India rejects Pakistan’s four-point peace initiative

UNITED NATIONS: India has rejected outright Pakistan’s four-point initiative for establishing normal ties between the two countries.
India’s formal response came from its Minister for External Affairs Sushma Swaraj on Thursday while addressing the 70th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA).
She gave the statement on behalf of her prime minister, Narendra Modi, who didn’t turn up on the occasion.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had proposed a four-point initiative while addressing the world body a day earlier.
Departing from diplomatic decency, the Indian minister used obnoxious language and with this it was understood that a “war of words” had started on the UN forum as Pakistan too would respond to the tone and tenor followed by the Indians.
India’s junior most diplomat at the United Nations Abeesh Singh while exercising right of reply on Wednesday evening hurled baseless allegations at Pakistan and talked in an irresponsible manner about the offer made by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
Discarding Pakistan’s four-point formula for peace, the Indian minister asserted that it was ready to discuss all issues if the neighbouring country addressed “just one” point of ending terrorism emanating from there, as she proposed NSA-level talks to address the problem. She refrained from mentioning the Kashmir dispute and used the language that had rarely been heard in the United Nations.
Sushma Swaraj referred to the perpetrators of 26/11 attacks who, she said, continued to roam freely in Pakistan and pressed the world community to ensure that countries which provided finances, safe havens and arms to terrorists paid a heavy price. She avoided reference to the Samjhota Express gory incident and massacre of Muslims in the Indian Gujarat.
The Indian minister raised the issue of “illegal occupation of parts of the state of Jammu and Kashmir” by Pakistan and said the terror attacks from there were engineered to legitimise it. She forgot that the UN Security Council had adopted resolutions for holding a plebiscite in Kashmir so that the people of the state were provided with a chance to decide their fate.
She alleged that terrorism emanating from Pakistan was hampering normalisation of bilateral relations as she underlined that “talks and terror cannot go together”.
“Yesterday, the prime minister of Pakistan proposed what he termed a four-point new peace initiative. I would like to respond. We do not need four points, we need just one — give up terrorism and let us sit down and talk,” Swaraj said while addressing the 193-member body.
Interestingly, India has twice evaded talking to Pakistan in recent months. She claimed this was precisely what was discussed and decided by the two prime ministers at Ufa this July. It is likely Pakistan would respond to the Indian minister’s statement soon.