'Don't equate victims and perpetrators of terrorism': India tells US, other Quad partners

New Delhi: The victims and perpetrators of terrorism must not be equated, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said in Washington D.C. on Tuesday in the presence of US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, conveying New Delhi’s displeasure over re-hyphenation of India and Pakistan by President Donald Trump’s administration.

“The world must display zero tolerance to terrorism. Victims and perpetrators must never be equated,” Jaishankar told journalists in Washington, D.C., before he and Rubio joined their Japanese and Australian counterparts, Takeshi Iwaya and Penny Wong, for a meeting of the foreign ministers of the Quad.

This is Jaishankar’s first visit to Washington, D.C., after New Delhi’s response to the April 22 terrorist attack in Jammu and Kashmir led to a four-day-long cross-border flare-up between India and Pakistan from May 7 to 10.

“India has every right to defend its people against terrorism, and we will exercise that right. We expect our Quad partners to understand and appreciate that,” the external affairs minister said, sending out a message to his American, Japanese and Australian counterparts.

The Quad had not issued any joint statement condemning the terrorist attack in J&K.

After the terrorists killed 26 people, mostly tourists, at Baisaran near Pahalgam in Jammu and Kashmir on April 22, The Resistance Force (TRF) – a proxy of Lashkar-e-Tayyiba – claimed responsibility for the attack.

The LeT has its headquarters in Pakistan and has been carrying out attacks in India.

Though many nations condemned the latest carnage in J&K, most of them refrained from calling out Pakistan for persistently sponsoring terrorism against India. During the May 7-10 cross-border military offensive and counter-offensive between India and Pakistan, several nations urged New Delhi to exercise restraint or work with Islamabad to diffuse tension.

President Donald Trump of the US and his administration re-hyphenated India and Pakistan and, despite New Delhi’s rebuttals, claimed credit for brokering a ceasefire between the two South Asian nations. Trump said after the terrorist attack in J&K that he was close to both India and Pakistan, and the two nations had been fighting over Kashmir for 1000 years.

A senior US Army commander showered praises on the Pakistan Army for hunting down the ISIS-K terrorists and called it a “phenomenal partner” in counter-terrorism. Though New Delhi accused Pakistan Army chief, Field Marshal Asim Munir, of provoking the April 22 attacks with his communal rhetoric against India, Trump hosted him at the White House on June 18. He even put Munir and Prime Minister Narendra Modi within the same bracket and said that “two smart people” had decided to halt the military flare-up, which had put the two South Asian neighbours on the brink of war.

The Quad was conceived in 2004 but fizzled out soon after its formal launch in 2007. The bloc was revived in 2017 as a coalition of democratic nations to counter the expansionist moves of China in the Indo-Pacific region.

Beijing extended its support to Islamabad after the India-Pakistan tension escalated in the wake of the April 22 terrorist attack in J&K. Even before India launched ‘Operation Sindoor’ targeting terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan as well as areas under illegal occupation of Pakistan, China vowed to support its 'all-weather ally' Pakistan in “safeguarding its territorial integrity and sovereignty”. Beijing also supported Islamabad’s call for an impartial probe into the terrorist attack in J&K. China even termed India’s military action targeting terrorist camps in Pakistan and areas under the illegal occupation of Pakistan on May 7 as “regrettable”.

New Delhi, however, was disappointed by the lack of interest by India’s partners in the Quad, Australia, Japan and the US, in issuing a joint statement condemning the latest manifestation of terrorism targeting one of the members of the four-nation coalition.

Australia had expressed concern over recent hostilities between India and Pakistan and, on May 10, welcomed “the ceasefire” and urged “respect for its terms” for “regional peace and security.” Japan strongly urged both India and Pakistan to exercise restraint and stabilise the situation through dialogue for the peace and stability in South Asia.

“We are all committed to ensuring a free and open Indo-Pacific,” Jaishankar said, before the meeting of the foreign ministers of the Quad on Tuesday. “To that end, our endeavours are devoted to promoting a rules-based international order. It is essential that nations of the Indo-Pacific have the freedom of choice, so essential to make the right decisions on development and security.”