Seven phrases, spoken nearly in passing on a latest afternoon in Srinagar, have set off a diplomatic tremor throughout South Asia.
“This is a crucial a part of India,” Sergio Gor informed reporters on August 19, in the course of the first go to by a US ambassador to Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir in six years.
Inside hours, Pakistan had summoned the highest American diplomat in Islamabad, Natalie Baker, to ship a proper protest.
Kashmir, a disputed Himalayan area claimed in full by each India and Pakistan, has been the casus belli for no fewer than three wars between the nuclear-armed arch-rivals, in addition to quite a few different skirmishes and border stand-offs since their independence and partition in 1947.
India now administers the populous central and southern Kashmir valley, whereas Pakistan controls a western portion of the area referred to as Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan.
