“Pakistan’s practice of using false pretenses to distract from addressing the malaise that afflicts it has run its course today,” India’s UN envoy Syed Akbaruddin told The Hindu after the informal “closed consultations” at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), the second such meeting in five months, had concluded on Wednesday afternoon. It was learnt that the situation in Kashmir was to be raised at the meeting.
“We are happy that neither the alarmist scenario painted by the representatives of Pakistan nor any of the baseless allegations made repeatedly by representatives of Pakistan in UN fora were found to be credible today,” Mr. Akbaruddin said.
The ambassador said the discussion was viewed as a “distraction” and that “many friends” had pointed out that bilateral mechanisms were available to address issues between India and Pakistan.
Russia called for differences between India and Pakistan to be settled bilaterally. “Russia firmly stands for the normalisation of relations between India and Pakistan,” a Russian diplomat at the UN, Dmitry Polyanskiy, tweeted.
“We hope that differences will be settled through bilateral efforts based on the 1972 Simla Agreement and the 1999 Lahore Declaration.”
The Hindu has reached out to the French and U.S. missions at the United Nations for their reactions.
Earlier, The Hindu had learned that the matter will be raised by China towards the end of the Council’s meeting under the “Any other matters” segment of the agenda. Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi is visiting the United Nations on Wednesday, as per reports.
The last meeting on the issue, held in August under the ‘closed consultation’ format, was the first in five decades and held days after India abrogated Article 370 (Special Status for Jammu and Kashmir).
Today’s meeting is the rescheduled version of a UNSC meeting that was to be held just before Christmas.
