New Delhi: Pakistan's hardline Opposition leader and chief of Jamiat-Ulema-Islam party Maulana Fazal- ur Rahman on July 18 said the Lahore Declaration could be the guiding principle to resolve Indo-Pak disputes if the Simla Accord was not favoured.

"If not content with the Simla Agreement, we have Lahore which again advocates the same," Rahman said urging religious leaders to come forward and force the governments of the two countries to hold talks.

At a reception hosted by Jamiat-Ulema Hind, Rahman, who has been one of the loudest critics of US attack on Afghanistan and Iraq, said, "Today the world is facing a major crisis as no one is taking an initiative to fill the gap created by the disintegration of USSR."

"I am of the strong belief that India and Pakistan together can play a pivotal role in providing balance to the world," he said amidst applause from the audience, which included Pakistan's new High Commissioner to India Aziz Ahmed Khan and former Hurriyat chairman Mirwaiz Umer Farooq.

Stressing the need to build a strong relation between India and Pakistan, Rahman said, "Partition is a history. We have disputes that is also a fact but why do we tend to ignore that both the countries signed Simla Agreement to solve all disputes bilaterally."

The hardline Muslim cleric sought to explode the myth that his party or other religious parties in Pakistan were sharing anti-India sentiments or were opposed to the process of Democracy.

PTI