Jaishankar attacks Pak for sheltering terrorists
NEWDELHI:EXTERNAL affairs minister S Jaishankar on Friday criticised Pakistan for portraying itself as a victim of terror while grudgingly acknowledging the presence of wanted terrorists and crime leaders on its territory due to international pressure.
Jaishankar did not name Pakistan in his remarks while presiding over the Darbari Seth memorial lecture, but there was no doubt as to which country he was referring to. He described the 9/11 terror attacks in the US and the Covid-19 pandemic as “standout moments that disrupted the trajectory of human society”.
Nineteen years after the 9/11 attacks and 12 years since the 2008 Mumbai attacks, the world has a range of mechanisms to counter terrorism, including the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), several UN sanctions committees and the Counter Terrorism Executive Directorate, he said. However, it lacks a comprehensive convention on international terrorism as members of the UN are still “wrestling with certain foundational principles”, he added.
“All the while states that have turned the production of terrorists into a primary export have attempted, by dint of bland denials, to paint themselves also as victims of terror,” Jaishankar said, a clear reference to Pakistan
“But as we have seen last week, sustained pressure through international mechanisms to prevent the movement of funds for terror groups and their front agencies can work. It has eventually compelled a state complicit in aiding, abetting, training and directing terror groups and associated criminal syndicates to grudgingly acknowledge the presence of wanted terrorists and organised crime leaders on its territory,” he said.
Jaishankar acknowledged the “struggle against terror and those who aid and abet it is a work in progress”. He said, “It remains for the international system to create the necessary mechanisms to shut down the structures that support and enable terrorism, whether in South Asia or across the globe.”
The memorial lecture was delivered by UN Secretary-general
Antonio Gutteres, who said India has all the ingredients for exerting leadership at home and abroad. He added the drivers are poverty alleviation and universal energy access – two of India’s top priorities.
“Scaling up clean energy, particularly solar, is the recipe for solving both. Investments in renewable energy, clean transport and energy efficiency during the recovery from the pandemic could extend electricity access to 270 million people worldwide – fully a third of people that currently lack it,” he said. “These same investments could help create nine million jobs annually over the next three years.”
NEWDELHI: Only an organisational makeover that accommodates age, merit and experience can bridge the divide that has come to spook the Congress. Much of the media has shown the dissenting group as delivering a “letter bomb”. In reality, it was a distress flare gun meant to flag issues dogging the party.
The intraparty fissures run deeper than can possibly be measured by outsiders. Their genesis is in myriad conflicts: egotistical, generational, temperamental, and ambition-driven. One side is in a hurry to arrive, the other disinclined to be cast aside. Nothing except a fine balance of competing interests will quell the discord. For the resentment the dissidents voiced has wider acceptance, including of those who made per forma statements of loyalty but with an eye on self-promotion. For that reason, the first appointments the party made after the heated August 24 Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting have been less than salutary. They’ve failed to dispel the notion of some in the party being more equal than others.
A low-profile MP saw a “shadow of the coming events” in the rejig in the Congress’s legislature parties in the two Houses of Parliament. A majority of the new inductees are either aligned with or are acceptable to what’s known as Team Rahul Gandhi.
That’s true more of the Lok Sabha. In the Rajya Sabha, leading dissenters Ghulam Nabi Azad and Anand Sharma continue as leader and deputy leader of the Opposition. The equation there could change when Azad’s term in the Upper House ends early next year.
One reason for the party’s state of suspended animation since the 2019 electoral debacle has been the emergence of a de facto power group. Claiming allegiance to Rahul Gandhi, this faction has sought an upper hand against rival claimants to positions in the