After India-led UNSC maritime session, Pakistan threatens continued militarisation

UNITED NATIONS: Pakistan has threatened to continue militarising citing what it claimed was a "geo-strategic competition and the pursuit of military dominance by some states", while mentioning India.

After Monday's high-level meeting on maritime security at the UN Security Council, Pakistan's Permanent Representative Munir Akram sent a written statement to the Indian Mission to be included in the record of the session. India is the current President of the Council and the meeting was presided over by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Akram asserted that "India has nuclearised the Indian Ocean and continues to induct advanced weapons systems and naval delivery platforms" with "hegemonistic designs".

"In light of these developments, Pakistan will continue to take all necessary measures to maintain full spectrum deterrence and ensure its national security on land, in the air and at the sea," he wrote.

In his address at the meeting, Modi called for resolving maritime disputes peacefully and cited the example in the South Asian region of India and Bangladesh reaching an agreement on their maritime boundary issues.

Moving beyond the ambit of the meeting's agenda of a holistic approach to maritime security, the constitutionally Islamic republic's representative accused India's policies of being "currently driven by an extremist 'Hindutva ideology'" which "pose an immediate and pervasive threat to international and regional peace and security".

Pakistan has adopted a line of ad hominem attacks on India by attaching "Hindutva" to its statements. Pakistan was not at the maritime security meeting as the participation was limited to members of the Council, UN officials and African Union President Felix- Antoine Tshisekedi Tshilombo.

But External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, who chaired the final segment of the meeting invited members states to send in written statements.

Pakistan's attack on India mirrored similar attacks by its all-weather patron China at the meeting when it tore into the US and Japan, naming them directly, and India indirectly.

Beijing's Deputy Permanent Representative, Dai Bing, was the only speaker to single out countries by name at the meeting on Monday morning.

Playing the spoiler, Dai called Washington the "biggest threat" in the Indo-Pacific region. Although Akram's claim about "geo-strategic competition and the pursuit of military dominance by some states" in the Indian Ocean echoed Dai's criticism of the US, the Pakistani diplomat did not name the US.

With no relevance to agenda, he accused Japan, which was not at the meeting, of releasing wastewater from the Fukushima nuclear plant into the ocean. The Fukushima reactor was hit by an earthquake and a tsunami in 2011

In the veiled attack on India, Dai said that some countries were "intensifying maritime conflicts" in the Asia Pacific region.

"At present, a few countries are pursuing exclusive regional strategies in the Asia Pacific region and attempt to create an intensifying maritime conflicts, undermine the sovereignty and security interests of relevant countries, and weaken regional peace and stability," he said.

Although he did not name India or the Quad. the group that is made up also of the US, Japan and Australia. his targets were obvious. At a news conference last week, India's Permanent Representative T.S. Tirumurti clarified that the meeting on maritime security was not aimed at anyone. (IANS)

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