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Pakistan on Thursday rejected India’s attempt to “distort facts” about the Indus Water Treaty (IWT) at a United Nations Security Council (UNSC) open debate, saying that New Delhi’s actions in the aftermath of the attack in occupied Kashmir’s Pulwama were “simply illegal”.
At a UNSC debate on natural resource governance, Pakistan’s Permanent Representation to the UN Asim Iftikhar Ahmad had highlighted India’s unilateral decision to hold the treaty in abeyance, saying that “no state should be permitted to abuse shared water resources as an instrument of coercion or political pressure, much less when it breaches solemn treaty obligations”.
Subsequently, India’s Permanent Representative to the UN Ambassador Harish Parvathaneni had accused Pakistan of “state-sponsored cross-border terrorism”, saying that it had “eroded the basis for bilateral cooperation on the treaty”, according to Indian news agency ANI. He had also asserted New Delhi’s claim on occupied Kashmir.
In response, Pakistan’s First Secretary Ansar Shah responded, saying India’s “misleading statement” was a “futile attempt to distort facts and misrepresent the situation”.
