US speaking India’s language : Pakistani minister

Islamabad, June 28 – Pakistan’s Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar has accused the US of speaking India’s language after Washington and New Delhi urged Islamabad not to let its territory be used for cross-border terror attacks.

This was a matter of concern, the Dawn newspaper on Wednesday quoted Nisar as saying, after the US and India came out with a joint statement following a meeting in Washington between President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Also, in the run-up to the meeting, the US State Department designated the Pakistan-based Hizbul Mujahideen leader Syed Salahuddin as a global terrorist and slapped sanctions on him.

“It seems as though the blood of Kashmiris in not at all important to the US and international laws relating to human rights do not apply to (Jammu and) Kashmir,” Nisar said.

He said overlooking “the worst kind of state terrorism” in Jammu and Kashmir had “laid bare the double standards of powers who claim to champion human rights and democratic values”.

Nisar insisted that Pakistan would not compromise on the rights of Kashmiris and the Kashmiri struggle to secede from India would continue.

Pakistan was “firmly committed to providing Kashmir diplomatic, political and moral support”, he added. India accuses Pakistan of arming, training and financing separatists fighting Indian rule in Jammu and Kashmir.

Meanwhile, Sardar Mohammad Masood Khan, President of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) province in Pakistan, warned that a “Trump-Modi nexus” could spell disaster to regional peace.

Sardar Khan, a former diplomat, said the US had always deceived Pakistan and its latest decision was yet another example of it.

“The US has never acknowledged Pakistan’s sacrifices despite the latter’s being a frontline state in the war against terrorism,” Dawn quoted him as saying.

Khan questioned the justification of the US decision to brand Salahuddin a global terrorist, saying the Hizbul Mujahideen was struggling solely for freedom from India and was neither linked to any terrorist group nor had resorted to any action outside India.