NEW DELHI, Sept 25: Hitting out at China amid repeated holds on proposals to designate Pakistan-based terrorists under the U.N. sanctions regime, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar said terrorism should not be used as a “political tool” and the idea that something is blocked without assigning a reason challenges common sense.
“We do believe that in any process if any party is taking a decision, they need to be transparent about it. So the idea that something is blocked without assigning a reason, it sort of challenges common sense,” Jaishankar said.
China, a veto-wielding permanent member of the Security Council, has repeatedly put holds on listing proposals by India, the U.S. and other allies to blacklist Pakistan-based terrorists under the 1267 Al Qaeda Sanctions regime of the Council.
He was responding to a question at a press conference on the issue of repeated holds and blocks on proposals to list Pakistan-based terror group leaders under the U.N. sanctions regime and whether this came up in his talks with his global counterparts as he met them during the high-level United Nation’s General Assembly earlier this week.
“It came up in some of my meetings. I also mentioned it in my BRICS intervention,” he said referring to the meeting held Thursday on the margins of the General Assembly between the foreign ministers of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa group – Brazilian Foreign Minister Carlos Alberto Franco Franca, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi and Minister of International Relations and Cooperation of the Republic of South Africa Naledi Pandor.
Last week, China put a hold on a proposal moved at the United Nations by the U.S. and co-supported by India to designate Lahkar-e-Taiba terrorist Sajid Mir wanted for his involvement in the 26/11 Mumbai terrorist attacks, as a global terrorist.
Last month, China put a hold on a proposal by the U.S. and India at the United Nations to blacklist Abdul Rauf Azhar, the brother of Jaish-e Mohammed (JEM) chief Masood Azhar and a senior leader of the Pakistan-based terror organisation. Abdul Rauf Azhar, born in 1974 in Pakistan, was sanctioned by the U.S. in December 2010.
In June this year, China had put a hold, at the last moment, on a joint proposal by India and the U.S. to list Pakistan-based terrorist Abdul Rehman Makki under the 1267 Al-Qaida Sanctions Committee of the UN Security Council.
“We hope that reason would prevail and people, first of all, would not arbitrarily or politically block,” Jaishankar said, underlining that the message is that this is “not inter-state politics which we are talking about. “We are trying to get across our message that terrorism is not political. It should not be used as a political tool, its consequences should not be made political.
“If you go into the U.N. and say does everybody consider terrorism a common threat, everybody will say yes. So we are saying well, if that’s what your position is, then why don’t your policies and your actions follow up on it,” he said.
Jaishankar, in his UNGA address on Saturday, said that no rhetoric, however sanctimonious can ever cover up blood stains and nations who defend proclaimed terrorists in the United Nations advance neither their own interests nor their reputation, a clear reference to China and Pakistan.
“Having borne the brunt of cross border terrorism for decades, India firmly advocates a ‘zero-tolerance’ approach. In our view, there is no justification for any act of terrorism, regardless of motivation. And no rhetoric, however sanctimonious can ever cover up blood stains,” Jaishankar had said in the U.N. General Debate.
(Manas Dasgupta)