India and Pakistan should not hark back to what happened in the past and take steps to move forward to remove the mistrust between the two neighbours, a former Pakistan Army official said today.
"Let us not be shackled to the past. We have to look forward and help our leaders remove the mistrust between the two neighbours," said Brigadier (retd) Zahid Zaman of Pakistan Army.
He was speaking at a roundtable discussion on "Indo-Pak Relations: The way forward" organised by a Delhi-based thinktank Observer Research Foundation (ORF) and India Pakistan Soldier's Peace Initiative.
Delegations of Indian and Pakistani soldiers also discussed issues related to terrorism, Kashmir, ceasefire violations, among others.
While stressing on the need of having proper engagement between the military and intelligence establishments of both the countries, Distinguished Fellow of ORF, Raja Mohan said, "we have to put pressure on both the governments to have some engagement between the military and intelligence establishments of India and Pakistan."
Commenting on cross-border terrorism, Senior Fellow, ORF, Wilson John, said, "we should discuss terrorism as a global issue and not as a bilateral one."
Allegations and counter-allegations would only serve to embolden the terrorist groups. We should stop levelling accusation at each other, he added.
Speaking on the Kashmir issue, Manoj Joshi, a Distinguished Fellow of ORF said, "Jammu and Kashmir will progress only if it can develop a robust economy.
