Our problem is just one - Kashmir, it can be solved, says PM Imran Khan during Kartarpur ceremony

 

 

"The only issue between us is Kashmir, all it needs is just two capable leaderships to resolve this issue. Just imagine the potential we have if our relationships becomes strong," PM Imran Khan said.

"Our problem is Kashmir," he said. "Kashmir can be solved." "It needs a new thought." "Mistakes have been committed by both sides," the Pakistan prime minister said.

"Politics must not divide us, it should unite," Imran Khan said while addressing the people at the ceremony. "Politics should not deter us."

"If India takes one step, we will take two steps," PM Imran Khan said.

 

 

 

India's food processing minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal said it is a historic day for Sikhs. 

Speaking at the ceremony, Navjot Sidhu thanked PM Imran Khan for the opportunity. 

"India and Pakistan have potential to grow together," he said, adding,"we've to change the way we look at each other."

PM Imran Khan was accompanied by Army chief General Bajwa and foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi along with ministers Harsimrat Kaur Badal and Navjot Sidhu during the ceremony.

PM Imran Khan today layed the foundation stone for the Kartarpur corridor in a ceremony which was also attended by Indian ministers - Harsimrat Kaur Badal and Hardeep Singh Puri.

News reports Wednesday said Pakistan Army chief General Qamar Bajwa would also attend the foundation stone-laying ceremony. 

India's External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj says that despite foundation stone-lyaing ceremony, "terror and talks can't go together'. 

 

Indian ministers Harsimrat Kaur Badal and Hardeep Singh Puri leave for Pakistan for the foundation stone-laying ceremony for the Kartarpur corridor  

 

 

Sidhu crossed over into Pakistan yesterday

 

Sidhu said yesterday that his hug with Pakistan Army chief Qamar Bajwa was not a Rafale deal. And that "when two Punjabis meet, they hug each other". 

 

Badal, interestingly, had called Sidhu a "gaddaar" when he first came back from Pakistan talking about the Kartarpur Corridor. Sidhu had gone to Pakistan for Imran Khan's swearing-in ceremony. 

He had run into trouble there after he and the Pakistani Army chief shared a hug. 

Sidhu will be at the ceremony today. 

India's External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj had been invited by Pakistan to attend but she turned down the invite, instead deputing Badal and Puri to go

News reports Wednesday said Pakistani Foreign Minister would be attending the foundation stone-laying ceremony for the Kartarpur Corridor. India is sending two of its union ministers to attend — Harsimrat Kaur Badal, who is minister for food processing industries, and Hardeep Singh Puri, who minister of state with independent charge foru housing and urban affairs. 

Punjab minister Navjot Singh Sidhu has said the opening of the Kartarpur Corridor could be the beginning of a new era of peace between India and Pakistan

 

Prime Minister Imran Khan will on Wednesday lay the foundation stone for the much-awaited corridor linking Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Pakistan's Kartarpur — the final resting place of Sikh faith's founder Guru Nanak Dev — to Dera Baba Nanak shrine in India's Gurdaspur district to facilitate visa-free movement of Indian Sikh pilgrims.

Kartarpur Sahib in Pakistan is located across the river Ravi, about four kilometres from the Dera Baba Nanak shrine. It was established by the Sikh Guru in 1522. The first Gurdwara, Gurdwara Kartarpur Sahib, was built here, where Guru Nanak Dev is said to have died.

The Kartarpur Corridor, which will facilitate the visa-free travel of Indian Sikh pilgrims to Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Kartarpur, is expected to be completed within six months, Pakistan Foreign Office Spokesman Mohammad Faisal said on Tuesday.

The development comes ahead of Guru Nanak's 550th birth anniversary next year.
India has also said it will build and develop a corridor from Dera Baba Nanak in Gurdaspur district to the International Border to facilitate Sikh pilgrims visiting Gurdwara Darbar Sahib Kartarpur.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi Friday hoped that the Kartarpur Corridor would act as a bridge between the peoples of India and Pakistan that might lead to a better future as he referred to the fall of the Berlin Wall to underline the importance of people-to-people contact.

Speaking at a function to mark the birth anniversary of Guru Nanak in New Delhi, Modi said the issues between the governments and the armies would continue and only time will show the way out.

Thousands of Sikh devotees from India visit Pakistan every year to celebrate the birth anniversary of Guru Nanak.

The issue of Kartarpur Sahib came into focus after Punjab Minister Navjot Singh Sidhu visited Pakistan in August to attend the oath-taking ceremony of his cricketer-turned-politician friend Imran Khan as prime minister of that country.

After his return, Sidhu said that Pakistan Army chief Qamar Javed Bajwa had told him that Pakistan may open a corridor to Kartarpur Sahib.

Sidhu has already arrived in Lahore with a group of Indian journalists to attend the ground breaking ceremony on Wednesday.

The India-Pakistan ties nose-dived in recent years with no bilateral talks taking place. The ties between the two countries had strained after the terror attacks by Pakistan-based groups in 2016.

Sidhu has termed the Kartarpur Corridor as a "corridor of infinite possibilities" and said such initiatives would promote peace and erase "enmity" between India and Pakistan. 

"The seed Imran Khan had sown three months ago has become a plant. It is a happy moment for the Sikh community that the corridor to reach Kartarpur to get Baba Guru Nanak's blessing without any hassle," he told the media. 

"Karturpur corridor will prove to be a path of peace," Sidhu added.

On Monday, Indian Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu and Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh laid the foundation stone of the corridor in Gurdaspur.

Pakistan had invited External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, who thanked her Pakistani counterpart Shah Mahmood Qureshi for the invite and said she was unable to travel to Kartarpur Sahib due to prior commitments.

India will send Union Ministers Harsimrat Kaur Badal and Hardeep Singh Puri to Pakistan Wednesday to attend the groundbreaking ceremony of the corridor in Kartarpur. 

(PTI)