Indian Kashmir linked to Dubai by weekly flight
Air India launched the first international commercial flights from Srinagar in Indian Kashmir on Saturday, a move it is hoped will boost tourism in the troubled Himalayan territory.
State-run Air India will operate weekly flights between the insurgency-hit city and Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. Previously the only international flights out of Srinagar were charter planes to take Kashmiri Muslims to Saudi Arabia during the Haj season.
Kashmir was a major tourist destination before 1989, when a dozen Islamic rebel groups kicked off an insurgency demanding Kashmir’s independence from India or its merger with neighboring Pakistan. The conflict has killed more than 68,000 people, mostly civilians.
Kashmir is divided between India and Pakistan and both claim the region in entirety, but violence there has declined since the two sides started a peace process in 2004. Still, anti-India sentiment runs deep in the region.
Sonia Gandhi, the governing Congress party president, spoke at the ceremony for the inaugural flight. She said she hopes international flights will boost tourism in the region.
Aiyaz Akbar, a spokesman for an umbrella group of separatist political and religious leaders, said the introduction of international flights from Srinagar would not change the anti-India sentiment in the region.
