A potential rising tension emerged when President of the United States of American stated that Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister of India wants him to meditate on the Kashmir issue which has seen struggling for 70 years as quoted by Prime Minister of Pakistan Imran Khan.
India went into a zone of the maze when Trump on Monday claimed in front of Pakistan PM Imran Khan stating- “I was with Prime Minister Modi two weeks ago and we talked about this subject and he actually said, ‘Would you like to be a mediator or arbitrator?’ I said, ‘Where?’ He said, ‘Kashmir’. Because this has been going on for many, many years.’
Brad Sherman, the Democrat leader in the House of Representatives stated “ Everyone who knows anything about foreign policy in South Asia knows that India consistently opposes third-party mediation re Kashmir (sic). Everyone knows PM Modi would never suggest such a thing. Trump’s statement is amateurish and delusional.”
The Indian foreign minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar denies any kind of statement made by the PM of India. He stated- “ It has been India’s consistent position that all outstanding issues with Pakistan are discussed only bilaterally.”
The opposition party in India is demanding a statement from the Modi to clarify the remark made by Trump on air. This is not the first time a third party is offering service to be a mediator in the Kashmir issue though India has maintained the Kashmir issue as a bilateral one and no third party has any role. The external affairs minister said- “I would like to reiterate that India’s position is that all issues with Pakistan will be discussed only bilaterally, and no third party will be involved in mediation. Any engagement with Pakistan would require an end to cross-border terrorism.”
United States Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley told reporters of India Today- “It’s absolutely right that this administration is concerned about the relationship between India and Pakistan and very much wants to see how we de-escalate any sort of conflict going forward.”
“So I would expect that the administration is in going to be in talks and try and find its place to be a part of that and we don’t think we should wait till something happens. We very much think that we should be proactive in the way that we are seeing tensions rise and conflicts start to bubble up and so we want to see if we can be a part of that,” Nikki added.
