Islamabad: Despite a joint survey of Sir Creek by officials of Pakistan and India, chances of an early settlement of the disputed waterway in the Arabian Sea between the two South Asian neighbours are bleak, authorities in Pakistan have indicated.
The 102-km strip of water in the Rann of Kutch marshlands in the vicinity of the oil-rich Gulf is important because of the prospects of finding oil and gas.
Also, both countries are racing against time as they would suffer economic losses if the dispute remains unresolved by 2009, when the UN Convention on the Law of Seas would be implemented.
Insistence
"The issue has been lingering on because India insists on setting maritime boundaries before resolving other issues related to Sir Creek," Daily Times said on Saturday quoting unnamed sources.
Sir Creek, along with Wular Lake in Jammu and Kashmir, and reducing military presence on the Siachen Glacier are among the specific issues on which India and Pakistan have been talking as part of the current peace dialogue, but there has been no resolution of any of them.
Imprisonment
The daily said Pakistan wants "important" issues to be resolved before taking up Sir Creek, where fishermen of both sides regularly stray into each other's territories and are caught and released only after several months of imprisonment.
The newspaper did not elaborate on what the "important" issues were while quoting sources. However, Pakistan has always cited resolution of the Kashmir issue as a major matter.
The sources told the daily that India only wanted to set maritime boundaries, but Pakistan was interested in the demarcation of overall frontiers. They said Pakistan also had a "historical mistrust" of India.
