Indian Leader Says Pakistan Must Do More to Rein In Extremists

NEW DELHI, May 30 -- Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh expressed concern Monday that the Pakistani government had not shut down extremist training camps operating in its territory.

While Singh said that the peace process with Pakistan was progressing, he warned that any major terrorist action "could greatly upset the whole process." Relations between the countries frayed in December 2001 after an attack on the Indian Parliament complex that New Delhi blamed on Islamic radicals supported by Pakistan.

"Not enough has been done to dismantle the infrastructure of terrorism, which is still intact," Singh said in an interview with foreign journalists in New Delhi, the capital, marking his first anniversary in office.

Pakistan has denied charges by India and the United States that extremists are operating camps on its soil.

Singh said he would work on all the issues that have complicated relations between the two nuclear-armed neighbors, including the dispute over Kashmir, the Muslim-majority province in the Himalayas that both countries claim and that they have gone to war over twice. But Singh dismissed the notion that a solution to the Kashmir problem would involve any redrawing of borders between India and Pakistan.

"I have said to President Pervez Musharraf that India will never accept another division of our country on religious lines. I told him that I have no mandate to negotiate or redraw boundaries of our country," Singh said. "Within these limitations, we have to search for a solution."

Kashmir has been divided between India and Pakistan since they were founded in 1947. Islamic separatists began an armed revolt inside the Indian-controlled portion in 1989, and the conflict has killed between 30,000 and 60,000 people.

Singh hinted at increasing freedom of travel for Kashmiri people between the two countries, and also boosting bilateral economic cooperation. He added that these measures would make the border less imposing for area residents.

The level of violence in Kashmir has decreased significantly since the peace process began in January 2004. But the biggest achievement came in April, when a bus to carried Kashmiris across the disputed border, the first link between the two sides of the province in nearly 60 years.

"I do believe that we have moved forward. We have today an atmosphere in which you can start discussing basic problems," Singh said. But he refused to set any time frame for finding a lasting solution to the Kashmir dispute.

"We are dealing with problems which have defied solutions for 57 years. I do not want to minimize the difficulties that lie ahead," Singh said. "It would be much too presumptuous on my part to give a timetable."