much there. However, in view of the situation, the implementation has been kept in abeyance, but it would be carried out at an appropriate time.