Pakistan PM Sharif to attend Gaza Peace Board meeting in Washington

Islamabad: Pakistan on Thursday announced that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif would attend the Board of Peace on Gaza meeting being convened in Washington next week.

Foreign Office spokesperson Tahir Andrabi said at the weekly press briefing that the composition of the prime minister’s delegation was still being worked out.

“Yes, I can confirm that the prime minister will attend the upcoming Board of Peace (BoP) meeting. He will be accompanied by the deputy prime minister /foreign minister. As regards the other members of delegation and on engagements of the delegation in the US, we will inform you in due course of time,” he said.

He said Pakistan joined the BoP in good faith and it was not doing so in isolation but as part of the collective voice of eight Islamic-Arab countries.

“So, our collective voice is resonating in the Board of Peace, and we will continue to strive for the rights, peace and prosperity of the people of Palestine, aimed at the long-term solution of the Palestine issue – to create a state of Palestine, in accordance with the pre-1967 border with Al Quds Al Sharif as its capital,” he said.

The spokesperson also said that Pakistan is “appreciative” of the role of the US during the military conflict with India in May last year.

“The role of the United States was for peace, for prevention of war and prevention of violence. So, in that context, President Trump's statements, previous statements, and these statements are all obviously welcomed and endorsed,” he said.

US President Donald Trump, in an interview to Fox Business on Tuesday, repeated his claim that he stopped the war between India and Pakistan last year, which he said could have turned nuclear.

"I settled eight wars. Of the eight wars, at least six were settled because of tariffs. In other words, I said, ‘if you don't settle this war, I'm going to charge you tariffs, because I don't want to see people getting killed,” Trump said.

"And they said, ‘Well, what does this have to do?’ I said, ‘you're going to be charged’. Like India and Pakistan. It would have been a nuclear war, in my opinion. They were really going at it, 10 planes were shot down. They were going at it,” Trump said.

Trump has claimed credit for stopping the India-Pakistan conflict more than 80 times since May 10 last year, when he announced on social media that the two neighbours had agreed to a “full and immediate” ceasefire after talks mediated by Washington.

India has consistently denied any third-party intervention.

India launched Operation Sindoor on May 7 last year, targeting terror infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir in retaliation for the April 22 Pahalgam attack that killed 26 civilians.

The spokesperson said that the UN 1267 Sanctions Committee Report published on February 4 extensively supports Pakistan's narrative on Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and Afghanistan and highlighted the important aspects related to the presence of TTP and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan.

“A very significant aspect of the report is that the interim government in Afghanistan continues to provide a permissive environment to a range of terrorists, notably TTP,” he said.

He also said Daesh was present in Afghanistan. The 1267 the UN sanctions committees report has also corroborated about the Daesh presence in Afghanistan and their masterminds planning terrorist attacks, he said.

The Foreign Office spokesperson said that the challenge of Afghanistan shadowed Pakistan’s objective of regional connectivity for the past three, four decades.

He said if the regional connectivity improves, the region will prosper, and Afghanistan’s prosperity is directly linked with actions that the Afghan government ought to take against these terrorists.