Kashmir in Pak talks with Malaysia
The joint statement was issued after Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan's visit to Malaysia where he held talks with Malaysian PM Mahathir Mohamad.
New Delhi: In what may worry New Delhi, the situation in Kashmir finds mention in a joint statement between Pakistan and Malaysia that was released by Islamabad on Wednesday.
The joint statement was issued after Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan’s visit to Malaysia where he held talks with Malaysian PM Mahathir Mohamad. The Pakistani PM claimed in the Malaysian Capital Kuala Lumpur that the human rights situation in Kashmir was “grave” but the mention of Kashmir in the joint statement—presumably with Malaysian consent—is bound to raise eyebrows in New Delhi.
But it may not come as too much of a surprise for India since the Malaysian PM has a decades-old image of being a hardliner on such issues. Malaysia was known to needle India on the Kashmir issue in the 1990s. But Kuala Lumpur got a dose of its own medicine and was seen to back down subsequently after it felt the heat following a massive controversy over the treatment of its own ethnic Tamil minority.
India considers Jammu and Kashmir as its integral part and also considers the Kashmir issue as a bilateral one between India and Pakistan as per the Shimla Agreement of 1972. The developments also follow Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent visit to Singapore where he held an Indo-ASEAN Breakfast meeting with ASEAN (south-east Asian) leaders. Malaysia is part of ASEAN.
According to Islamabad, the joint statement on Wednesday read, “Prime Minister Imran Khan briefed Prime Minister Mahathir on the grave human rights situation in Kashmir (J&K) and in this regard referred to the Reports of UNOHCHR, Amnesty International.