The Pakistan-India Peoples' Forum for Peace and Democracy strongly condemns the wanton and motivated killing of 36 Sikh civilians ... Killing innocent civilians is the worst form of terrorism and it cannot be justified ...

Such acts of violent terror ... expose the tragic futility of the state's obsessive emphasis on military means to tackle political problems. It reinforces the urgent need for civil society to reassert the primacy of the democratic politics of engagement and dialogue so as to wrest back the terrain from the forces of terror who know no other language than violence ... It is ... imperative that the democratic peoples of India, Pakistan and Jammu and Kashmir from both sides of the LoC, should together pressurise the governments of India and Pakistan to immediately declare cease-fire and rein in the armed forces ... (and) to resume a political dialogue ...

The Forum believes a cease-fire by all armed actors, state and non-state, is an essential precondition for the free ... participation by the peoples of Jammu and Kashmir in a sustainable peace process. (Source: The Mainstream)