Hurriyat leader Abdul Gani Lone had recently returned from Florida USA, where he had gone for his heart treatment after attending the controversial Dubai Conference. On May 20, he addressed a Hurriyat organised seminar on ‘‘Kashmir issue and Peace in South Asia’’ in Srinagar where he denied having any inclination to participate in the forthcoming Assembly polls but came down heavily on hardliners saying that ‘‘mature political struggles need to change their strategies to keep in tune with the changing times’’. Referring to the September 11 incidents, he said: ‘‘If we don’t understand the changing international scenario, we will be in loss’’. He even said that he was sad to see the way ‘‘we portray Kashmir’s freedom movement to the outside world’’. Soon after the meeting, he had a brief chat with this paper wherein he reiterated his stand that ‘‘Kashmir’s movement needs innovative ideas to counter the changing world perspectives on violent struggles’’. In fact, he stuck to his earlier interview with this newspaper which he had given from London (on way to the USA) last month saying that ‘‘nothing can be achieved if we antagonise the international community’’. ‘‘The September 11 incidents have led to a new international situation. The fine line between a genuine armed struggle and international terrorism is fast fading,’’ Lone said. ‘‘I tell my colleagues that we need to re-think our strategies,’’ he said. ‘‘But this does not mean I am for participating in the forthcoming Assembly polls. I am for democratic process that would lead to a permanent resolution of the Kashmir dispute,’’ he said. He also categorically rejected any possibility of a meeting with Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee during his Kashmir visit. ‘‘It is a symbolic visit and what will we talk to him about,’’ he said. ‘‘The need is to have a serious dialogue and not any patchwork solution,’’ he said. He, however, once again talked of the gun outliving its utility. ‘‘Violence is counter-productive for us now. We have to think of ways and means so that the the international community does not isolate us,’’ he said. He said politics does not accept blinkers. ‘‘We are not horses that we need blinkers. We have to look around us. That is maturity and only that can take us anywhere,’’ he said. He said that a successful decision regarding the Kashmir issue has to be taken by Kashmiris right here in Kashmir and not by anybody sitting in Delhi or Islamabad. Angry over the recent allegations levelled against him for his moderate views, he said elections were not taboo: ‘‘We are not against elections per se but against participation in the coming polls because that will not lead to anything.”
