New Delhi: In a veiled attack on Pakistan, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar has said that India cannot hold a SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) meeting unless a member is involved in acts of terrorism, adding that India cannot handle such a situation. Will not tolerate where there is “terrorism”. Happens at night and business happens during the day.”
Responding to a question on hearing nothing on SAARC at the India International Center on Wednesday, Jaishankar said, “You haven’t heard much about SAARC because in the last few years, not much to hear about it.” Is. The meetings didn’t happen because you have a member of SAARC that doesn’t conform to all the basic requirements of a good membership, and that is a deterrent reality for SAARC today. You know I said that we cannot continue such acts of terrorism and say that cooperation will still continue.”
“So, I think there are some issues there and it is time to recognize the seriousness of those issues and not allow terrorism by night and trade by day. I don’t think it will help the country,” he said. Will happen.”
Even before this, Jaishankar had blamed Pakistan for not being an active organization of SAARC. In December 2022, Jaishankar said in Varanasi that SAARC is currently not active as a member of SAARC believes that “dealing with neighbors is conducive to factors of cross-border terrorism.”
Significantly, SAARC is a regional intergovernmental organization of eight countries of South Asia Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.
Talking about having good relations not with Pakistan but with other neighboring countries, Jaishankar said that their relations cannot be normal due to cross-border terrorism.
“I would say that Pakistan is clearly an exception when it comes to the neighbourhood. Again, it needs little explanation. The fact is that we cannot allow terrorism to become normal. Jaishankar said, “Pakistan. So I don’t think it’s a very common sense proposition.”
“In fact, if anything, I’m still a little puzzled as to why we didn’t get to this position earlier. But we’ve got to it now. And the point really is that until there’s a departure Till then I would call for repeal of this policy of cross-border terrorism. Frankly, it is not possible to have normal relations with that particular neighbour,” he said.