India
(MNN) — India and Pakistan
held the first joint anti-terrorism meeting this week, in the latest initiative
of the South Asian peace process.
Pakistan
hoped for more information about the February 19th firebombing of a
train linking the two countries that killed 68 people. Few new leads though
from India
left both sides with little to investigate.
However, the panel formed in November when the two sides
resumed peace talks in New Delhi
following July 2006 train bombings in Mumbai.
Those blasts claimed the lives of 186 people, and left security rattled. India said Pakistani intelligence
was involved in the blasts. It became
evident a more cooperative effort was needed.
A main sticking issue has been the blame game. India accuses Pakistan-backed Islamic militants
of waging an insurgency in its sector of Kashmir
and of triggering attacks in other parts of the country. Pakistan denies
it arms or trains the militants.
What is evident is that the insurgency does not benefit by peace.
The well-orchestrated blasts on the Samjhauta Express, which connects New Delhi to the Pakistani city of Lahore, underlined the threats that the
fragile peace faces between the countries.
Gospel For Asia's KP Yohannan says, "The reports are
that this whole bombing created by the religious fundamentalists from Pakistan itself
to stop these kind of peace negotiations.
People are nervous, they're scared.
We're deeply concerned about reaching the Muslims with the Gospel, and
all these things don't help at all."
Yohanan says the terrorists discount what happens in fear:
people respond to the Gospel of peace. "Whenever this kind of terrorist
activity takes place, we've learned, quite interestingly, that people are being
more despair and feeling hopelessness. This is the kind of opportunity, also,
for our people to share the Gospel with them."
In 1990, GFA reports that there
were only a few thousand evangelical believers in Jammu and Kashmir, but that number doubled
during the '90s. The need for Gospel workers is great, especially in war-torn Kashmir.
Gospel for Asia
missionaries regularly face spiritual attacks in the form of discouragement,
illness and physical assaults from anti-Christian forces. Several other
organizations are also spreading the Gospel in Jammu and Kashmir. Pray for their
teams' boldness in sharing the Gospel.
