Pakistan marks Prophet's birth with a missile

Kashmir: Two rival nuclear nations are 'on a knife-edge' with a million troops on the border as UN teams watch impotently

With tension between India and Pakistan still "as hot as the weather and on a knife-edge", according to the EU External Relations Commissioner Chris Patten in Delhi, Pakistan chose the Prophet Mohammed's birthday yesterday to test-fire its Ghauri missile system. The missile can deliver nuclear warheads and has a range of nearly 1,000 miles, bringing most of India within range.

"I want to congratulate the country and all the people of Pakistan ... I want to thank God for this success," said President Pervez Musharraf. "We do not want war," he told an Islamic conference in Islamabad, "but we are not afraid of war. We are ready for war. Let no one have any misunderstanding about that."

India had been informed of the tests in advance, and the spokeswoman of the Foreign Ministry commented: "We are not impressed by these missile antics." On holiday in the hill station of Manali, the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, said India's patience with Pakistan was running out. "We have waited far too long," he said, "and our wait is nearing its end."

Meanwhile the region at the heart of the problem, Kashmir, was this week sunk even deeper in gloom and dejection than usual. Sitting in the garden of an Edwardian villa in central Srinagar, a senior European army officer with the United Nations' mission to Kashmir shared the gloomy mood.

The mission to Kashmir is one of the UN's more futile operations. Styled Unmogip, the United Nations Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan, it came into existence in 1949 to monitor the ceasefire agreement that ended the first Indo-Pakistan war. It has been here ever since ­ most of the time with very little purpose. Wishing to erase from memory the fact that the Kashmir dispute once had an international dimension and that the UN had passed resolutions intended to settle it, India has given Unmogip's luckless officials very little help or encouragement.

"We have seven field stations," says the officer with a sigh, "and we are allowed to move between them. But other than that the Indians give us no freedom of movement, because they say our security is their responsibility." So although ostensibly responsible for monitoring the "ceasefire", they are not allowed to visit the Line of Control, Kashmir's de facto border, or forward Indian army positions. They are not allowed to strike up relations with Kashmiris, and a Raj-era law is invoked to ban them even from speaking to Indian Army officers.

"We spend a lot of time on the computer," says the officer. He has also proved a boon to Kashmir's embattled craftsmen: he becomes animated describing the fantastic souvenirs he has acquired, including an elaborately carved dining table and other pieces of folk furniture. But mention the politics and his mouth turns down again. "Unless they agree to cut Kashmir in half along the Line of Control," he says, "they will fight for another 50 years."

Mr Vajpayee came through Kashmir last week on his way to address soldiers on the front line. He announced a huge package of financial assistance to the state ­ 61bn rupees, more than £890m ­ but Kashmiris were not impressed. A strike to protest his visit called by separatist groups was very widely observed. Abdul Ghani Bhat, chairman of the separatist umbrella group All-party Hurriyat [Freedom] Conference, said "We are back at square one. When the Indian leaders refuse to recognise the realities on the ground, things are bound to go back to square one." Mr Vajpayee has floated several initiatives to kick-start a peace process with the mass of disaffected Kashmiri Muslims who are opposed to remaining part of India, but each has been strangled at birth by hawks in his cabinet.

And the hawks on the Pakistani side have ensured that any Kashmiris speaking the language of reconciliation with India come to a nasty end. The latest was the moderate separatist leader Abdul Gani Lone, who had called for the foreign militants active in the Kashmir Valley to go home. He was shot dead on Tuesday, probably by agents of a militant group based in Pakistan.

State elections are due to be held in Kashmir in the autumn, a demonstration by India to the world of how its citizens exercise their democratic rights. But it is fated to be a charade. The separatists have vowed to boycott it, the militants will threaten anyone planning to vote with a bullet in the back of the head. The few parties that favour continued membership of the Indian Union will again carve up the state between themselves.

"The election has no relevance," Abdul Gani Lone said on the day he died. "For us it would be a diversion. Instead of arguing for liberation, we would be arguing whether or not the polls were rigged."