CHICAGO, Sept 11: President Pervez Musharraf on Tuesday accused India of dramatically increasing its stockpile of conventional weapons in a move that could jeopardise the volatile power balance in the region.

New Delhi had stepped up defence spending by 50 per cent in the past three years, was spending 4.5 billion dollars a year on high-tech imports, putting it on course to become the world’s biggest purchaser of arms, he said.

In contrast, Islamabad had frozen its defence expenditures at the level they were three years ago.

“The visible tilt in conventional arms balance between India and Pakistan has dangerous portents and must be checked,” he told a gathering of business leaders at a luncheon organised by the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations.

President Musharraf said that the development was all the more intimidating because 95 per cent of Indian forces were deployed at border with Pakistan.

Pakistan stood ready to work with its neighbour to defuse tension in the region, but the only way to achieve regional stability was to settle the question of Kashmiri sovereignty, he said.

“A sustained dialogue for a principled and lasting settlement must commence without further delay,” he said, adding “we remain ready for such a dialogue at any time, any place and any level.”

Calling for resumption of “genuine, sustained and purpose-oriented dialogue” with India, the president said: “We must live in harmony, not acrimony.”

He said: “Because of the Indian intransigence, the war clouds continue to loom large on the horizon of South Asia.”

He, however, said he had no hesitation in giving a commitment that while assuring for itself the strongest possible defence against aggression, “Pakistan shall not initiate a war with India.”

Gen Musharraf said: “We must work for a South Asia of friendship and amity, cooperation and collaboration.”

“Indian and Pakistani troops continue to be in eyeball-to-eyeball mode across the entire length of our border. Of late the imminence of aggression could have receded and Indian war rhetoric may have gone down, but until such time that the forces of the two countries do not disengage the capability and risk of adventurism remains.”

NUCLEAR WAR: President Musharraf said he knew that scare scenarios of nuclear holocaust in South Asia have been painted. “It goes without saying that nuclear war should be unthinkable. Nuclear weapons must not be weapons of use. They are primarily designed to deter aggression.”

“We have offered to India a triad of peace. Resolution of disputes, a no-war pact, mutual reduction of forces and denuclearization and economic cooperation,” he said, adding that unfortunately, India had not responded positively to our proposals and seems intent, instead, on building a triad of nuclear weapon systems.”

AFGHANISTAN: The president said a peaceful and stable Afghanistan engaged in national reconstruction and reintegrated with the world is another imperative.

He said Pakistan supports the Bonn Agreement. “We support and fully back President Karzai and his administration. Pakistan has offered full cooperation by opening up its markets to Afghanistan. We have earmarked $100 million for reconstruction purposes over a period of five years of which $18 million have already been disbursed.”

He urged the international community to start implementing the $4.5 billion Tokyo Reconstruction Plan without further delay.

TERRORISM: Gen Musharraf said Pakistan was against terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, wherever it occurs. We are part of the international coalition in the fight against terrorism. Our role and record speak for themselves. Our soldiers and policemen in Pakistan have given their lives in the fight against terrorism and terrorists.

President Musharraf said he had taken unprecedented actions and wide-ranging strategic decisions to curb terrorism, extremism and religious intolerance in society.

He, however, said our actions had not been without cost. “We are being targeted for the decisions taken by us to combat extremism. However, we are resolute.”

“I shall not allow a fringe minority to hold us to ransom. We need your support and understanding in accomplishing this mission, specially so, when we see sections of the western media casting unfair aspersions on us that we are “back-tracking” or “going slow”. “Such comments/views are most discouraging because they are anything but the truth.”

US-PAKISTAN RELATIONS: President Musharraf said both the countries enjoyed a tradition of close, cordial and cooperative relations. These relations stand renewed and re-invigorated in the post 9/11 environment. Both sides were committed to an enduring and mutually beneficial partnership, he said and added: “I believe that Pakistan-US relations serve the cause of peace and stability in our region.”

He also appeared to point the finger at India in connection with terrorist attacks on Western targets inside Pakistan in recent months, saying that Pakistani extremists had been “abetted,” by an “Intelligence Organization in a neighbouring country.”

Gen Musharraf did not give specifics but appeared to be referring to a bomb attack against the US consulate in Karachi in June that killed 12 Pakistanis and a March 17 raid on an Islamabad church in which the wife and stepdaughter of a US diplomat were killed. —AFP/APP