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Indian PM to make Siachen a "peace mountain"
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-06-12 15:39

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, on a visit to the Siachen Glacier which has been the scene of bloody fighting with Pakistan, said on Sunday it was time to convert the world's highest battlefield into a "peace mountain".

Singh is the first prime minister to visit Siachen, between 18,000 and 22,000 feet above sea level.

There has been no fighting on Siachen since 2003, when a ceasefire came into effect between Indian and Pakistani troops. But thousands have died in the past two decades with more soldiers killed by sub-zero temperatures, the high altitude and accidents than enemy action.

An aerial view of mountains is seen around Kargil, India, Saturday, June 11, 2005. The Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is on a three-day visit to the remote Ladakh district in northwest Kashmir that began Friday to inaugurate two-power projects and to interact with Indian soldiers at Siachen, the world's highest battlefield. [AP]

"The time has come that we make efforts that this battlefield is converted into a peace mountain," Singh, 72, told troops stationed there, the Press Trust of India news agency reported.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, center, interacts with Indian army soldiers as Indian army chief J.J.Singh, in green and red turban, looks on in Leh, India, Saturday, June 11, 2005. [AP]

A ceasefire has been in place in Siachen and along the rest of the Kashmir border since 2003 as part of a gradual but steady peace process between the nuclear powers, which have fought three wars since they were created in 1947.

Two have been over the disputed region of Kashmir.

The overall peace process began in earnest in early 2004. It has moved slowly, but a recent meeting in New Delhi between Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and Singh went off well and has fed hopes of more progress.

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