Ganesh Kendale
UNITED NATIONS: Pakistan PM Shehbaz Sharif on Friday accused India of “massive expansion of its military capabilities” and issuing threats to cross the LoC for taking over Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir, as he raised the Kashmir issue again in his UNGA address. He demanded that New Delhi reverse the 2019 abrogation of Article 370.
Pakistan routinely raises the Kashmir issue at the annual UN debate.India is expected to exercise its right of reply to counter Sharif’s allegations.
Sharif said “like the people of Palestine”, the people of Jammu and Kashmir have “struggled for a century for their freedom and right to self-determination”.
He said the escalation of Islamophobia was a troubling global development. “The most alarming manifestation of Islamophobia is the Hindu supremacist agenda in India. It aggressively seeks the subjugation of 200 million Muslims and the obliteration of India’s Islamic heritage,” he claimed.
“Even more worryingly,” he said, India “is engaged in massive expansion of its military capabilities which are essentially deployed against Pakistan”. Its war doctrines envisage a surprise attack and a limited war under the nuclear overhang, he said, adding that India had spurned his country’s proposal for a mutual strategic restraint regime, and its leadership has “often threatened to cross the Line of Control” and take over what Pakistan refers to as “Azad Kashmir”.
