Reacting to the allegations made by the Pakistan foreign ministry, the ministry of external affairs said that this was Islamabad’s latest attempt at peddling false and malicious anti-India propaganda.
“We have seen media reports regarding certain remarks by the Pakistan foreign secretary. As the world knows, Pakistan has long been the epicentre of terrorism, organised crime and illegal transnational activities,” joint secretary Randhir Jaiswal said, adding that India and many other countries had publicly warned and cautioned Pakistan that it would be consumed by its own culture of terror and violence.
Blaming others for own misdeeds not justification or solution: India to Pak
Pakistan will reap what it sows. To blame others for its own misdeeds can neither be a justification nor a solution,” the official said.
Earlier in the day, Pakistan claimed it had “credible evidence” of links between “Indian agents” and the assassination of two Pakistani terrorists associated with Jaish-e-Mohammed and the Lashkar-e-Taiba in Sialkot and Rawalkot last year.
India was carrying out “extra-territorial and extra-judicial killings” inside Pakistan, foreign secretary Muhammad Syrus Sajjad Qazi claimed at a press conference in Islamabad. The allegations were seen by many as an effort to corner the Indian government at a time India is facing similar allegations from the US and Canada.
“Indian agents used technology and safe havens on foreign soil to commit assassinations in Pakistan. They played specific roles in these killings by enlisting, funding and supporting terrorists, criminals and gullible citizens,” Qazi claimed. “On October 11, 2023, Shahid Latif was assassinated outside a mosque in Sialkot.
A detailed investigation revealed that an Indian agent, based in a third country, orchestrated the assassination,” Qazi added. Latif, a key aide of Jaish chief Masood Azhar, was the mastermind of the 2016 attack on the Indian Air Force base in Pathankot.
Qazi said all those involved in “reconnaissance and killing have been apprehended and are being tried in a court of law”, adding that Pakistan’s foreign office also had evidence of transactions made in the process, linking the entire chain to an Indian agent.
