Decision to implement NAP taken in national interest: Qureshi

SUKKUR: Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Saturday said that decision on implementation of National Action Plan (NAP) was taken in national interest.

He said that Pakistan pursued a policy of long-lasting peace, stability and economic prosperity of the region while India was treading path of belligerency.

India on the contrary had adopted a belligerent posture that even its cricket players were wearing caps of their army while playing matches, he said while talking to media persons here.

“Pakistan wants peace, but if India resorts to any aggression, we will give a befitting response,” he added.

Qureshi said the country's interests, its ideology and geography, are fully safeguarded as its people and the civil and military leadership are on the same page.

The government had tactfully tackled the situation arisen due to the Indian aggression.

“The entire world is now acknowledging Pakistan's narrative while that of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is not even accepted by his own people as some sane people in India are voicing that New Delhi had lost Kashmir,” he said.

Modi would continue pursuing the same belligerent path till the general elections, he added.

The foreign minister acknowledged the positive and responsible role played by the Pakistani media during the crisis with India.

He said the United Nations Human Rights Commission had called for setting up a commission of inquiry to probe human rights abuses in the Indian-Held Kashmir (IHK) while the British House of Commons had also expressed its concerns over the situation in the valley.

To another question, Qureshi said besides the Hurriyat leadership, including Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, Syed Ali Geelani and Yasin Malik, other political leaders Mehbooba Mufti and Farooq Abdullah were also criticising the Indian policies in IHK.

The situation in the IHK had deteriorated to the extent that the United States had described the place dangerous and warned its citizens not to visit it, he added.

He asked the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and the world community to take notice of India's belligerent attitude towards Kashmir and intervene to stop human rights violations there.

India would not be able to suppress the Kashmiris' indigenous movement and grant them self-determination right, he added. Qureshi appealed to the leadership of all political parties to evolve consensus on the full implementation of the National Action Plan, which had been formulated through their consensus.