India has warned Pakistan it will continue to act firmly and decisively against cross-border terrorism and any meaningful dialogue can only take place bilaterally in a terror-free atmosphere. Madhu Sudan, a counsellor in India's Permanent Mission, said on Tuesday at UN Security Council, “Any meaningful dialogue can be held only in an atmosphere free of terror, hostility and violence. The onus is on Pakistan to create such a conducive atmosphere.”

“Till then, India will continue to take firm and decisive steps to respond to cross-border terrorism,” he warned while responding to an attack on India by Pakistan's Permanent Representative Munir Akram at a Security Council debate. Sudan said that given Islamabad's history of being the patron of terrorists, “most terrorist attacks around the world have their origin, in some form or the other, to Pakistan.”

“India desires normal neighbourly relations with all countries, including Pakistan, and is committed to addressing outstanding issues, if any, bilaterally and peacefully in accordance with the Simla Agreement and the Lahore declaration,” Sudan said.

The Simla Agreement signed in 1972 by Prime Minister India Gandhi and Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, who was then the president of Pakistan, committed the two neighbours to resolve their differences bilaterally. In the 1999 Lahore Declaration signed by Prime Ministers Atal Bihari Vajpayee of India and Nawaz Sharif of Pakistan the two countries undertook to resolve Kashmir and other disputes through bilateral dialogue.

Illustrating Sudan's point, in the most recent terrorism case in the US, a Briton of Pakistani descent took hostages at a Jewish synagogue in Texas demanding the release of convicted Pakistani terrorist Aafia Siddiqui, whose freedom Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan had sought.

Sudan said Pakistan “is a country which has been globally recognised as one openly supporting, training, financing and arming terrorists as a matter of State policy. It holds the ignoble record of hosting the largest number of terrorists proscribed by the UN Security Council.”

Akram's “Prime Minister and his Foreign Minister (Shah Mahmood Qureshi) have been called out for being supporters of terrorists, including Osama Bin Laden, but they continue to carry on down the same path undeterred,” Sudan said.

The topic of debate at the Security Council was “Protection of civilians in armed conflict: Wars in cities – protection of civilians in urban settings,” but Akram veered off into a lecture about Kashmir repeating accusations against India of occupation and human rights violations there.

Irrespective of the topic at hand, Pakistan brings up Kashmir at the UN and Sudan likened Akram's speech to a Pavlovian reaction.

Speaking earlier during the debate on behalf of India, an elected member of the Security Council, Permanent Representative T. S. Tirumurti said, “Any debate on protection of civilians in urban areas would be incomplete without taking into account the carnage wrought by terrorist forces, especially those backed by state actors.”

“We are already witnessing the effect of urban warfare and terrorist attacks in cities,” he said.

The 2008 terrorist attack on Mumbai that resulted in the killing of 166 civilians from 15 countries “epitomise the sheer scale and scope of urban warfare that we had to mount against jihadi terrorists when our police personnel had to put their lives on the line to secure the city’s safety,” Tirumurti said.

Sudan pointed out that "the perpetrators of the heinous terror attack in Mumbai in 2008 continue to enjoy patronage of the state which he (Akram) represents.”

Akram returned to give a response to Sudan, grandstanding on two points that were non-sequiturs. He asked if India would abide by Article 25 of the UN Charter that states that members agree to carry out the decisions of the Security Council. But a Security Council resolution adopted on April 21, 1948, in fact, demands a Pakistani withdrawal from all of Kashmir, which Islamabad continues to defy.

The resolution asks Pakistan “to secure the withdrawal from the State of Jammu and Kashmir of tribesmen and Pakistani nationals not normally resident therein who have entered the State for the purpose of fighting, and to prevent any intrusion into the State of such elements and any furnishing of material aid to those fighting in the State.”

Akram asked if Indian leaders would denounce the December 17 statements in Haridwar calling for genocide of Muslims.

However, two of the leading figures at that meeting of Hindu fringe elements, Yati Narsinghanand Giri and Jitendra Narayan Tyagi, have already been arrested and are being prosecuted for hate speech. Tyagi was known as Wasim Rizvi before his conversion to Hinduism.

(SAM)