GOI Sends Gen (R) VK Singh To Pak High Commission
NEW DELHI: Gen VK Singh, minister of state for external affairs, attended Pakistan Day celebrations in the Pakistani high commission in New Delhi on Monday evening.
Several Kashmiri leaders, including Syed Ali Shah Geelani, attended the event.
Earlier reports said foreign minister Sushma Swaraj decided not to attend the function and
VK Singh told reporters he was asked by the government to represent it at the Pakistan National Day reception.
“The Government of India has to sent an MoS. They sent me and I went there and came back,” he said replying to a question about his presence at the reception.
Asked specifically whether Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked him to attend the event at the Pakistani High Commission, he said, “The Government of India asked me to go there.”
Singh, former Army Chief, attended the event where several Kashmiri separatist leaders including Mirwaiz Umer Farooq, Syed Ali Shah Geelani and Yasin Malik were also present.
The Minister’s visit to the Pakistani High Commission came on a day India and Pakistan sparred over Hurriyat leaders’ meeting Pakistani envoy Abdul Basit with government making it clear that there was no role for a third party.
Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, along with Abdul Gani Bhat, Maulana Abbas Ansari, Bilal Gani Lone, Aga Syed Hassan, Mussadiq Adil and Mukhtar Ahmad Waza had held talks with Basit Sunday night.
Basit, who invited them to the Pakistan National Day celebrations, said that India was not against these interactions. However, India hit out, saying “the Government of India prefers to speak for itself”.
Former Union minister and Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar, who attended the reception, pitched for “uninterrupted” talks with Pakistan to resolve all outstanding issues.
“I think it is foolish to break the talks on the pretext that the Pakistan High Commissioner met the Hurriyat leaders. There should be uninterrupted dialogue,” Aiyar said.
He said talks between Pakistan High Commissioner and Hurriyat had started when Atal Bihari Vajpayee was Prime Minister and it continued during the UPA rule.
Geelani said all the issues between the two countries should be resolved through talks.
Earlier on Monday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said he was of firm belief that all outstanding issues with Pakistan can be resolved through bilateral dialogue in an atmosphere free from terror and violence.
He underlined it on Pakistan’s national day while greeting his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif in a letter.
“I have written to Pakistan PM Mr. Nawaz Sharif, conveying my greetings on the National Day of Pakistan,” Modi tweeted.
“It is my firm conviction that all outstanding issues can be resolved through bilateral dialogue in an atmosphere free from terror & violence,” he said in another tweet.
The Prime Minister’s emphasis on atmosphere free from terror and violence assumes significance as only last week J&K was hit by two attacks in as many days in Kathua and Samba areas.