Pakistan says no role in perpetuating terror in India

On Board Air India One, Sep 18 (UNI) Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today said Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf had assured him that his country had no hand in perpetuating terrorism in India.

''He did not go into the past. He said whatever has happened in the past, let's work together in the future,'' Dr Singh told journalists who accompanied him on his visit to Brazil and Cuba.

In Havana, Dr Singh had a one-to-one meeting with Gen Musharraf on Saturday for a little over an hour, on the sidelines of the 14th Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit, at the end of which the two leaders issued a path-breaking Joint Statement.

The statement said the two leaders had decided to put in place an India-Pakistan anti-terrorism institutional mechanism to identify and implement counter-terrorism initiatives and investigations.

They also strongly condemned all acts of terrorism, in the context of the July 11 Mumbai blasts, which claimed over 180 lives, and agreed that terrorism was a scourge that needed to be effectively dealt with.

Talking to journalists on his way back home from Havana, Dr Singh said he welcomed the commitment made by Pakistan in the statement.

''As explicitly as it could be stated, it is reiterated in the statement we have issued... I believe this is the best that we could get in the circumstances,'' he said.

''...there is an explicit commitment on the part of Pakistan to say that they will work with us to do all that is in their control to fight this scourge,'' he said.

The Prime Minister also totally denied any suggestion that the statement was agreed upon at the behest of the United States or any other country.

''It is a question of our own sovereign national interest.'' MORE UNI SA PDS BST0654