Pakistan rejects India's 'absurd comments' on Sino-Pak joint statement

Islamabad: Pakistan on Thursday categorically rejected the "unwarranted and preposterous comments" made by the spokesperson of the Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) about the joint statement issued by Pakistan and China on February 6.

Accoridng to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA), Pakistan also strongly rejects India’s persistent propaganda against the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), adding that Pakistan has shared irrefutable evidence of India’s sinister campaign to sabotage CPEC through its dossiers released in 2020 and 2021.

"There is strong evidence of Indian involvement in the recent sinister attempts to stir up unrest in Balochistan by supporting anti-state elements," the MoFA's statement said. 

The statement further said Naval Commander Kulbhushan Jadhav is "living and irrefutable proof" of how India has been seeking to sponsor and patronise subversive activities in Pakistan and the region.

"Similarly, New Delhi’s baseless claims over Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) can neither change the facts of history nor the legal status of the Jammu & Kashmir dispute. IIOJK never was and never will be India’s 'integral part'", per the statement.

It maintained that "the irrefutable fact remains that India is an occupation force in IIOJK in clear violation of the relevant United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions, and its illegal and unilateral actions of August 5, 2019 — seeking to change the internationally recognised disputed status of IIOJK and to alter its demographic structure — have been rejected by the Kashmiris, by Pakistan, and by the international community."

"Rather than resorting to false and misleading assertions without success, India must vacate its illegal occupation of the disputed territory, immediately reverse its illegal and unilateral actions of August 5, 2019  and let Kashmiris exercise their inalienable right to self-determination through a free and impartial plebiscite under the auspices of the United Nations (UN) as enshrined in the relevant UNSC resolutions," it said. 

Pakistan would continue to extend all possible support to Kashmiris in their just struggle against India’s illegal occupation, the ministery's statement concluded.