Musharraf plays down Indian threat to Pakistan (greatest threat is internal; AQ, Taliban, extremism)

Reuters on Yahoo ^ | 7/17/09 | Simon Cameron-Moore

[NormsRevenge]

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) – The greatest threats to Pakistan come from the Taliban, al Qaeda and homegrown extremists and not from India, former Pakistani president and army chief Pervez Musharraf told an Indian television news channel.

The United States would like the Pakistan army to be less preoccupied by any potential threat from India and concentrate on destroying the Taliban and al Qaeda forces ranging across the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

"Obviously at this moment there is no war scenario and there are no threats at this moment," Musharraf said of India during an interview with CNN-IBN that was recorded on Wednesday in London and will be aired on Saturday.

Kashmir is at the core of a decades-old dispute between Pakistan and India and the cause of two of their three wars since their independence from British rule in 1947.

Both became nuclear armed states in 1998, and having gone to the brink of a fourth war in 2002, they embarked on a peace process two years later.

"I don't think India is posing any offensive move or offensive attitude," he said, according to a transcript of the interview given to Reuters.

Musharraf said threat perceptions shifted according to circumstances, citing the tensions that ballooned after last November's attack on the Indian city of Mumbai by Islamist militants from Pakistan.

Musharraf resigned last August in the face of an impending impeachment motion. He left Pakistan over a month ago.

[NormsRevenge]

Former Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf salutes upon his arrival at
the airport in New Delhi March 6, 2009. REUTERS/Stringer/Files

[marron]

ping

[353FMG]

“...threat to Pakistan (greatest threat is intermal...”)

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Pakistan and the US have a lot in common. They are better off, though — they don’t have RINOs and RATs and a illigitimate president.

[Joe Boucher]

Possibly the most sane thing I’ve heard coming from Pakistan is years.

[swarthyguy]

It is in the financial interest of the architect of the Kargil Offensive against India to subdue his real colors and act the role of a statesman, boosting his fees on the speaker circuit.

If this is the case, why did he stonewall Bush’s entreaties to begin fighting jihadis in Waziristan all through his tenure, citing the threat of India as the reason not to.

You just have to admire the Machiavellian chutzpah of Perv. I do, the man is awesome. Good thing he didn’t stay in India and become an outsourcing magnate.