ISLAMABAD – Pakistan categorically rejected the unwarranted and preposterous comments made by the Spokesperson of the Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on the Pakistan-China Joint Statement issued after Prime Minister Imran Khan’s Beijing visit.

Foreign Office spokesperson Asim Iftikhar in a statement said, “We also strongly reject India’s persistent propaganda against China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC)”.

Pakistan has shared irrefutable evidence of India’s sinister campaign to sabotage CPEC through its dossiers released in 2020 and 2021. There is strong evidence of Indian involvement in recent sinister attempts to stir up unrest in Balochistan by supporting anti-state elements. Besides, Naval Commander Kulbhushan Jadhav is a living and irrefutable proof of how India has been seeking to sponsor and patronize subversive activities in Pakistan and the region.

Similarly, New Delhi’s baseless claims over Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) can neither change the facts of history nor the legal status of the Jammu & Kashmir dispute. IIOJK never was and never will be India’s “integral part”.

 The irrefutable fact remains that India is an occupation force in IIOJK in clear violation of the relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions, and its illegal and unilateral actions of 5 August 2019, seeking to change the internationally recognized disputed status of IIOJK and to alter its demographic structure, have been rejected by the Kashmiris, by Pakistan, and by the international community.

Pakistan will continue to extend all possible support to the Kashmiris in their just struggle against India’s illegal occupation. Rather than resorting to false and misleading assertions without success, India must vacate its illegal occupation of the disputed territory, immediately reverse its illegal and unilateral actions of 5 August 2019, and let Kashmiris exercise their inalienable right to self-determination through a free and impartial plebiscite under the auspices of the United Nations as enshrined in the relevant UNSC resolutions.