Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi Thursday said the Indus Water Treaty between New Delhi will remain suspended and Pakistan will not get water from rivers over which India has rights.
Speaking at a public rally in the state of Rajasthan that borders Pakistan, Modi said that Pakistan would have to pay a heavy price for what he called every terrorist attack.
Pakistan receives its share of water flowing downstream from the Himalayan regions of Jammu and Kashmir under the Indus Water Treaty.
Modi spoke in the wake of deadliest India-Pakistan clashes in recent history after India said it targeted militant hideouts in Pakistan.
Pakistan said only civilians were killed in India airstrikes. Pakistan said it shot down at least five Indian jets including state-of-the-art French Rafale warplanes.
The clashes stopped only after U.S. President brokered a ceasefire agreement between the two nuclear-armed South Asian countries. Trump had also threated to stop trade if the two countries did not stop hostilities. After the ceasefire, Trump said he would be expanding trade with both countries and that he had saved millions of people from the threat of a nuclear war.
India had announced the suspension of the 65 years old Indus Water Treaty after killing of 26 tourists in April 22 terrorist attack in the Indian-ruled Kashmir. New Delhi quickly alleged that the perpetrators were linked to a Pakistan-based banned militant organization Lashkar-e-Taiba.
Meanwhile, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has said Saudi Arabia could be the “neutral” venue for much-needed talks between Pakistan and India on critical issues.
Sharif said that Kashmir, water, trade and terrorism will be the key points during the dialogue with India.
Questioned if there was a possibility of a third venue for talks in light of the mediation offered by US President Donald Trump, Sharif ruled out the possibility of China as a neutral venue, saying India would never agree to that.
When it was pointed out that India intends to hold dialogue on terrorism while Pakistan wants to focus on Kashmir, the PM reiterated: “Kashmir, water, trade and terrorism will be the key points during Pakistan-India talks.”
Meanwhile, Pakistan’s attorney general, Mansoor Usman Awan said that Islamabad was willing to discuss water sharing between the but said India must stick to a decades-old treaty.
“Any move to stop Pakistan accessing the water would have a devastating impact,”. Pakistan’s top lawyer warned.
The Indus treaty, negotiated by the World Bank in 1960, guarantees water for 80% of Pakistan’s farms from three rivers that flow from India.
“Pakistan is willing to talk about or to address anything, any concerns they may have,” Mansoor Usman Awan assured.
He said India had written to Pakistan in recent weeks, citing population growth and clean energy needs as reasons to modify the treaty. But he said any discussions would have to take part under the terms of the treaty.
Islamabad believes the treaty is legally binding and no party can unilaterally suspend it, Awan said.
“As far as Pakistan is concerned, the treaty is very much operational, functional, and anything which India does, it does at its own cost and peril as far as the building of any hydroelectric power projects are concerned,” he said in an interview.
Pakistan military has said Indian state-sponsored terrorism against Pakistan” — which has been ongoing since the inception of the country — was also responsible for the recent attack in Balochistan’s Khuzdar.
The head of the media wing of the military Inter-Services Public Relations Lt Gen Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry has reiterated that ““Pakistan has irrefutable evidence of Indian involvement in terrorism.“
On May 21, at least eight people, including six students, were slain while over 40 others — mostly students — were injured after a bomb targeted a school bus near Zero Point in Khuzdar on the Quetta-Karachi highway when it was on its way to drop the students at the Army Public School in Khuzdar Cantonment.
The director general ISPR says India was planning and instructing terrorist activities taking place in Pakistan, the funding for which is also provided by India.
“The attack in Balochistan had nothing to do with the Baloch identity, rather it was just India’s provocation.”
New Delhi has rejected the Pakistani allegations that it is involved in perpetrating terror in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa through banned militant outfits Baloch Liberation Army and Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan.
The UN Security Council has condemned the attack and asked countries to help combat terrorism.
“The members of the Security Council reiterated that any acts of terrorism are criminal and unjustifiable, regardless of their motivation, wherever, whenever and by whomsoever committed,” the statement said, according to Views News Now correspondent Iftikhar Ali.
The UNSC members reaffirmed the need for all States to combat by all means, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and other obligations under international law, including international human rights law, international refugee law and international humanitarian law, threats to international peace and security caused by terrorist acts.
