Referring to US President Donald Trump’s claim earlier this month that his administration had used trade incentives in talks with India and Pakistan regarding a ceasefire, Jammu and Kashmir Congress president Tariq Hameed Karra on Tuesday criticised the central government, saying that it had “accepted third party intervention”.
“We would like to know what that trade diplomacy was,” Karra said at the Jai Hind Sabha event attended by party workers at the Pradesh Congress Committee Headquarters in .
Trump had claimed credit for “mediation” in stopping a “nuclear” conflict between India and Pakistan. However, the Centre last week rejected the claims and also said that trade was not part of any discussions held with US officials during the period of the hostilities with Pakistan.
Karra on Tuesday accused the Centre of undermining the 1972 agreement between India and Pakistan, under which the two countries would only engage in bilateral talks to resolve all issues between them. “By agreeing to the ensuing ceasefire, the government has not only compromised the Shimla agreement, but also accepted third-party intervention between India and Pakistan,” Karra claimed.
He also said that during the 1971 Indo-Pak war, then US president Richard Nixon had tried to pass some instructions to then PM Indira Gandhi, but that she had not accepted those instructions.
“For the last 10 years, you (the central government) have been creating rhetoric about taking back Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, and when the time came to reclaim it, you missed the opportunity,” he said.
“The country wants to know why you did not attack and reclaim PoK,” Karra said.
He also described the April 22 terror attack in Pahalgam, in which 25 tourists and a local man were killed, as an “intelligence failure”. He claimed that the government had intelligence input about terrorists “likely to do something big in the Valley”.
He questioned the Centre about the situation in Jammu and Kashmir post the abrogation of special powers under Article 370 on August 5, 2019, and asked whether the non-deployment of security at a place like Baisaran was the result of a casual approach. He also asked the government whether it had fixed responsibility for this alleged lapse and what happened to the terrorists directly responsible for the shooting of the tourists.
The Congress leader further criticised the for allegedly politicising Operation Sindoor, and said that by doing so, the ruling party was insulting the “valour and sacrifice of our troops”.
The Congress took out the Jai Hind Yatra in Jammu on Tuesday as a mark of respect to the soldiers who guarded the border during the period of hostilities in the aftermath of Operation Sindoor and those who died in the conflict.
