US leadership delivered Indo-Pak de-escalation: American diplomat at UNSC meeting

United Nations: The Trump administration has delivered “de-escalations” between India and Pakistan, Washington's top diplomat at the UN said on Tuesday, emphasising that the US remains committed to mediating disputes and advancing peaceful resolutions worldwide.

“Across the globe, the United States continues to work with parties to disputes, wherever possible, to find peaceful solutions,” Acting US Representative Ambassador Dorothy Shea said at the UN Security Council open debate on ‘Multilateralism and Peaceful Settlement of Disputes’ held here under Pakistan’s presidency of the Council.

With Pakistan Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar presiding over the Council meeting, Shea said in the past three months alone, the US leadership has delivered "de-escalations between Israel and Iran, between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda, and between India and Pakistan”.

“The United States, under President Trump’s leadership, played an important role in encouraging the parties to reach these resolutions, which we applaud and support,” she said.

The US calls on all UN member states involved in disputes or conflicts to follow the example of those countries and to make every effort to resolve their disputes and cease violence, the diplomat said.

Pakistan, currently a non-permanent member of the 15-nation Council, is President of the UN body for the month of July. Under its presidency, it is holding two “signature” events on ‘Promoting International Peace and Security through Multilateralism and the Peaceful Settlement of Disputes’ and on ‘cooperation between the United Nations and regional and sub-regional organisations (Organisation of Islamic Cooperation).’

In his remarks to the debate in his national capacity, Dar raised the issue of Jammu and Kashmir as well as the Indus Waters Treaty.

In the wake of the horrific April 22 Pahalgam attack in Jammu and Kashmir, for which The Resistance Front had claimed responsibility and in which 26 civilians were killed, India decided that the Indus Waters Treaty of 1960 will be held in abeyance until Pakistan credibly and irrevocably abjures its support for cross-border terrorism.

Shea said for peaceful dispute settlement processes to be credible, their outcomes must be implemented.

"We again call on China to abide by the 2016 ruling of the Arbitral Tribunal convened under the 1982 Law of the Sea Convention, which is both final and legally binding on China and the Philippines," she said.

She said for nine years now, China has refused to live up to its obligations as a party to the Convention, and instead continued to publicly reject the ruling, interfere with the exercise of high seas freedoms, and assert expansive and unlawful claims that infringe on the sovereign rights and jurisdictions of other South China Sea littoral states, including the Philippines, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam.

"We once again condemn China's expansive and unlawful maritime claims in the South China Sea and the dangerous and destabilising ways it attempts to enforce them," she said.

Since May 10, Trump, as well as his administration, has repeated the claim several times on various occasions that the US president “helped settle” the tensions between India and Pakistan and that he told the nuclear-armed South Asian neighbours that America will do a “lot of trade” with them if they stop the conflict.

India launched Operation Sindoor on May 7, targeting terrorist infrastructure in territories controlled by Pakistan in response to the Pahalgam terror attack. The strikes triggered four days of intense clashes that ended with an understanding on stopping the military actions on May 10.

The Resistance Front (TRF), a front for Pakistan-based terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), had claimed responsibility for the Pahalgam attack.

Last week, the US designated The Resistance Front as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation (FTO) and Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT).

India welcomed the US decision to designate TRF as a designated FTO and SDGT.