Pakistan Summons US Envoy Over Modi-Biden Statement On Cross-Border Terrorism

International

oi-Deepika S

Pakistan has summoned the US embassy’s deputy chief of mission to express concern and disappointment over a last week’s joint statement by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Joe Biden that called on Islamabad to ensure its territory was not used as a base for terrorist attacks.

Pakistan urged the US to refrain from issuing statements that may be “construed as encouragement of India’s baseless and politically motivated narrative against Pakistan.”

“It was stressed that the United States should refrain from issuing statements that may be construed as an encouragement of India’s baseless and politically motivated narrative against Pakistan,” Pakistan’s foreign office said in a statement.

“It was also emphasised that counter-terrorism cooperation between Pakistan and the U.S. had been progressing well and that an enabling environment, centred around trust and understanding, was imperative to further solidify Pakistan-U.S. ties.”

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The move comes after the White House released a US-India joint statement with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Joe Biden calling upon Pakistan to take immediate action to ensure that no territory under its control is used for launching terrorist attacks.

India-US strongly condemned cross-border terrorism, and the use of terrorist proxies and called on Pakistan to take immediate action to ensure that no territory under its control is used for launching terrorist attacks. They called for the perpetrators of the 26/11 Mumbai and Pathankot attacks to be brought to justice.

Pakistan immediately protested the joint statement calling it “contrary to diplomatic norms.” The country’s FO had also expressed surprise at the statement considering “Pakistan’s close counterterrorism cooperation with the US.”

However, U.S. State Department spokesperson Matt Miller reacted to Pakistan’s demarche during his daily news briefing. Miller said that while Pakistan had taken important steps to counter terrorist groups, Washington advocated for more to be done.

“At the same time, however, we have also been consistent on the importance of Pakistan continuing to take steps to permanently dismantle all terrorist groups, including Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammad, and their various front organizations and we will raise the issue regularly with Pakistani officials,” he said.

Imran Khan attacks Bajwa

Pakistan’s former prime minister Imran Khan took a dig at retired Pakistani army general Qamar Javed Bajwa, questioning the effectiveness of his “countless trips” to the United States while referring to a joint statement from the United States and India where Pakistan was strongly condemned for cross-border terrorism and the use of terrorist proxies.

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“Gen Bajwa along with his PDM cronies claimed that I had isolated Pakistan internationally. The question we want to ask him and PDM is that after a year in government and countless trips of Pakistan’s FM to the US, the joint India/US statement reduces Pakistan to a promoter of cross-border terrorism in India and nothing more,” Imran Khan tweeted.

“No balancing statement about the gross human rights abuse in Kashmir or the appalling treatment of minorities in India. So now the imported govt experiment has not just made Pakistan irrelevant internationally but our democracy, rule of law, and the entire economic and institutional structure are also collapsing right in front of our eyes,” he added.