United Nations, Oct 23 (IANS) India launched a scorching salvo against Pakistan’s campaign against it, saying that Islamabad-backed Pahalgam attack is indelibly fresh in the world’s memory and the terrorism sponsor stands exposed before all as “the worst violator of human rights”.
“The international community stands witness to Pakistan’s sponsorship of cross-border terrorism and its use of terrorism as a tool of State policy directed against India,” Raghoo Puri, a first Secretary at India’s UN Mission, said on Wednesday.
“Terrorism is the gravest threat to humanity, and its abettor and aider like Pakistan remains the worst violator of human rights,” he added.
“The brutal, targeted attacks carried out by Pakistan-trained terrorists, which claimed the lives of 26 innocent civilians in Jammu and Kashmir’s Pahalgam on April 22, 2025, have not been forgotten by the world,” he said.
Puri was responding to what he characterised as Pakistan “peddling lies and making false equivalences” during an interactive dialogue with the Special Rapporteur on Fundamental Freedoms While Countering Terrorism at the General Assembly’s Third Committee that deals with humanitarian affairs.
It was the latest in a series of diatribes by Pakistan in the current General Assembly session bringing up Kashmir regardless of the topic on the agenda — a gambit that has failed to click with any of the other 192 members of the UN.
The rapporteur, Ben Saul, said that he was in touch with India and Pakistan regarding the Pahalgam attack, but could not comment on it as communication is confidential under the procedures.
Puri defended Operation Sindoor, which India launched in May this year against terrorist bases in Pakistan.
“India’s legitimate right to defend itself was measured and non-escalatory in order to protect our people against terrorism and bring its organisers and perpetrators to justice,” he said.
Bringing the terrorists to justice was “articulated in the UNSC’s (Security Council) press statement that was released condemning this very attack,” he added.
“In contrast, Pakistan deliberately targeted our border villages resulting in civilian deaths, including children,” he said.
He advised Islamabad, the “epicentre” of global terrorism, to “look itself in the mirror, stop preaching sermons in this forum, act to protect children within its own borders, and stop targeting women and children across its borders”.
Puri drew attention to Pakistan’s recent air strikes on Afghanistan, “including in Kabul, resulting in the death of civilians”.
“This represents a blatant violation of the UN Charter and international law,” he said.
He also gave a reminder of the genocide Pakistan had carried out in Bangladesh during its War of Independence in 1971.
Puri said while trying to hide behind claims of “Islamophobia”, Pakistan has made religious and ethnic persecution its state policy exemplified by it officially calling certain groups “Khawarij/Fitna”, — terms with “special religious connotation”.
Those terms originating in Islam’s history refer to dissident religious factions that were defeated, and Pakistan has used that label for some opposition groups.
Pakistan has “normalised dehumanising its ethnic and religious minorities,” he added.
For decades, Islamabad has “institutionalised persecution of Hindu, Christian and Ahmadiyya minority communities, with impunity, in the name of religion” and this “continues unabated”, he said.
–IANS
al/khz
