PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari on Tuesday urged the United Nations and the international community to push India towards a comprehensive dialogue with Pakistan, where the two countries could address their outstanding issues and achieve peace in the wake of their recent military conflict in the aftermath of the Pahalgam attack.
Addressing a news conference at the UN Headquarters in New York on recent regional developments after the military conflict, Bilawal, who is heading a diplomatic delegation, said the Pakistani delegation was concluding its visit to New York and the UN with appeal to the international community to assist the country in its pursuit of peace as it did in the case of the ceasefire between Pakistan and India.
Bilawal made an impact during his tenure as the Foreign Minister of the country and he is effectively putting across the point of view of the country before the world community as leader of the delegation, which has been assigned the task to counter Indian propaganda against Pakistan and its hegemonic pursuits in South Asia.
He sensitized the international community on the urgency to play its role in promoting peace prospects in the region by pointing out that the conflict threshold between Pakistan and India lowered during the recent conflict and the concern is that the next time there may not be time for the international community to intervene before things get a lot worse.
Bilawal also falsified the Indian narrative on terrorism, which is being used as an excuse for aggressive posture against Pakistan by highlighting that Pakistan’s position was to hold a comprehensive dialogue with India that would include the issue of terrorism as well.
He underlined that Pakistan was the country where the single largest number of terrorist attacks occurred and was also the country with the single largest number of victims of terrorism.
The very fact that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, soon after the Pahalgam attack, expressed Pakistan’s willingness to India and the global community to be part of any impartial international investigation is proof that Pakistan’s hands were clean and the country had nothing to do with the incident.
Pakistan’s sincere campaign against terrorism of all sorts has also been acknowledged by the international community as the Financial Action Task Force the international watchdog against money laundering and financing of terrorism had endorsed Pakistan’s measures to combat terror financing.
In fact, India is using terrorism as a political tool to demonize Muslims in Kashmir and Pakistan but despite all this Pakistan has expressed its willingness to cooperate with India in combating terrorism as the region cannot develop and prosper in an environment of instability.
Bilawal mooted a sensible proposal to avoid blame game and the resulting threats to peace saying there should be a mechanism in which Pakistan and India could bring any complaints to a mutually agreed forum where both worked together to identify, track and deliver justice to terrorists.
Exposing Indian designs, the head of the delegation pointed out that during illegal strikes carried out by Indian forces, civilian infrastructure, places of worship, energy infrastructure and innocent women and children were targeted.
As always, Pakistan acted in self defence but in a responsible manner as it chose only military targets, a fact confirmed and appreciated by the world media.
On the basis of what the entire world saw during the recent conflict, Pakistan delegation had a point in telling the international community India positioned itself as a net security provider and yet India’s actions have shown as a result of this conflict that they’re a source of insecurity, not a source of security for the region.
The true net security provider for our region and beyond will be peace between India and Pakistan, this is the sum total of the message that Pakistan is conveying to the world in the backdrop of heightened tension in South Asia.
