The leader, whose group pioneered suicide bombings in the territory, says the ban is aimed at appeasing India Maulana Masood Azhar, founder of the feared Jaish-e-Mohammed militant Islamic group, has been banned by Pakistan from entering Kashmir. Mr Azhar, who had been under house arrest in Pakistan until his release last December, was to address a meeting of his radical followers in Pakistani-held Kashmir yesterday. Mr Azhar said: 'It is unjustified to stop me from going to Kashmir to express solidarity with the freedom struggle in Indian-held Kashmir.' Both India and Pakistan lay claim to the Muslim-majority province, and Mr Azhar's group is at the forefront of separatist insurgency in the Indian part of Kashmir. The stocky, bearded radical, who styles himself as a religious leader, charged that the ban on his entry was 'aimed at appeasing India'. A fiery orator, Mr Azhar formed the Jaish-e-Mohammed group three years ago after his release from an Indian jail in exchange for passengers of an Indian Airlines plane hijacked to Afghanistan. The Jaish and the Lashkar-e-Taiba, another Pakistani-led group, introduced suicide missions into Kashmir. They were blamed for the terrorist strike on the Indian parliament in New Delhi in December 2001, which brought India and Pakistan to the brink of war. Under US pressure, Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf was forced to ban the two organisations last year, but their infrastructure and activities were largely left untouched. Even as late as last month, after Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee ended a prolonged standoff with Pakistan by offering talks, Lashkar leader Hafeez Mohammed Saeed, who like Mr Azhar hails from Pakistan's Punjab province, was allowed to address a rally in Kashmir. 'Jihad forces do not believe in talks,' Mr Saeed had declared. 'The jihad [in Kashmir] will not stop, the suicide attacks will continue.' India therefore considers it significant that following US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage's recent mission, Mr Azhar has been stopped from going to Kashmir, even though his visit was ostensibly for a rally to commemorate the Prophet Mohammed's birthday. Indian intelligence agencies have also reported that two training camps of another major group, the Hizbul Mujahedeen, in Pakistani-held Kashmir are being shut down, and that the rebels have been asked to deposit their weapons with the authorities. India's hawkish Defence Minister, George Fernandes, has disclosed that infiltration of militants from across the provisional border with Pakistan 'is looking down at the moment'. As a result, Mr Vajpayee, on a six-day summer break in the Himalayas, said for the first time that an end to the insurgent violence 'is not a pre-condition' for talks with Pakistan. India has so far ruled out talks unless there is a halt to rebel activity in Kashmir. The hope is that by next month full diplomatic ties will be restored between the two nuclear-armed neighbours, and officials will begin the groundwork for a possible visit by Mr Vajpayee to Islamabad in December. Karachi's Dawn newspaper reported that Pakistan had offered to host the long-delayed summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Co-operation in December. This will allow Mr Vajpayee to meet his Pakistani counterpart, Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali, on the sidelines of the summit. Meanwhile, attackers on a motorcycle set off a series of explosions yesterday at 18 Shell petrol stations in the southern Pakistani city of Karachi, police and company officials said. Four employees suffered minor injuries.
