Pakistan, India can’t afford war: analysts

The risk of war between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan has increased with the redeployment of troops along the common border, but neither can afford the cost of such a conflict, analysts say.

The two sides have raised tensions by whipping up war hype for domestic reasons since the Mumbai attacks last month, but must step back from the brink to focus on more pressing issues such as the spread of militancy, they say.

A war is even less likely as the United States, a key ally of both Islamabad and New Delhi, would suffer as a result, the experts warn.

(ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW)

“The risk of war has increased with troop mobilisation,” Hasan Askari, a political analyst and former head of the political science department at the University of Punjab, told AFP.

“However this does not necessarily mean that the two countries will go to war. There are a number of considerations which impel the two sides not to cross the red line.”

• A d v e r t i s e m e n t

Senior Pakistani security and defence officials said Friday the military had moved a “limited number” of troops fighting Taliban militants in the tribal areas near Afghanistan to the Indian border as a “minimum security” measure.

This followed intelligence intercepts indicating that India had put its forces on notice to move to the border and cancelled all leave, they said. An Indian army spokesman however told AFP that no troops had been moved.

Full article here