Pakistan & China’s attempts to raise Kashmir in UNSC fail miserably as India rejects their claims

Last updated on February 14th, 2023 at 01:11 pm

Pakistan and China once again tried to raise the Kashmir issue at the United Nations Security Council in view of the first anniversary of the Indian government’s decision to abrogate Article 370 which revoked the special status of Jammu and Kashmir. Responding to China’s remarks raising Kashmir at the UNSC meeting, India lashed out at Beijing and reiterated that J&K will remain the country’s internal affair.

On Thursday, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) released a statement in response to the development, stating that it “firmly rejects” China’s interference in India’s internal affairs and urged Beijing to “draw proper conclusions from such infructuous attempts”.

“This was not the first time that China has sought to raise a subject that is solely an internal matter of India. As on such previous occasions, this attempt too met with little support from the international community,” the MEA statement added.

Incidentally, China’s move has come amid the ongoing border standoff between the forces of the two neighbouring countries in eastern Ladakh.

Earlier on Wednesday, Pakistan attempted to invoke the Kashmir issue at the UNSC body. However, India’s permanent representative to the UN, TS Tirumurti, stated that Pakistan’s attempt to internationalise Kashmir turned out to be another failure. Taking to Twitter, the Indian diplomat revealed that Wednesday’s UN Security Council meeting was closed, informal, not recorded and without any outcome. He added that all participating countries had underlined that Jammu and Kashmir was a bilateral issue and did not deserve time and attention of the Council.

Furthermore, TS Tirumurti spoke to news agency ANI wherein he said: “Pakistan has once again been singularly unsuccessful in making any inroads into the UN on Jammu and Kashmir and their narrative has lost steam on the Council members.”

At the same time, India ridiculed the new political map released by Pakistan which claimed that the Indian state of Gujarat and Union Territories of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh. The MEA released a statement on August 4, calling the “so-called” map “political absurdity”.

“This is an exercise in political absurdity, laying untenable claims to territories in the Indian State of Gujarat and our Union Territories of Jammu & Kashmir and of Ladakh. These ridiculous assertions have neither legal validity nor international credibility. In fact, this new effort only confirms reality of Pakistan’s obsession with territorial aggrandisement supported by cross-border terrorism,” the statement read.

Time and again, China and Pakistan have made multiple attempts at the UNSC to raise questions against the Indian government’s decision to scrap Article 370 and Article 35(a) in Jammu and Kashmir. However, these attempts have been rejected by UNSC members and India, maintaining that it is the country’s internal matter.

On August 5, 2019, the Modi government revoked the special status granted to Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 and bifurcated the state into two Union Territories – J&K and Ladakh.

Read: Kashmir: Turkey fans anti-national aspirations of Indian Muslims and political ambitions of Pakistan

Meanwhile, India will be joining the United Nations Security Council as a non-permanent member for the eighth time on January 1, 2021, for a period of two years.