India and Pakistan had through "back channels" agreed to a non-territorial solution to Kashmir. A newly released WikiLeaks cable revealed that former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh were inches away to resolve the Kashmir issue.
According to the US embassy cable-dated April 21, 2009-Singh confirmed this to a visiting US delegation led by the then House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Howard Berman in April 2009 saying that the solution included free trade and movement across LoC.
Singh told the US delegation that Delhi and Islamabad had made great progress prior to February 2007, when President Musharraf ran into trouble. "We had reached an understanding in back channels," he related, says the cable, in which Musharraf had agreed to a non-territorial solution to Kashmir. Singh went on to add that India wanted a strong, stable, peaceful, democratic Pakistan and makes no claim on "even an inch" of Pakistani territory.
Singh's comments authenticate Musharraf's assertions last year that India and Pakistan had reached that stage, where they were preparing the final draft for the resolution. He had said the two sides shared drafts through "back channels", and these were in keeping with the four-point template which he had envisaged to resolve the issue.
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