External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj yesterday said Jammu and Kashmir is and will always remain an integral part of India.
In a strong reply to Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s address to the UN General Assembly last week, Swaraj hit out at the neighbour on the issue of terrorism and raked up the “human rights violations” in Balochistan.
She told the world body that India had offered an unconditional hand of friendship to Pakistan but got in return cross border terror attacks.
“And what did we get in return? Pathankot, Bahadur Ali, and Uri,” she said in her speech in Hindi.
In his address to the General Assembly, Sharif last week praised Burhan Wani, the Hizbul Mujahideen commander, whose killing triggered a fresh wave of deadly unrest in Jammu and Kashmir. The Pakistan prime minister said his country wanted to have better ties with India and was open to an unconditional dialogue to resolve all issues, including Kashmir.
But Swaraj rebutted the claim that India had put any conditions for talks “which are not acceptable to him.”
“What pre-conditions? Did we impose any pre-conditions before extending an invitation for the swearing-in ceremony of our government? We took the initiative to resolve issues not on the basis of conditions, but on the basis of friendship. We conveyed Eid greetings to the prime minister of Pakistan, wished success to his cricket team, extended good wishes for his health and well-being.
“Our prime minister went to Lahore to wish Nawaz Sharif on his birthday. Did all this come with conditions attached?”
She claimed the confession of Bahadur Ali, who was captured after a shootout in Kashmir, “is a living proof of Pakistan’s complicity in cross-border terror.”
India has claimed Ali confessed that he was trained by the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) militant group.
“But when confronted with such evidence, Pakistan remains in denial. It persists in the belief that such attacks will enable it to obtain the territory it covets,” she said on the final day of the annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations.
“My firm advice to Pakistan is: abandon this dream. Let me state unequivocally that Jammu and Kashmir is an integral part of India and will always remain so,” Swaraj said.
“We need to forget our prejudices and join hands together to script an effective strategy against terror,” Swaraj said. “And if any nation refuses to join this global strategy, then we must isolate it.”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowed on Saturday to mount a global campaign to isolate Pakistan. Last month US Secretary of State John Kerry urged Pakistan to join other nations in fighting terrorism.
Pakistan’s UN Ambassador Maleeha Lodhi dismissed Swaraj’s statement as “a litany of falsehoods and baseless allegations”.
“For the Indian foreign minister to claim that her country has imposed no preconditions for talks with Pakistan is another flight from reality. India suspended talks more than a year ago, and has refused to resume these despite repeated offers from Pakistan,” Lodhi said.