India's refusal to start peace talks with Pakistan after the Kashmiri incursion may have some tortuous logic for politicians in New Delhi. But their reasons are as mystifying to foreign observers as Premier Atal Behari Vajpayee's consistent rejection of outside help in mediation, despite offers from foreign powers for at least two years before this latest spat.
Mr Vajpayee may persist in thinking he can go it alone, but without Washington's intervention, it is doubtful that the fighting would have ended as quickly, or as decisively, as it did. Now that the last of the guerillas has left Indian territory, there can be no justifiable obstacle to talks.
India has proved its point about the involvement of Pakistan army personnel. Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has done what he promised in his White House meeting with President Bill Clinton, at considerable risk to his political future at home.
If there ever was any genuine 'trust' between the two neighbours, it is certainly shattered now. But a fresh start begins at the conference table, with or without another party present to facilitate reasoned dialogue. No doubt the Indian premier feels betrayed by Islamabad when the ink is hardly dry on the Lahore Declaration, which his friendly overtures helped to bring about. But he risks losing the moral high ground through intransigence.
Kashmir is on the international agenda now, due to concerns about stability in a region where two nuclear nations are locked in a seemingly intractable dispute. And India's record there is not without blemish. Human rights abuses are widespread and the army stands accused of torturing and murdering suspected rebels and sympathisers.
Kashmir has been the pawn in a bloody game for 50 years, and has suffered enough. Its people, though Muslim, are a different sect to most Pakistanis. It is time they were asked what future they prefer.
