ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Saturday responded to India’s latest criticism of Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari’s speech, saying that the masterminds of the Gujarat massacre have escaped justice and “now hold key government positions in India.”
Earlier this week, India’s External Affairs Minister accused Pakistan of “hosting” slain Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden and accused Islamabad of sponsoring cross-border militancy at the UN. In response, Pakistan’s Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari referred to Modi as the “butcher of Gujarat” and repeated accusations that New Delhi was suppressing the rights of the people of Kashmir.
Following Bhutto-Zardari’s remarks, India’s Ministry of External Affairs criticized the foreign minister’s “uncivilized outburst,” saying that the comments were a “new low” for Pakistan.
Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) spokesperson responded by saying that India’s comments were an attempt to hide behind “subterfuge and canard” to conceal the realities of the 2002 Gujarat massacre.
“The fact of the matter is that the masterminds of the Gujarat massacre have escaped justice and now hold key government positions in India,” MoFA said in a statement.
The spokesperson was referring to a massacre that occurred during a series of religious riots that flared for two months in Gujarat and killed more than 1,000 people, most of them Muslims. Clashes began when a Hindu mob scaled the boundary wall of a housing complex in Ahmedabad, Gujarat’s largest city, in February 2002 before torching the homes in which Muslim families were trapped.
Pakistan alleged that India has unleashed Hindu supremacists to exercise cow vigilantism, ransack places of worship, and attack religious congregations.
“The MEA statement is also a reflection of India’s growing frustration over its failure in maligning and isolating Pakistan,” it said.
Nuclear-armed neighbors India and Pakistan have fought two of their three wars, over the past seven decades, over the disputed territory of Kashmir. The Himalayan territory is claimed in full by India and Pakistan. Both, however, administer parts of the territory.
Pakistan, India continue war of words with ‘terrorism’, ‘Gujarat massacre’ barbs
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Pakistan, India continue war of words with ‘terrorism’, ‘Gujarat massacre’ barbs
- Masterminds of Gujarat massacre have escaped justice, Pakistan says
- India, Pakistan accused each other of sponsoring ‘terrorism’ this week at UN
Pakistan reports current account surplus in Jan. owing to improved trade, remittances
- Pakistan’s exports crossed the $3 billion mark in Jan. as the country received $3.5 billion in remittances
- Last month, IMF urged Pakistan to accelerate pace of structural reforms to strengthen economic growth
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan recorded a current account surplus of more than $120 million in January, the country’s finance adviser said on Tuesday, attributing it to improved trade balance and remittance inflows.
Pakistan’s exports rebounded in January 2026 after five months of weak performance, rising 3.73 percent year on year and surging 34.96 percent month on month, according to data released by the country’s statistics bureau.
Exports crossed the $3 billion mark for the first time in January to reach $3.061 billion, compared to $2.27 billion in Dec. 2025. The country received $3.5 billion in foreign remittances in Jan. 2026.
Khurram Schehzad, an adviser to the finance minister, said Pakistan reported a current account surplus of $121 million in Jan., compared to a current account deficit of $393 million in the same month last year.
“Improved trade balance in January 2026, strong remittance inflows, and sustained momentum in services exports (IT/Tech) continue to reinforce the country’s external account position,” he said on X.
Pakistan has undergone a difficult period of stabilization, marked by inflation, currency depreciation and financing gaps, and international rating agencies have acknowledged improvements after Islamabad began implementing reforms such as privatizing loss-making, state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and ending subsidies as part of a $7 billion International Monetary Fund (IMF) loan program.
Late last month, the IMF urged Pakistan to accelerate the pace of these structural reforms to strengthen economic growth.
Responding to questions from Arab News at a virtual media roundtable on emerging markets’ resilience, IMF’s director of the Middle East and Central Asia Jihad Azour said Islamabad’s implementation of the IMF requirements had been “strong” despite devastating floods that killed more than 1,000 people and devastated farmland, forcing the government to revise its 4.2 percent growth target to 3.9 percent.
“What is important going forward in order to strengthen growth and to maintain the level of macroeconomic stability is to accelerate the structural reforms,” he said at the meeting.
Azour underlined Pakistan’s plans to privatize some of the SOEs and improve financial management of important public entities, particularly power companies, as an important way for the country to boost its capacity to cater to the economy for additional exports.
“This comes in addition to the effort that the authorities have made in order to reform their tariffs, which will allow the private sector of Pakistan to become more competitive,” the IMF official said.
