Abstract
The decade of 1990's was marked by a shift in the US policy on the issue of Kashmir. According to US policy both Pakistan and India should resolve their dispute over Kashmir through negotiations and confidence building measures. To ensure human rights protection, it cut off aid to India for human rights violations in Jammu Kashmir. Similarly, it insisted Pakistan to stop supporting the militant groups in Kashmir and even it was about to declare Pakistan as a terrorist state on the issue. Pakistan was upset with the US policy, as the latter pressurized the former for supporting the Kahsmiri liberation movement. When the issue of Kashmir brought South Asia to the brink of a nuclear confrontation (1990 and 1999), the US played the role of crisis management cataylist between the two countries that resulted in a peaceful withdrawal of troops, and restrained to play any role in the resolution of the Kashmir problem. The question of plebiscite, election, human rights violations in the Indian held Kashmir, the link between the nuclear issue and Kashmir and the role of the US as a mediator; are some of the issues that exposed the inconsistency of US policy towards the issue of Kashmir in the 1990s. In this context, the present research paper provides academic and impartial analysis of US policy towards the issue of Kashmir during 1990s and its impact on Pak-US relations as well.
