Resume truck services to PoK, J

Srinagar, Aug 2 (UNI) Urging India and Pakistan to revive trade links across the borders without any further delay, a senior minister in Jammu and Kashmir said the truck service between Srinagar and Muzaffarabad would go a long way in removing the sense of economic siege and subjugation among the people of the state.

Addressing a public meeting at Kupwara, once a hub of militants, Minister for Public Health and Engineering, Tourism and Horticulture Mohammad Dilawar Mir said the revival of trade and tourism ties across the Line Of Control (LOC) would help reach confidence building measures (CBMs) to remove alienation, cynicism, aloofness and helplessness among the people of the state.

He stressed the need for the immediate restoration of trade, travel and tourism across the Line of Control (LoC).

The PDP leader said adding the Jammu and Kashmir-centric cross-LoC economic dimension to the ongoing peace process would facilitate the much-needed political stability in the region.

He made it clear that the key to the South Asian Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) lay in cross-LoC trade. ''SAFTA will become a reality, the day trucks start rolling on the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad road.'' He said the tardy follow-up of last year announcement by India and Pakistan to start trade through the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad road was brewing cynicism and disinterest among the people of the state, who led the peace process from the front.

The people of two parts of the state have to be allowed to interact fully and freely at social, cultural and business levels to weaken the forces of ignorance and obscurity that fuel the fires of alienation, he added.

UNI