Staff Reporter
Islamabad
Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Thursday said India faced “expulsion by Iran in Chabahar project due to its wrong policies”, adding that the country had “gradually strained” its relations with all its neighbours — Pakistan, China, Nepal and Bangladesh.
In a statement, Qureshi said India was spoiling its relations due to a “Hindutva mindset”. “The so-called impression of a ‘Shining India’ is over now owing to incumbent government’s policies of hatred and bias,” he added. Earlier this month it emerged that Iran had dropped India from the Chabahar rail project citing delayed finances.
The foreign minister also said that the president-elect of the United Nations General Assembly, Ambassador Volkan Bozkir, is due to visit Pakistan on Monday.
Qureshi said he would present to Bozkir Pakistan’s position on Indian occupied Kashmir, which he said was suffering the “worst human rights situation” in the world.
The foreign minister said that he would also inform Bozkir about the atrocities committed by the Indian Army in occupied Kashmir. Qureshi termed the visit of foreign media journalists to the Line of Control in Chirikot sector a day earlier “an important step” in this regard. The journalists, he said, were escorted by the military to the region to witness the plight of residents living along the frontier.
Qureshi said the journalists had been invited by Pakistan to “show them the double standards of India”.
“Will India follow suit and allow independent media to visit the occupied valley?” he questioned, adding that India was also “restricting movement of UN-deployed observers to hide the truth”.
Shah Mahmood said that India has been targeting civilians along the Line of Control and committing violations of international laws. In a statement, the minister said the visit of the foreign media representatives to the Line of Control yesterday was very important. He said India always used double standards, but Pakistan took foreign media persons to the Line of Control to show them the reality. The minister said India’s relations with its neighbours, including China, Nepal and Bangladesh are getting tense day by day.
