Chapter Sixteen

Peace in Kashmir which can be availed to achieve justice. This, I mentioned, was in accordance both with reason and Islam. When the Prophet Muhammad entered into a peace treaty with the pagan Quraysh at Hudaybiya, he secured from this only peace, not justice. However, this peace created opportunities. The Prophet availed of these opportunities and finally justice was achieved. Justice is never a part of peace. The two cannot be had simultaneously. Rather, justice is always secured only after peace is established, by using the available opportunities. Justice does not automatically stem from peace. The leaders of the Kashmiri militant movement constantly and unanimously repeat one point. And that is that they want the Kashmir issue to be resolved in accordance with the resolutions of the United Nations, or, in other words, that a referendum be held in Kashmir. The meaninglessness of this argument, from the legal and logical points of view, was made clear to the whole world when the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, announced in Islamabad that the United Nations’ resolutions had now become irrelevant. Here I would like to point out a matter of principle. And that is that one can secure one’s rights only on the basis of one’s own strength, and not through someone else’s. It is simply unrealistic and wishful thinking to expect the United Nations’ resolutions to be acted upon in today’s context. This is Not an Islamic Movement Kashmir’s Muslim militants call their war an ‘Islamic jihad’. This is completely erroneous. The un-understandable silence of the Muslim ulema on this point has only further convinced these Kashmiri militants of their claim. The fact is that the present war in Kashmir is most definitely not a jihad. Those who are part of this war definitely cannot receive the reward for participating in jihad.