While reports are rife about backdoor talks between Pakistan and India, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi in an interview with Turkish news agency Anadolu said Pakistan is ready to hold talks with India if the neighbouring country revisits unilateral decisions it took on 5th August 2019 in Occupied Jammu and Kashmir.
The statement indeed is reaffirmation of Pakistan’s principled and pragmatic position for talks.
The fact of the matter is that Pakistan has never shied away from talks and has always kept its doors open.
It is India that vitiated the environment by withdrawing semi-autonomous status of occupied Jammu and Kashmir in order to tighten its grip over the disputed territory.
Being party to the dispute, Pakistan could not stay silent on this development.
Acting as per aspirations of people as well as of Kashmiris, our government downgraded diplomatic ties and suspended bilateral trade.
Now if Modi government is really interested to sit with Pakistan for bilateral negotiations, it will have to create an enabling environment.
Firstly, as suggested by the FM, it will have to withdraw the controversial decisions as well as take steps that ease the lives of Kashmiri people.\ How could negotiations take place in an environment of abuse and oppression of innocent Kashmiri people? India is currently in the midst of a cataclysmic Covid-19 nightmare that has unleashed unimaginable suffering on its people.
Instead of sticking to intransigence, it must now demonstrate flexibility and sanity in its stance, which will pave way for cooperation between the two countries as well as the SAARC region to collectively tackle the pandemic.
Kashmir is an internationally recognised dispute and its solution lies only in the UN Security Council resolutions that accept the right of self-determination for people of Kashmir.
It will be better for New Delhi to accept this reality as no amount of force and oppression can suppress the Kashmiri struggle for freedom.
Resolution of this longstanding dispute will remove all impediments in the way of exploiting full potential of the region.
The funds that are being currently used for purchasing weapons will directly go to address chronic issues of illiteracy, poverty and backwardness.
