India is upping the ante

Salman Khurshid

Karachi

That sanity gaining ground in the Donald Trump’s White House is a fact that has found its best expression from State Department Spokesperson Tammy Bruce’s remarks that the United States was monitoring the rapidly changing situation between India and Pakistan very closely after a terrorist attack in Illegally Indian-Occupied Jammu and Kashmir’s (IIOJK) Pahalgam area that killed 27 people and injured several. In a press talk, Tammy Bruce has reportedly said that the US is not taking a position on the status of Jammu or Kashmir for the moment.

According to media reports, Bruce opened her briefing with the Pahalgam attack, saying that “As President Trump and Secretary Rubio have made clear, the US stands with India” and “strongly condemns all acts of terrorism”. Pakistan too has condemned the Pahalgam attack on tourists. But the belligerence of Narendra Modi’s government knows no bounds in blaming Pakistan for the terrorist attack. Not only has India preferred to show any inclination to present to Pakistan the evidence of its allegations, it has been upping the ante, creating an atmosphere of war amid reports that troops from India and Pakistan have exchanged fire from across the Line of Control. It is also important to note that the United Nations has urged the rivals to show “maximum restraint”. UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric has told reporters in New York that issues between the countries “can be and should be resolved peacefully through meaningful mutual engagement”. The world powers, particularly the US, must ask India to resolve the matter through talks, instead of a waging a war against its neighbour.