Daily Times

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said the country would give a ‘strong reply’ to those behind the Kashmir attack as New Delhi withdrew the Most Favoured Nation (MFN) trade status given to Pakistan, in the aftermath of a suicide bombing in occupied valley that killed at least 44 security personnel.

According to reports in Indian media, the decision was taken during a Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) chaired by the Indian prime minister. The high-level huddle decided to withdraw the MFN status for Islamabad and ‘initiate all possible steps’ to ensure ‘complete isolation’ of the country. “The most favoured nation status granted to Pakistan stands withdrawn. The ministry of commerce will issue [a] necessary notification in this regard,” said Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley while speaking to the media.

India had granted MFN status to Pakistan in 1996, a year after the formation of the World Trade Organisation for the promotion of international trade.

Pakistan expressed grave concern on the Kashmir attack. In a statement, Foreign Office Spokesperson Dr Faisal said Islamabad has always condemned heightened acts of violence in the valley. He also strongly rejected the insinuation by elements in the Indian government and media circles that seek to link the attack to Pakistan without investigations.

Pakistan also summoned India’s Deputy High Commissioner Gaurav Ahluwalia and lodged a strong protest over allegations by India linking Thursday’s blast in held Kashmir to Islamabad. The Foreign Office handed him a protest note, stating that India leveled unfounded allegations against Pakistan without carrying out a probe into the blast in Pulwama district of the occupied valley. “Pakistan strongly rejects the Indian government’s allegations. Jaish-e-Muhammad is a proscribed outfit and has no links with Pakistan. The alleged attackers belonged to the area under the Indian occupation,” it said.

Pakistan’s High Commissioner to India Sohail Mahmood was also summoned by the Indian external affairs ministry and issued a ‘strong démarche’ in connection with the attack, The Hindu reported. Also on Friday, Indian High Commissioner to Pakistan Ajay Bisaria was recalled by New Delhi for consultations in the aftermath of the attack. The envoy is currently on his way to India, a spokesperson for the Indian High Commission, Shubham Singh, told a private TV channel.

Indian finance minister said the foreign ministry would “also engage with the international community to make sure that the comprehensive convention on international terrorism, which has been pending for over three decades before the United Nations, particularly because of the definition of the word terrorism, is now adopted at the earliest.” “As far as our security forces are concerned, we will be taking all possible steps, firstly to ensure that full security is maintained, and secondly, to ensure that those who have committed this heinous act of terrorism and those who have supported it actively are made to pay a heavy cost for it,” he said.

The finance minister said that Indian Home Minister Rajnath Singh would be leaving for Srinagar with a team of officials. Upon his return, he will be calling an all-parties meeting to brief them on the situation, Jaitley said.

Even though the investigation is in its preliminary stages, the US singled out Pakistan in its statement late Thursday night condemning the attack. “The United States calls on Pakistan to immediately end the support and safe haven provided to all terrorist groups operating on its soil, whose only goal is to sow chaos, violence, and terror in the region,” the statement from the White House press secretary’s office said, according to AP. It said the attack strengthened US resolve to bolster counterterrorism cooperation with India.

PPP Senator Sherry Rehman, in response to Indian allegations, said, “Modi’s India is escalating its response to a heinous #KashmirTerrorAttack by premising Pakistan’s hand in it.” “Yet Islamabad makes no gains from such an attack,” she posted on her Twitter handle. “Instead of a political response to years of brutal repression in Kashmir, hysteria is being amplified against Pakistan.”

At least 44 Indian paramilitary soldiers were killed on Thursday in occupied valley in the deadliest attack on security forces since 2002. The attack, surpassing one in 2016 when 19 soldiers died, saw explosives packed inside a van rip through buses in a convoy of 78 vehicles carrying some 2,500 members of the paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF). Two blue buses carrying around 35 people each bore the brunt of the explosion around 20 kilometres from the main city of Srinagar on the main highway towards Jammu. Some of the bodies were so badly blown up that officials feel it may take some time to identity them, the Press Trust of India reported. The convoy was bringing the troopers back from leave to rejoin active service.

Published in Daily Times, February 16^th 2019.