India sponsoring terror in Pakistan: FO

ISLAMABAD: The Foreign Office on Thursday said India and its intelligence agencies "are involved in money-laundering and financial crimes in Pakistan to sponsor terrorism," Geo News reported.

Spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri, at a weekly press briefing, said the Bharatia Janta Party (BJP) regime had once again revealed the true face of India before the world by pursuing the heinous agenda of "sponsoring terrorism and extremism".

He drew the world's attention towards the policies of political leadership of India, which, as the "so-called largest democracy", had been fully exposed. The spokesperson said the situation in India-occupied Jammu and Kashmir continues to deteriorate for the last 423 days since the unilateral action of the Indian government to change the valley's special status.

He said that last week Indian occupation forces martyred another six Kashmiris in fake encounters and so-called search operations in Pulwama and Anantnag. "India, however, will not be able to succeed in subjugating the Kashmiri people through killings and abductions," he said.

Chaudhri said Pakistan would continue to apprise the world about India's crimes against the Kashmiri people. He said India had escalated tensions along the Line of Control to divert the world's attention from its atrocities in occupied Kashmir.

During the current year, India has committed 2,404 ceasefire violations that have claimed 19 lives and seriously injured others, he added. On Saudi Arabia's permission for Pakistani iqama-holders, he said the Saudi government, on the request of Pakistan, had allowed people to apply for an extension in visa even from its embassy in Islamabad.

The process can be initiated after the requisite approval of kafeels, including companies and private persons. In case of a private person as a kafeel, he said iqamas could be extended through an online website called ''Abshar''. The Saudi authorities have also cleared 47 out of 118 Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) flights for the month of October, the spokesperson said.

About Prime Minister Imran Khan's address at the United Nations General Assembly, he said Pakistan’s perspective was shared on all major regional and international issues, including the COVID-19 pandemic, Prime Minister’s Debt Relief Initiative for developing countries, the Jammu and Kashmir dispute, treatment of minorities in India, the Palestine issue, the Afghan peace process, illicit financial flows, climate change, Islamophobia, and the United Nations reforms.

He said that foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi had addressed another letter to the UN Security Council president as part of efforts to apprise the world body of the grave situation in occupied Kashmir as well as peace and security in the region.

In his letter, he said, the foreign minister highlighted gross and systematic violations of human rights in the occupied region, India's illegal measures to change its demographic structure, and the threat to peace and security posed by its belligerent rhetoric and actions.

The spokesperson said the recent crackdown against Amnesty International by the Indian government was another manifestation of its extremist agenda and intolerance to the truth being told by independent human rights organisations.

The BJP regime's action, he said, had once again revealed the true face of India. "The so-called largest democracy stands fully exposed," he said. The spokesperson also condemned the shameful acquittal of all 32 criminals responsible for demolishing the centuries-old Babri Masjid in Ayodhya in 1992.

Responding to a question regarding the so-called “neighbourhood first policy” of India, Zahid Chaudhri said: "No such policy exists and it is only a facade." The current Indian leadership, he said, was in fact guided by the Chanakya doctrine, deeply imbedded in the rank and file of the BJP-RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh) combine.