The Irony of Bilawal Bhutto Zardari’s ‘Weaponising Terrorism for Diplomatic Point-Scoring’ Statement - News18

On the same day as foreign ministers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation gathered for a meeting in Goa, India experienced a devastating attack in the Rajouri district of Jammu and Kashmir by Pakistan-backed Lashkar-e-Toiba terrorists. Pakistan’s words and deeds were so considerably at odds with one another that India’s External Affairs Minister, S Jaishankar, in one of his sharpest attacks, had to call out Bhutto as the “promoter, justifier and spokesperson of a terrorism industry.” In his address at the SCO Council of Foreign Ministers’ meeting, Jaishankar said, “taking the eyes off terrorism would be detrimental to the security interests of the grouping” and that when the world was engaged in facing the Covid pandemic and its consequences, the “menace of terrorism continued unabated”, a clear reference to Pakistan. Maintaining the facade of a cohesive counter-terrorism framework under the tutelage of SCO, Pakistani foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto stated that he and his country were “firmly committed to being part of regional and global efforts for eradicating this menace” and that the SCO’s member countries should adopt a “comprehensive and collective approach” instead of engaging in “diplomatic point scoring” and “geopolitical partisanship.” “Terrorism continues to threaten global security,” he remarked. FM @BhuttoZardari urged to collectively eradicate the menace of terrorism💬" Let’s not get caught up in weaponising terrorism for diplomatic point scoring"#PakFMatSCO pic.twitter.com/H5awOoQDF5 — Spokesperson 🇵🇰 MoFA May 5, 2023 Bhutto’s advocacy for discontinuing the erroneous association of non-state actors with state actors is a clear manifestation of his intention to persist with the policy of recantation of Pakistan’s role in terrorism and feigning an unyielding commitment to counter-terrorism efforts. Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Hina Rabbani Khar, had previously stated during a press conference in Islamabad that “no country had used terrorism better than India.” She went on to say that India was portraying itself as a champion of counter-terrorism even though it had not made any contributions in this regard while Pakistan has always been at the “forefront of counter-terrorism.” This, coupled with Bhutto’s unrelenting and hostile attitude and remarks on Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, only reinforces the already existing schism between the two countries.