Pakistan’s High Commissioner in New Delhi Abdul Basit on Sunday said Islamabad is ‘very’ concerned about the recent ceasefire violations by Indian forces along the Line of Control and working boundary. “There have been 70 ceasefire violations from this [the Indian] side of the working boundary during July and August. We are obviously very concerned about that,” Basit, who was summoned by India’s external affairs ministry earlier in the day, told reporters in New Delhi. At least three more people, two of them women, were injured in shelling by Indian forces in the Nikial sector of the LoC on Sunday. The injured – identified as Sardar Hanif, his daughter Mariam and a woman Naheed Akhtar – could not be moved to a hospital due to the continuous barrage of heavy arms, sources said. They added that the Pakistan Army retaliated in a befitting manner. Both Rangers and the Indian Border Security Force accuse each other of initiating firing across the border and the Indian deputy high commissioner in Islamabad has been summoned to the FO three times over the past week alone to hear the complaints voiced by Islamabad. This past Sunday Senate Chairman Raza Rabbani, as he visited the injured at Sialkot hospitals, called for nations around the world, especially Muslim ones, to raise a louder voice against what was happening. On a separate visit, Defence Minister Khwaja Asif said that Indian aggression would not be tolerated. Pakistan’s mounting concerns over the situation with India were conveyed also by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to the visiting US National Security Advisor Dr Susan Rice, who was also provided evidence of what Pakistan terms Indian intelligence intervention in its territory. Dr Rice is reported to have conveyed that Washington is indeed worried by the escalating aggression between Pakistan and India and would have liked to see the NSAs of both countries meet in August as was scheduled. The worsening situation between India and Pakistan has obviously pleased hawks on both sides of the border. The Indian media has also played a role in building up the tensions and blaming Pakistan for all that is going wrong. But voices of anguish have been raised from within Kashmir, where analysts point out that the hostility between the two nations will adversely affect them and make it more difficult to move towards the settlement that the disputed territory requires. The Kashmir angle has played a part in Indian attitudes and its hard-line stance on Pakistan. The question now is how to resolve all this so that some kind of normalcy can be restored.
pk.shafaqna.com
