A Hurriyat delegation visiting Pakistan was stopped by authorities from attending a reception organised in Lahore by people with links to the founder of the banned terrorist group Lashkar-e-Tayiba, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed.
Hurriyat leaders, led by Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, were on their way to the reception on Wednesday night when a top government official asked them not to attend the event "hosted on the platform of the Jamaat-ud-Dawah", the new organisation set up by Saeed after the LeT was banned.
The Hurriyat team was "barred from the reception only to avoid annoying Western quarters and Delhi," sources said.
Those who attended the reception waited for over two hours before Saeed told them that the Hurriyat team would not be participating in it, The News daily reported.
Saeed said the Jamaat "did not want to cause problems for the guests (Hurriyat leaders) or for the cause of Kashmir...."
Saeed hinted that political problems in Pakistan had diverted attention from the Kashmir issue and vowed that the "jihad would continue."
The Hurriyat leaders are currently visiting Pakistan at the invitation of Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi for
consultations with the top political leadership ahead of Qureshi's visit to India beginning June 27.
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