By NNN-Bernama,
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia : India should reciprocate Pakistan’s positive gesture with a view to fighting terrorism effectively, said Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi.
He said that as far as India was concerned, the dialogue process between the two neighbouring countries was put on hold following the Mumbai attacks on Nov 26 last year.
“We continue to strongly believe that the terrorists are out there to sabotage the peace process between Pakistan and India. Our two countries should not be driven and dictated by them,” he said in a written interview with Bernama ahead of the Group of Eight Developing Islamic Countries (D-8) ministerial meeting here on Monday.
Qureshi stressed that Islamabad was committed not to allow its soil to be used for terrorism acts against any country.
He was responding to a question that in the eyes of a few countries, such as India and Afghanistan, Pakistan was seen as supporting cross-border terrorism or not doing enough to tackle the problem.
New Delhi has accused Islamabad of arming and training militant groups who have fought Indian security forces in Indian Kashmir since 1989 and the Indian government had repeatedly urged Pakistan to crack down on terrorist groups operating from its soil.
The five-year peace process between the nuclear-armed neighbours came to a halt after last November’s attacks in Mumbai, which New Delhi blamed on a militant group based in Pakistan.
Qureshi said terrorism was a common challenge which required a joint response.
“As you know, Pakistan is fighting terrorism in its own interest. At the same time, we fully understand that in order to deal with terrorism and militancy, regional cooperation is a sine qua non (an essential element or condition),” he said.
Qureshi also pointed out that since the democratic government assumed power in Pakistan last year, the country had come a long way in enhancing its cooperation with Afghanistan, bilaterally or through its trilateral and quadrilateral framework involving Turkey, Iran, the United States, Russia and Tajikistan.
“There has been significant improvement in controlling across-the-board infiltration.
“We hope that the review of strategy underway in the United States would cater for all aspects of the problems in Afghanistan so that the situation in that country stabilises.
“As far as we are concerned, we have undertaken a successful law enforcement operation in Swat and Malakand and now we are doing the same in Waziristan,” he said.