Awami Action Committee (AAC) Chief Mirwaiz Umar Farooq was re-elected as the chairman of the moderate faction of the Hurriyat Conference for another two-year term. Mirwaiz was unanimously re-elected after his term expired on November 07, 2006.
The decision was taken at an extra-ordinary meeting of the Hurriyat Conference at its Raj Bagh headquarters. The name of Mirwaiz Farooq was proposed by former Hurriyat Chairman Professor Abdul Ghani Bhat and seconded by all the other Executive Committee members. After the Hurriyat Executive Committee cleared the name, the General Council confirmed the decision.
"Mohammad Omar Farooq was chosen as the chairman from now onwards for two years," Bhat said, adding that the election was important as APHC was "trying to move forward in a specific direction while working on a political agenda."
Meanwhile, affirming its commitment to a meaningful dialogue on the Kashmir issue, the Hurriyat Conference has hoped the upcoming Indo-Pak Foreign Secretary talks and the Indian prime minister's visit to Pakistan would facilitate a permanent solution to the dispute.
"The Hurriyat Conference is committed to the meaningful dialogue process aimed at resolution of the Kashmir issue," said Mirwaiz Umer Farooq. "We want continuation of the talks between India and Pakistan so that the Kashmir issue could be solved permanently," he told a news agency in an interview after his election for a two-year term. He, however, described roundtable conferences, in which mainstream political parties took part, as futile exercises.
Mirwaiz expressed the hope that positive suggestions and proposals for resolving the long-standing dispute would come up in the foreign secretary-level talks and further progress would be made during Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to Pakistan.
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