ISLAMABAD, Pakistan: The Foreign Office Friday said that statement of Indian defence minister on why India cannot use nuclear weapons first was a “manifestation of India’s double speak and a threat to region’s peace and security”.
“Such statements from a person no less than defence minister of a country that has repeatedly and constantly heightened tensions with aggressive posture is a threat to regional and global peace,” Foreign Office Spokesman Nafees Zakaria said at a weekly press briefing at Foreign Office in Islamabad.
Indian defence minister Manohar Parrikar had stated that “instead of saying that India won’t use nuclear weapons first, should say it is a responsible nuclear power”.
The Spokesman said India’s claim of ‘no first use of nuclear weapons’ could not substitute to the restraint measures as proposed in Pakistan’s standing offer of ‘Strategic Restraint Regime’.
“Pakistan has long maintained that India’s ambiguous no first use declaration is not verifiable and amounts to nothing,” he said.
The Spokesman said that Pakistan had time and again cautioned the international community of “Indian tendency towards adventurism”.
He said in this backdrop, signing of nuclear deals by some countries was a matter of concern as “it had only reinforced arrogance and belligerence to the Indian conduct in the region and beyond”.
He mentioned that India’s atrocities and worst crimes in Indian Occupied Kashmir and its non-stop ceasefire violations at Line of Control (LoC) and Working Boundary also testified this fact.
“India has deliberately escalated tensions at LoC and Working Boundary in an attempt to divert world’s attention from the grave human rights violations committed by Indian security forces in IOK,” he added.
The Spokesman said Pakistan had no desire to escalate the tension, however was forced to retaliate, adding that the restraint had also been appreciated by the international community.
