INDIA RESORTED TO UNPROVOKED FIRING, SAYS PAKISTAN PM
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Friday played down India’s surgical strikes across the Line of Control (LoC), saying Pakistan is fully prepared to defend itself against aggression as he sought to keep the focus on Kashmir by describing it as an “unfinished agenda of Partition”.
Chairing a special meeting of his Cabinet a day after the raids, Sharif repeated Pakistan’s rejection of the strikes and said New Delhi had resorted to “unprovoked firing” on the LoC.
He also signalled his government’s intent to project the Kashmir issue as the source of tensions between the two sides, calling for an investigation under the United Nations into the “killings of innocent civilians” and reiterating Pakistan’s commitment to provide political, moral and diplomatic support to the Kashmiri people.
Sharif said his government wants peace in the region to pursue its development agenda but would defend the “homeland against any aggression”, according to an official statement.
“The entire nation is standing shoulder to shoulder with our armed forces. No one will be allowed to cast an evil eye against Pakistan,” he said. The people and leadership would “counter any aggressive Indian designs”, he added.
As the Cabinet reviewed the situation in Kashmir and ceasefire violations on the LoC, Pakistan Army chief Gen Raheel Sharif told troops at a training facility near the Lahore Garrison that the “highest state of vigil is being maintained along LoC/working boundary and all along international border”.
“Any misadventure by our adversary will meet the most befitting response from Pakistan,” the army chief said, adding Islamabad “can’t be coerced through any amount of malicious propaganda”. The general also said “training in peace time is the only guarantor of averting and winning war if imposed”. NEW DELHI: The military action that neutralised seven terrorist launch pads across the Line of Control also set the stage for a thaw in the frosty relations between the Narendra Modi regime and the top Congress leadership.
The government reached out and the principal Opposition rose to the occasion.
The NDA initiative was led by external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj. She turned up late at Thursday’s all-party meeting as she had taken time out for a call on Sonia Gandhi. The minister inquired about the Congress president’s health and she briefed her on the army operation.
Swaraj found it apt to call on Sonia as she was recuperating from an ailment and was unable to attend the government-convened