Washington rules out mediation over the dispute. PHOTO: FILE
The United States has ruled out any mediation on the Kashmir dispute, saying the issue needs to be discussed directly between India and Pakistan.
The US believes India and Pakistan ‘need to keep building a better relationship’ and ‘work together’ on issues like Kashmir, said US State Department spokesperson Marie Harf.
“We’ve been very clear that this is an issue we think needs to be discussed directly between Pakistan and India,” she said at a news briefing on Saturday.
The State Department also urged Islamabad and New Delhi to keep working for improvement in their bilateral relations.
“Well, we’ve always said that we believe they [Pakistan and India] need to keep building a better relationship, they need to work together on these issues, and certainly we hope they will do so,” Harf said when asked to assess the current state of Pakistan-India relations in the US perspective.
When asked about Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s supposed remarks that the Kashmir dispute could trigger a fourth war between India and Pakistan, the spokesperson replied: “I didn’t actually see those comments, so I don’t want to respond to comments I haven’t seen.”
Published in The Express Tribune, December 8th, 2013.
COMMENTS
Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
For more information, please see our Comments FAQ