To Bhim: I have been watching and dialoguing with some JKLF leaders since shortly after 911... who are based in the area of Bedford, England, not actually in the sub continent. However, through them I have had some dialogue about the current leader in India of the JKLF, who of course are up in the Srinigar area when not traveling.
***In recent years the leader of the JKLF has been doing college and univeristy speaking tours here in the USA. However, I am saddened that all to often the JKLF leader ends up speaking at predominanently Black colleges instead of largely to integrated or traditional colleges and universities. This does not bode well, I admit, as it implies speaking to the growing Black American student population instead of to the broad mix of all American college students and intellectuals.
My observations of the JKLF are factual in that the head of the organization disavowed violence in any and all forms years ago. He renounced his violent past over 10 years ago, which in itself is a form of progress.
Unfiltrators seeking to create bloodshed and mayhem are another cat, of the al Qaida and related Taliban types, of which as you know there are 5 Taliban variations with further breakdown into other splinter groups. Here some of the past and still current leadership and others within the ISI have been in league with these terrorists under the tired old story of trying to "fight India to save Muslims in illegally held parts of Kashmir."
I separate the JKLF out of such thuggery. Having lived and worked in old West Pakistan, some things never change. Get a bunch of young, deprived of many basics folks into a large crowd and it is a negative version of an old "Down South" Revival where a carismatic speaker can quickly whip the crowd into a violent rage. People the world over like to find fault and have someone else to blame for their problems, and undemocratic rulers in Pakistan historically want to keep the crowds focused on India lest they realize they are continually repressed, dictated to and ill treated by their own government at home.
There is the secondary issue of splinter Hindu terrorists in Kashmir, too, but they pale by comparison to what the ISI and their mignons do frequently.
BUT someday we have to see open borders, what is now the LOC, so families, commerce, and good spirited travel and communications can naturally break down the damnable hatred and hostility between Pakistan and India.
Many, especially among you who are well educated, expect instant results. I am a realist, an American, and see the long time frame necessary, not as a pipe smoking coffee swilling arm chair person. Cold reality requires a consltant effort to bring a better day instead of slinging violence inciting epithets. There is too much of that already from the half baked so called mullahs who are in league with the Wahabbi movement out of Saudi Arabia, whence comes some of the terror supporting financing.