ISLAMABAD: A senior Pakistani diplomat at the United Nations this week responded to India’s allegations that its neighboring country was a “terrorist epicenter,” accusing Delhi of sponsoring cross-border “terrorism” as the war of words between the two nations at the global platform worsened.
India’s External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, during his UN General Assembly speech on Saturday, said his country had a neighbor that was the “epicenter of global terrorism,” without naming Pakistan.
His statement came after Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s UNGA speech on Friday, in which he offered talks to India. However, the Pakistani prime minister blamed India for seeking to “extract political gains” from a militant attack in Indian-administered Kashmir’s Pahalgam, which killed 26 tourists in April.
India had blamed Pakistan for the attack, a charge denied by Islamabad. The incident triggered a four-day military conflict between the neighbors that saw over 70 killed on both sides of the border before they agreed to a ceasefire on May 10.
“India itself has been implicated in supporting and sponsoring terrorism beyond its borders,” Muhammad Rashid, the second secretary at the Pakistan Mission at the UN, said in a statement on Saturday.
“There are credible reports pointing to networks run by Indian intelligence agencies to destabilize its neighboring countries.”
Pakistan and India routinely accuse each other of supporting militant groups waging attacks against the other. Pakistan alleges India arms and funds militants in its western provinces bordering Afghanistan through its Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) intelligence agency, charges New Delhi denies.
Pakistan has also cited accusations by former Canadian PM Justin Trudeau, who had accused the Indian government last year of being involved in the 2023 killing of Sikh separatist Hardeep Singh Nijjar in British Columbia. India denied the allegations, triggering a diplomatic row between the two nations.
India, on the other hand, accuses Pakistan of supporting militants in Indian-administered Kashmir, which Islamabad denies. The two countries have fought three wars since 1947, two of which were over the disputed territory of Kashmir.
In his statement, Rashid said undermining regional stability and violating international law had become a “habit for India.”
“Therefore, such actions expose the duplicity of its counterterrorism claims and raise serious concerns about its role in fueling rather than combating terrorism,” the statement said.
While the fragile ceasefire between India and Pakistan continues to hold, tensions remain high as Delhi vows to hold in abeyance the Indus Waters Treaty of 1960 that governs the sharing of the Indus River system between the two countries.
Pakistan has warned that any attempt to restrict or divert the flow of its waters by India would be taken as an “act of war” and would be firmly responded to.
