Bilawal says Pakistan has not recognised Taliban govt

Says India did not come to Pakistan’s aid ‘nor did we ask for it’

NEW YORK:

 

Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said that along with the rest of the international community, Pakistan has not officially recognised the government in Afghanistan.

In an interview with France 24 in New York on Thursday, the PPP chairman said that the interim Afghan government made promises to the international community and to its people and fulfilling those promises would help them gain legitimacy and a path to international recognition.

Bilawal said, “Primary and segregated tertiary education is being offered but we are waiting for secondary education.”

Bilawal said that India did not reach out to help Pakistan as unprecedented flooding in the country devastated infrastructure and affected over 33 million people.

Read FM Bilawal contacts OIC on rising Islamophobia in India

To a question, he said that the neighbouring country had not helped Pakistan and Pakistan had also not asked for its help either.

The foreign minister described the current relations with India, saying: “We have a long and complicated history with India… Unfortunately, the India today is a changed India. It is no longer the secular India promised by its founding fathers for all its citizens.

“It is increasingly becoming a Hindu-supremacist India at the expense of its Christian and Muslim minorities.”

He referred to the August 2019 move when the Indian government revoked the special status of IIOJK, saying that these recent steps and actions “have left very little space for Pakistan to engage”.

“Unilateral illegal actions of August 2019 where attempts to undermine the resolution of the United Nations... United Nations Security Council… and change the boundaries of this disputed territory and going a step further and attempting to change the Muslim majority in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir into a minority in their own land,” the minister said.

The India today, is a changed India. It is no longer a secular India. It is increasingly becoming a Hindu supremacist India at the expense of its Christian and Muslim minorities - Pakistan FM @BBhuttoZardari in an interview with @FRANCE24 pic.twitter.com/j1K6MbWM13

— PPP (@MediaCellPPP) September 22, 2022

Bilawal added India’s “absolutely racist” and “Islamophobic” policy has caused a reaction not only within Kashmir but all across India.

The PPP chairman added that the Muslim minority in India was feeling persecuted and insecure, adding that this was an active policy of the state and this was how the government of India was treating its own Muslim citizens and that one could only imagine how they were treating the Muslims of Pakistan and IIOJK.

Bilawal added that he believed the younger generation on both sides wanted to see the countries living in peace.

'The scale of climate catastrophe in Pakistan is truly apocalyptic' - Foreign Minister @BBhuttoZardari interview with @FRANCE24 pic.twitter.com/35Ncrj2WoI

— PPP (@MediaCellPPP) September 22, 2022

 

Pakistan floods

Talking about the unprecedented flooding in Pakistan, the foreign minister said, “We are still in the state of an active disaster and the scale of climate catastrophe in Pakistan is truly apocalyptic.”

He added that the country was still in the rescue and relief phase of this tragedy.

Read More 'Haven't seen destruction of this scale': Bilawal says help needed after overwhelming floods

“This monster monsoon that Pakistan experienced started in mid-June and ended at the end of August… Once the rains finally stopped, they left a 100-kilometre lake in the middle of my country that could be seen from space,” he added.

The minister said that the “irony” was that despite producing minimum amount of carbon output, Pakistan was one of the 10 most climate-stressed countries.