ISLAMABAD: Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf views his proposals on self-governance and joint management of Kashmir as the via media between the Indian and Pakistani positions, one that will make the Line of Control (LoC) "irrelevant."

In an interview to Geo TV, General Musharraf said India would not accept a redrawing of borders, and Pakistan would not accept the LoC as a permanent border.

"We need to work out a via media. My proposals are this via media, which means giving them self- governance with a joint-management system, on both sides of the LoC, so that the LoC becomes irrelevant.

``This way neither do we need to redraw the borders, nor does the LoC become permanent," he said.

He dismissed criticism of his proposals by the hardline Hurriyat faction leader Syed Ali Geelani.

"Those are his views. [If we go by them] we can keep fighting for another 100 years," he said.

Kargil withdrawal

Denying that the withdrawal from Kargil was at his instance, General Musharraf said the versions of Pakistan Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif, and the then U.S. Centcom chief, General Anthony Zinni, both of which pin the decision on him, were wrong.

Mr. Sharif took the decision to pull out from Kargil on his own, he said.

At a meeting of the Defence Committee of the Cabinet on July 2, 1999, he gave a one-hour briefing on all aspects of the operation, taking into account all possibilities, "war, limited war, air-attack, what would be our response, our capabilities. But I never once talked about withdrawal."

"India never withdrew from Siachen, so why should we have withdrawn from Kargil?" he asked.

Asked why he was reluctant to appoint a commission of enquiry into the Kargil operation, General Musharraf said there were lots of "sensitivities relating to mujahideen."

Asked to elaborate, he said: "Old corpses need not be dug out. It's an old story; there are lots of sensitivities, and lots of differences have been created without any purpose."

Summit failure

He stuck to his view that the failure of the 2001 Agra summit was the handiwork of "someone behind the scenes," who "scuttled the draft joint statement" that he and the then Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, had agreed upon.

"My guess was that somebody behind the scene was not for signing.

``The signing ceremony was ready, even chairs were arranged. We have got the draft ready. The draft copy is with us," he said.

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