ISLAMABAD - Pakistan Army has urged Indian army chief against sacrificing professional ethics on the altar of political expediency and refraining from issuing provocative statements which pose a threat to peace in the region.
General Bipin Rawat is “repeatedly provoking war through irresponsible statements endangering regional peace for electioneering of political masters”, chief spokesman of Pakistan Army commented on Twitter on Friday.
“From fake surgical strike to-date his only success has been to turn Indian Army into a rogue force and getting them killed,” Director General
Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Major General Asif Ghafoor said in one of his tweets.
In a subsequent tweet, he said, “Indian Army Chief’s statements coupled with blood of innocents on hand, losses to Indian forces at the hands of Pakistan Armed Forces, heli crashes due to so called tech fault cum fratricide just to become Indian CDS is actually at the cost of professional military ethos.”
These statements came hours after General Rawat was reported by Indian media as saying on Friday that Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) and Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) were “controlled by terrorists, not the Pakistani establishment.”
The irresponsible statement was made only days after another such lie of the Indian army chief was exposed by Pakistan.
Going a step further, the Indian COAS said that AJK and GB were part of the “complete state” of Jammu and Kashmir and being “occupied” by Pakistan.
“PoK [Pakistani part of Kashmir] and Gilgit-Baltistan are occupied territory -- a territory which has been illegally occupied by our western neighbour,” he said in his provocative comments.
Gen Rawat’s statement comes after some ministers of BJP-led racist government declared that their “next agenda” after abrogating autonomy of India-occupied Kashmir (IoK) is to make Pakistani part of Kashmir an integral part of India.
The Hindutva government of Narendra Modi abrogated the special status of the IoK on August 5 by abrogating Article 370 and imposed an inhuman clampdown in the occupied valley which continues to date.
Besides killing and maiming Kashmiris in IoK, Indian forces keep killing innocent civilians in Azad Kashmir through cross-border shelling on populated areas. Owing to Pakistani forces’ response to the Indian violations of the ceasefire agreement, artillery duels have peaked at the Line of Control during last few months.
On October 20, Major General Asif Ghafoor had rejected Indian army chief’s claim of destroying three alleged terror camps in AJK.
“Indian COAS’ statement claiming destruction of 3 alleged camps in AJK is disappointing as he holds a very responsible appointment,” he had tweeted adding that there were no camps let alone targeting those. He also offered the Indian Embassy in Pakistan to take any foreign diplomat and media to “prove it on ground.”
But New Delhi did not respond to this unusual offer. After that, Foreign Office and Pakistan Army jointly took to a group of 23 foreign diplomats posted in Islamabad to visit areas of AJK to verify whether Indian army has smashed terror camps early last Sunday as claimed by Indian army chief General Rawat.
The diplomats were also taken to the areas near the LoC which have suffered severe damage in attacks by Indian troops. Indian government did not allow its diplomats based in Islamabad to visit the LoC.