PM Imran Khan policy statement on Pulwama incident

Lahore : In the name of Allah the most beneficent the most merciful.

I had wanted to respond to the Pulwama attack right away because Delhi had accused Pakistan of having a hand in the attack, but we had a very important visit from the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, we had an investment conference planned, that we had been planning for a long time. Therefore, I decided not to respond immediately, because the attention would have been diverted from the visit onto this issue. That’s why I am responding now, that the Crown Prince has left. This message is for the Indian government. First of all, you accused Pakistan without any evidence. You never thought: What would pakistan gain out of this attack? Only a fool would take such an action to sabotage his own conference?

Even if the crown prince had not been visiting, what benefit would Pakistan get from the Pulwama attack? Why would Pakistan, at this stage indulge when it is moving towards stability?

We have fought a war against terrorism for 15 years, thousands of Pakistanis have lost their lives, terrorism is receding, peace and stability is returning, what benefit would we get from such an attack. You wish to remain stuck in the past, and each time something happens in Kashmir, you want to hold Pakistan responsible. Instead of trying to resolve the Kashmir issue, start a dialogue or move forward, you want to make Islamabad your whipping boy again and again.

I would like to tell you that, this is ‘Naya’ Pakistan. It is a new mindset, a new way of thinking. We believe that it is in our interest that our soil is not used for carrying out terrorist attacks in other countries, nor do we want outsiders to come and carry out terror attacks here. We desire stability. Today, I would like to make the Indian government an offer. Any sort of investigation you wish carried out regarding this incident about the involvement of any Pakistani, we are ready for it. If you have any actionable intelligence that any Pakistani is involved, give it to us. I guarantee you that we will take action, not because we are under pressure, but because they are acting as enemies of Pakistan. If someone is using Pakistan’s soil to carry out terror attacks elsewhere, it is against our interests.

The second issue is, whenever we talked about dialogue, the pre-condition of India is to talk about terrorism first. I would say that we are ready to talk on terrorism, as it is an issue of entire region and we are ready to discuss it, because

we want terrorism in the region to end, Pakistan has been the worst affected by terrorism. 70,000 Pakistanis have lost their lives; we faced a loss of
more than 100 billion dollars due to terrorism, so we are ready to talk with you. But, at the end I want to say two things to you, a new mindset should take place in India; introspection should also be under taken, what is the reason that Kashmiris have reached a level when they are not afraid of death. Do you think that this one-dimensional oppression, cruelty, using military to curb protests will succeed?

These measures have not succeeded till date; do you think they will be successful in future? If today in Afghanistan, after 17 years, the entire world
has accepted that there is no military solution and that the issue can only be resolved through dialogue, shouldn’t there be discussion about this in India as well?

We are hearing the voices in India, media, politicians, they all say that Pakistan must be taught a lesson, Revenge must be taken from Pakistan, There should be a strike, first of all, what law gives any country the right to be the judge, jury and executioner? What sort of justice is this? Secondly, you are facing an election year. And we believe that during the election you will get a big boost if you ‘teach Pakistan a lesson.

If you think you can carry out any kind of attack on Pakistan, we will no just think about retaliation, we will retaliate. There will be no other way, and after that, where does that take us? All of us know that starting a war is very easy and is in our hands. No one better than Allah knows where it will go but
ending a war would not be in our hands. That’s why I am hopeful that better sense will prevail and we will be sensible in handling this issue. At the end this issue
will also be resolved through dialogue just like the Afghanistan issue.