Omar favours triangular talks to solve Kashmir

In a shift of stand, Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Sunday favoured triangular talks among India, Pakistan and separatist leadership and also offered to be a facilitator if militant outfit Hizbul Mujahideen wanted to come to the negotiating table.

The 39-year-old Chief Minister, however, had a word of caution for moderate Hurriyat Chairman Mirwaiz Umer Farooq asking him to take his other members on board for talks as "otherwise all they will do is (to) jump on to the hard-line bandwagon and threaten the process."

"I think again (it is) realistic. You are not going to get a situation where New Delhi, Islamabad and the Hurriyat are going to be sitting at the same table - it is not going to happen. Therefore, if you can work a system wherein you engage with Islamabad and you engage with New Delhi, both at the same time, I see no harm in it.

"We have done it from the mainstream point of view. I have had engagement with the government of Pakistan as well as the government of India, and I don't think anything harmful has come out of that," said Omar during an interview.