Moderate Muslim separatists in Indian Kashmir are to travel to Pakistan tomorrow for talks about the disputed region's future, defying fierce opposition from hardliners and rebels.
The 11 separatists will travel aboard a bus service launched two months ago that crosses the Line of Control -- the de facto border dividing Kashmir between nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan.
"Going to Pakistan will be a big step toward resolving the Kashmir issue," said Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, the region's top Muslim cleric and head of the moderate wing of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference separatist alliance.
Security will be on high alert for tomorrow's bus run, the fourth so far since the start April 7 of the service opposed by some rebel groups who have threatened to turn the buses into "coffins."
"We'll search the road for bobby traps and landmines," said a police official.
The trip is part of a slow 18-month peace process between India and Pakistan aimed at ending the dispute over Muslim-majority Kashmir, spark of two of their three wars since independence from Britain in 1947.
The moderates will meet Pakistani political leaders and heads of rebel groups based in Pakistan-held Kashmir that have been battling New Delhi's rule in Indian Kashmir for 15 years.
"The meeting with militants will be at the top of our agenda. We also want to know the stand of the Pakistani people and politicians in getting the Kashmir issue settled," Farooq said.
Separatists sources say the moderates will carry a message to militants that the "role of the gun is over" and urge a ceasefire in Indian Kashmir where tens of thousands have died in violence.
Pakistan last week invited the Hurriyat separatist alliance made up of two dozen political groups seeking Kashmir's independence or merger with Pakistan.
Moderate separatists led by Farooq accepted the invitation, as did Yasin Malik, head of the pro-independence Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front, a Pakistani official told reporters Tuesday.
But at least one of the hardline members, angry over as Pakistan's refusal to hold out for direct three-way talks involving New Delhi, Islamabad and Kashmiris, rejected the invitation.
"Pakistan's present leadership is deviating from the country's basic stance on Kashmir. We've decided not to go to show our unhappiness," said Syed Ali Geelani, the hardline faction head who declined the invitation.
India had been reluctant to allow the separatist leaders to travel to Kashmir but after the Pakistani invitation said it would endorse the trip.
"The visit has lost some significance as all the separatists aren't going," said Tahir Mohiudin, editor of leading Urdu weekly Chattan, meaning Rock.
"But it's a big event as the separatists are being allowed to cross the divide for the first time."
The bus service on which the separatist leaders will travel is seen by many as the biggest achievement of the peace process as it has reunited relatives divided by the Line of Control.
But it has been opposed by some rebel groups and hardline separatists who fear greater person-to-person contact will diminish momentum for their cause.
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