31 January 2019•Update: 01 February 2019
By Islamuddin Sajid
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan
Pakistan’s foreign secretary on Thursday summoned the Indian ambassador to Islamabad to strongly protest an Indian statement related to Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi’s telephone call to a Kashmiri leader.
Foreign Secretary Tehmina Janjua told the Indian envoy that Pakistan's outreach to the Hurriyat leadership was in line with its stated, publicly declared, time-honored policy of extending political, diplomatic and moral support to Kashmir’s "legitimate struggle for the right to self-determination," said a Foreign Office statement.
"The Indian reaction was only an indication of domestic politics being allowed to override India's international obligations and violated international law for electioneering. Pakistan should not be dragged into Indian elections for seeking votes," Janjua told the ambassador, said the statement.
On Wednesday India’s Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale summoned Pakistan’s ambassador and issued a statement protesting Qureshi’s phone call to Mir Waiz Umer Farooq, the leader of All-Parties Hurriyat.
Jammu and Kashmir, a Muslim-majority Himalayan region, is held by India and Pakistan in parts and claimed by both in full. A small sliver of Kashmir is also held by China.
Since they were partitioned in 1947, the two countries have fought three wars -- in 1948, 1965 and 1971 -- two of them over Kashmir.
Also, in Siachen glacier in northern Kashmir, Indian and Pakistani troops have fought intermittently since 1984. A cease-fire came into effect in 2003.
Some Kashmiri groups in Jammu and Kashmir have been fighting against Indian rule for independence, or for unification with neighboring Pakistan.
According to several human rights groups, thousands of people have been killed in the conflict in the region since 1989.
