In an interview with ‘The Wire’ Prime Minister Imran Khan’s aid Moeed Yusuf said that Pakistan was ready to hold talks with India on the condition that Kashmir be made privy to the talks as a third party.
“As far as 5th of August 2019 is concerned, India has scored an ‘own goal,’ there was no doubt about how the people of occupied Kashmir felt (about India) but if there was any doubt, it’s gone now.”
“What Kashmiris feel is a separate issue,” Indian Journalist
“What the Kashmiris feel about India is another matter,” said Karan Thapar, the interviewer, and Moeed was quick to correct him saying that,” If India thinks it has permanently changed the demographic and geographic status of the region and that is not against the UN charter then India is a rogue state.”
“The UN resolutions are very clear, and you have never obeyed them but now you have formally stated that you are going to violate them. Your foreign minister was in the US last year and he said that India would now resolve all its issues unilaterally.”
Moeed, continued to explain that there are in foreign affairs three ways to solve an issue, firstly multilaterally with organizations such as the UN. India Moeed said after going to the UN itself backed out from its resolutions, then there is bilateral, which was the Simla agreement. Moeed said that India had berated in the international community the narrative that Kashmir was a bilateral issue under the Simla agreement, but has since august last year broken that agreement as well. India is taking the third way of solving issues, it is making unilateral decisions.
“You made a unilateral decision, you had to bring in 180,000 troops, you lied to the world about a terrorist threat,” Moeed took the stance that India had made a unilateral decision in a multilateral issue, not an internal one.
Moeed suggested that if he and Pakistan’s position on Kashmir was wrong then they should hold an UN-administered plebiscite in Kashmir and the results would be adamantly clear.
Read more: Pakistan’s enemy is naked in its aggression, Dr. Moeed Yusuf
In response to a question where Yusuf was asked if it was hypocritical of Pakistan to protest the change of Kashmir’s status when it was itself changing Gilgit-Baltistan’s, Yusuf said “no decision has been made” regarding granting Gilgit Baltistan a provincial status but added that the matter was the subject of “public debate”.
“One: no decision has been made. Two: there is a public debate. The public debate has not been generated by the government of Pakistan. It’s been generated by the people of Gilgit Baltistan. They have been saying this for two or three years now. What are they saying? ‘We want to be fully integrated with Pakistan.’”
He also said that the public debate had come up because the people of Gilgit Baltistan demanded it.
Read more: Dr. Moeed Yusuf appointed SAPM on National Security: What can Pakistan Expect?
“If it was so confirmed and so done, where is the act?” Yusuf said.
In interview to @thewire_in to be aired 5pm today, Pak NSA says India approached for talks. But Pak wants Kashmiris to be third party to talks & want India to end siege in Kashmir & reverse 370 – these are impossible conditions to meet for Modi gov. Stand by for the interview!
— Pravin Sawhney (@PravinSawhney) October 13, 2020
“If the resolutions bar a permanent change of territorial status, there will be no permanent change,” Yusuf stated, adding that the matter was being debated in Pakistan since “this is how democratic societies” work.
Read more: FM Qureshi: Kashmiris have rejected Indian annexation of Occupied Kashmir
“Democratic societies, by the way, do not bring in 180,000 troops to change the status of a territory. That’s the difference between Pakistan and India right now,” Yusuf said, referring to heavy Indian military deployment in occupied Kashmir since August 2019.
The interview looked more like a debate, with heated arguments dominating the conversation. Thapar the Indian interviewer kept deflecting the insinuation that the wishes of the Kashmiri people be the deciding factor in the status of the region.
GVS News Desk