Stating this at a media meet at Chandigarh Press Club here on Wednesday, senior Congress leader Natwar Singh said the recent US-Pakistan joint statement on the Kargil crisis had indicated that Clinton would take personal interest in encouraging Indo-Pak talks to resolve their differences. Singh said "though we welcome US statement on the LoC, we did not want mediation on the Kargil issue".

Singh later also delivered a talk on India's foreign policy and the situation in Kargil, at Tagore Theatre, organised by former MP Pawan Kumar Bansal.

Singh lamented that Pakistan had been successful in their motive of internationalising the Kashmir issue. He added that as per general perception, Pakistan was not completely isolated on the Kargil crisis as the oil-exporting countries had unanimously endorsed their support in favour ofPakistan.

Natwar Singh, who is in-charge of the Congress foreign affairs cell, said that "it will be for the first time that a third party would mediate in the affairs of the two countries", after India gained independence.

He sought clarification as to who will monitor the withdrawal of Pakistani intruders from the Indian side of LoC, when would the hostilities cease and how much time the whole process will take.

He also lamented that Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, who had written to Clinton to raise the Kargil issue at the G-8 summit, had failed to muster enough support from the G-8 as there was hardly any mention of the conflict and neither was Pakistan reprimanded by them for having crossed the LoC.

Singh said Pakistan "has not been isolated at the international-level on the Kargil conflict but managed to garner the United States support over the issue".

While encouraging the efforts of the valiant soldiers fighting in Kargil, Singh said "all Indians were united and fully backed thesoldiers who were pushing back the Pakistan-backed intruders from the Valley.