Tag: Foreign Office

  • Pakistani exiles in UK not on ‘hit list’, Pakistan rejects Guardian report

    Pakistani exiles in UK not on ‘hit list’, Pakistan rejects Guardian report

    Pakistan on Tuesday “categorically rejected” a report published in The Guardian, which alleges that Pakistan was cracking down on dissidents abroad, adding that such accusations were baseless.

    Foreign Office (FO) spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri said that the unsubstantiated allegations appeared to be part of the rather “blatant on-going misinformation campaign” against Pakistan to malign the country and its state institutions.

    “Pakistan is a parliamentary democracy with a vibrant civil society, free media, and independent judiciary, which remains fully committed to the promotion and protection of human rights for all its citizens without discrimination,” said the FO spokesperson. “Our strong commitment to the right to freedom of opinion and expression is demonstrated by the presence of scores of vibrant media channels and newspapers in the country.”

    Chaudhri said it was regrettable that any news outlet provided a “platform for the peddling of unsubstantiated and false narratives against Pakistan”.

    British security sources are understood to be concerned that Pakistan might be prepared to target individuals on British soil, said a report published in The Guardian.

    According to the report, there are further warnings given by other intelligence services across Europe to Pakistani dissidents, including rights activists from Balochistan, journalists, and members of the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM).

    “If there is illegal pressure, in particular on journalists in the UK, then I would expect the law enforcement agencies and the British government to take notice of that and to make an appropriate legal and/or diplomatic response,” said Mark Lyall Grant, former UK High Commissioner to Pakistan.

  • FO condemns ‘malicious smear campaign against Pakistan’ by former Canadian minister

    FO condemns ‘malicious smear campaign against Pakistan’ by former Canadian minister

    The Foreign Office (FO) strongly objected to the remarks made by a former Canadian minister, saying his comments betrayed a lack of understanding of the Afghan peace process as well as showed ignorance about facts on the ground.

    In a series of tweets, the Foreign Office addressed the matter and said, “We strongly condemn the unwarranted comments by former Canadian minister Chris Alexander, making unfounded & misleading assertions about…Pakistan’s role in #AfghanPeaceProcess.”

    Chris Alexander, former Canadian minister posted on Twitter, “Taliban fighters waiting to cross the border from Pakistan to Afghanistan… anyone still denying that Pakistan is engaged in an ‘act of aggression’ against Afghanistan is complicit in proxy war & war crimes.”

    The FO also reiterated Pakistan’s policy on Afghanistan and said that international powers had begun to appreciate what Prime Minister Imran Khan had been saying for a long time. “Now when the world has acknowledged what…Pakistan & PM @ImranKhanPTI has consistently maintained abt there being no military solution to the conflict in #Afghanistan & the need for an inclusive, broad-based & comprehensive political settlement, such gratuitous commentary is deplorable,” it added.

    The FO further said that Pakistan had taken up the matter with the government of Canada. “The matter has been taken up with the Canadian side. We have urged the Canadian authorities to take steps to address this motivated and malicious smear campaign.”

  • ‘The world has seen true face of so-called Indian democracy,’ Pakistan demands answers

    ‘The world has seen true face of so-called Indian democracy,’ Pakistan demands answers

    In a statement released by the Foreign Office regarding India’s use of Israeli spyware, Pegasus, to hack Prime Minister Imran Khan’s phone, Foreign Office Spokesperson Zahid Hafeez stated, “We call on the relevant UN bodies to thoroughly investigate the matter, bring the facts to light, and hold the Indian perpetrators to account.”

    The statement further said, “We condemn in strongest possible terms India’s state-sponsored, continuing and widespread surveillance and spying operations in clear breach of global norms of responsible state behaviour.”

    “Keeping a clandestine tab on dissenting voices is a long-standing textbook ploy of the RSS-BJP regime to commit human rights atrocities in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) and peddle disinformation against Pakistan,” read the statement.

    “The world has seen the true face of the so-called Indian ‘democracy’. We are closely following these revelations and will bring the Indian abuses to the attention of appropriate global platforms.”

    The recent revelations by Pegasus Project show that the Indian government had targeted Prime Minister Imran Khan’s phone for surveillance in 2019. Analysis of the more than 1,000 mostly Indian phone numbers selected for potential targeting by using Pegasus spyware strongly indicates intelligence agencies within the Indian government were behind the selection.

  • Shah Mahmood says Dasu incident ‘accident’, Fawad Chaudhry says ‘terrorism can’t be ruled out’

    Shah Mahmood says Dasu incident ‘accident’, Fawad Chaudhry says ‘terrorism can’t be ruled out’

    Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi told his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi that the initial investigation into the bus tragedy near Dasu hydropower project in the Kohistan district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was not a consequence of a terrorist attack, according to a statement on China’s foreign ministry website reports Dawn.

    Nine Chinese nationals and three Pakistanis lost their lives on Wednesday in a blast that took place on the bus that was taking them to their workplace. They were going there for an ongoing project, as per a statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA). 

    “The Chinese side is shocked by the serious Chinese casualties in Pakistan, hoping that the Pakistani side could quickly find out its cause, conduct rescue and treatment work at all costs, deal with the aftermath in time, and prevent similar incidents from happening again,” read the statement.

    “If it is a terrorist attack, the criminals must be immediately arrested and severely punished,” said the Chinese ministry.

    Qureshi, on behalf of the government and the people of Pakistan, expressed sincere condolences to the Chinese side over the heavy Chinese casualties. He said that the preliminary investigation shows that the incident was “an accident and no background of terrorist attacks has been found.”

    However, Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry took to Twitter and said, “Initial investigations into Dassu incident have now confirmed traces of explosives, terrorism cannot be ruled out,” contradicting the statement by his party’s Foreign Minister.

    “Prime Minister Imran Khan is personally supervising all developments, in this regard Govt is in close coordination with the Chinese embassy we are committed to fighting the menace of terrorism together,” read the tweet.

  • VIDEO: US President Joe Biden stumbles twice while boarding Air Force One

    President of the United States of America Joe Biden stumbled three times while climbing the stairs to board Air Force One. The video of him losing his footing is being widely shared on social media.

    Boarding a flight to Atlanta, where he was to speak to the Asian-American community about a shooting there earlier this week, Biden stumbled slightly about halfway up the 25 or so stairs, recovered, then stumbled again and briefly went down on one knee, according to video footage.

    The president appeared to rub his left knee before getting back up, then completed the stairs at a slower pace. He stopped at the top of the stairs, turned around and offered a crisp salute.

    Following the incident, Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told White House reporters that the president was “doing fine” after the fall.

    “It was very windy. I almost fell coming up the steps myself. He is doing 100 percent,” she told reporters.

    “He’s doing fine. He’s preparing for the trip just fine,” she added.

    Biden’s stumbling has raised concerns about the 78-year-old President’s health, was the oldest person ever to assume the presidency. In late November, Biden suffered a hairline fracture in his right foot while playing with one of his dogs.

    In November 2020, Biden won an extremely close US election battle against former president Donald Trump. He was sworn in as the 46th President of the United States in January 2021.

  • Pakistan reacts to Indian claims of taking Kartarpur Gurdwara’s management away from Sikh body

    Pakistan reacts to Indian claims of taking Kartarpur Gurdwara’s management away from Sikh body

    Pakistan has firmly rejected the “baseless and fallacious” claims made by the Indian government against the Kartarpur Corridor, and the same have also been rejected by the Pakistan Sikh Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee (PSGPC).

    In a statement, Foreign Office (FO) Spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri has said that the malicious propaganda by the Indian government is simply an attempt to malign the peace corridor initiative.

    “The malicious propaganda by the Indian government is simply an attempt to malign the peace corridor initiative by casting mischievous aspersions against the interests of the Sikh community and to detract attention from the reprehensible violation of human rights of minorities in India,” he said.

    The FO said that it was no more than an Indian attempt to cast damaging accusations against the interests of the Sikh community and to detract attention from India’s own reprehensible human rights violations of minorities in India.

    Chaudri added that the PSGPC is responsible for carrying out rituals in Gurdwara Sahiban, including Kartarpur, as per Sikh Rehat Maryada.

    “Any insinuations regarding ‘transferring’ the affairs of Gurdwara Kartarpur Sahib from the PSGPC to the Project Management Unit (PMU) are not only contrary to the facts but are also aimed at creating religious disharmony by the Hindutva-driven government in India,” the FO spokesperson said.

    “The PMU, under the Evacuee Trust Property Board (ETPB), has simply been created to facilitate the committee in this regard,” he added.

    Chaudhri said that the Sikh community from all over the world remains greatly appreciative of the efforts made by Pakistan to complete the Kartarpur Corridor project in record time and for the excellent arrangements made to facilitate the pilgrims.

    “India would be well advised to take steps to protect its minorities and their places of worship, rather than feigning misleading and sham concerns for the rights of minorities elsewhere,” he said.

    INDIAN CLAIMS:

    India had on Thursday “highly condemned” Pakistan’s then alleged decision to transfer the management of the Kartarpur Sahib Gurdwara from PSGPC to a separate trust, saying the move ran against the religious sentiments of the Sikh community.

    The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) had said India received representations from the Sikh community expressing grave concern over the decision to transfer the management and maintenance of the gurudwara from the PSGPC to the administrative control of the ETPB.

    KARTARPUR SAHIB:

    Kartarpur Sahib Gurdwara is located in Pakistan’s Narowal district across Ravi, about four kilometres from the Dera Baba Nanak shrine.

    In November last year, the two countries threw open a corridor linking Dera Baba Sahib in Gurdaspur in India with Gurdwara Kartarpur Sahib in Pakistan, in a historic people-to-people initiative.

    The move was lauded by members of the Sikh community from all across the globe.

  • Saudi Arabia backstabbing Pakistan at FATF?

    Saudi Arabia backstabbing Pakistan at FATF?

    Foreign Office (FO) spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri has rejected “false media reports” regarding Saudi Arabia’s role in the assessment of Pakistan’s Financial Action Task Force (FATF) action plan.

    According to a press release, FO categorically rejected the story circulating on a segment of the media as false and baseless.

    Earlier in the day, Azhar Mashwani, Punjab chief minister’s focal person for digital media, tweeted that reports of Saudi Arabia voting against Pakistan at FATF were fake and that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs would issue a statement on this.

    “Pakistan and Saudi Arabia enjoy strong fraternal ties and the two countries have always cooperated with each other on all matters of bilateral, regional and international importance,” said the statement by the FO spokesperson.

    “Pakistan greatly values its relations with the brotherly Saudi Arabia and firmly rejects such malicious propaganda.”

    The statements come after renowned journalist, Sabir Shakir, claimed that Saudi Arabia had voted against Pakistan in the virtual plenary of the FATF.

    He had asserted that Saudi Arabia lobbied to woo the support of other Muslim countries including Turkey to move Pakistan into the blacklist of the global financial watchdog.

    FATF:

    According to Dawn, a virtual meeting of the FATF, from October 21-23, will decide if Pakistan should be excluded from its ‘grey list’, based on a review of Islamabad’s performance to meet global commitments and standards on fight against money laundering and terror financing (ML&TF).

    The FATF plenary was earlier scheduled in June but Islamabad got an unexpected breather after the global watchdog against financial crimes temporarily postponed all mutual evaluations and follow-up deadlines in the wake of grave health risk following COVID-19 pandemic. The Paris-based agency also put a general pause in the review process, thus giving additional four months to Pakistan to meet the requirements.

    The plenary had formally placed Pakistan in the grey list in June 2018 due to “strategic deficiencies” in anti-money laundering/combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) after a push from India supported by the United States (US), the United Kingdom (UK) and some European countries.

    The FATF will examine if the country had demonstrated remedial actions and sanctions applied in cases of AML/CFT violations, relating to terrorist financing (TF) risk management and TFS (terror financing sanctions) obligations.

    The FATF will also judge if competent authorities were cooperating and taking action to identify and taking enforcement action against illegal money or value transfer services (MVTS) and had proven implementation of cross-border currency and bearer negotiable instruments (BNI) controls at all ports of entry, including applying effective, proportionate and dissuasive sanctions.

  • Pakistan breaks silence on reports claiming its army is fighting Armenia alongside Azerbaijan

    Pakistan breaks silence on reports claiming its army is fighting Armenia alongside Azerbaijan

    Pakistan has refuted “irresponsible” reports claiming that Pakistan Army is fighting alongside Azerbaijani forces against Armenia in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

    According to reports, Foreign Office (FO) spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri said the reports were “speculative and baseless”.

    “Pakistan is deeply concerned over the deteriorating security situation in the Nagorno-Karabakh region,” Chaudhri said while reiterating Pakistan’s position on the conflict.

    The spokesperson also said that intensive shelling by Armenian forces on the civilian populations of Azerbaijan is reprehensible and most unfortunate.

    “This could compromise peace and security of the entire region. Armenia must stop its military action to avoid further escalation,” the spokesperson said.

    Chaudhri said that Pakistan supports Azerbaijan’s position on Nagorno-Karabakh, adding that the position was in line with the “several unanimously adopted United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions”.

    The statement comes as tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan forces continued to heighten despite the world’s calls for ceasefire.

    Armenia and Azerbaijan have been locked in a simmering conflict for decades over the region and new fighting that erupted on Sunday has been the heaviest in decades. Nearly 200 people, including 30 civilians, have died amid fears of a multi-front war that could suck in regional powers Turkey and Russia.

  • Pakistan condemns burning of Holy Quran at anti-Islam protests in Sweden, Norway

    Pakistan condemns burning of Holy Quran at anti-Islam protests in Sweden, Norway

    The Foreign Office on Sunday strongly condemned recent incidents in Sweden and Norway in which copies of the Holy Quran were reportedly burnt, saying that “freedom of speech can’t justify religious hatred”, Dawn reported.

    In a statement issued on Twitter, FO spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri further said:

    “The rise of such Islamophobic occurrences goes against the spirit of any religion.”

    “Ensuring respect for religious beliefs of others is a collective responsibility and is absolutely critical for global peace and prosperity,” Chaudhri added.

    A day earlier, a riot broke out in the southern Swedish town of Malmo, where at least 300 people had gathered to protest against anti-Islam activities, police said.

    Protesters were throwing objects at police officers and car tyres had been set on fire, a police spokesman said. Earlier in the day, a copy of the Quran had been burned in Malmo by right-wing extremists.

    The demonstrations had escalated in the same place where the Quran had been burned, the spokesman added.

    Daily Aftonbladet said several anti-Islam activities had taken place in Malmo on Friday, including three men kicking a copy of the Quran between them in a public square.

    Meanwhile, at an anti-Islam protest on Saturday in Oslo, Sweden — held by the far-right group Stop the Islamisation of Norway (SION) — a protester tore out pages of the Quran and spat on them, Anadolu Agency reported.

  • Qureshi leaves for ‘very important’ China visit to represent Pakistan’s civil, military stance

    Qureshi leaves for ‘very important’ China visit to represent Pakistan’s civil, military stance

    Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi has left for a two-day visit to China to attend the second round of the China-Pakistan Foreign Ministers’ Strategic Dialogue, a statement from the Foreign Office said on Thursday.

    In a video message released before his departure, the foreign minister said he was going on a “very important trip to China” and that he had a discussion with Prime Minister (PM) Imran Khan before leaving.

    “I am leaving on a very important visit to China. I had a discussion with the prime minister regarding this visit yesterday. My delegation will represent the stance of the political and military leadership of the country. I am hopeful that my meeting with Foreign Minister Wang Yi will prove to be beneficial for both countries,” Qureshi said.

    WATCH VIDEO:

    Qureshi, who is accompanied by senior officials, will visit China’s Hainan province where he will lead the Pakistani delegation in the dialogue, the FO statement added. He is scheduled to return tomorrow (Aug 21).

    State Councillor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi will lead the Chinese side during the dialogue, according to the statement.

    “During the dialogue, both sides will discuss cooperation on COVID-19, bilateral relations and regional and international issues of mutual interest,” the FO said.

    “The visit will play an important role in further strengthening Pakistan-China ‘All-Weather Strategic Cooperative Partnership’ and deepen strategic communication and coordination with China on a range of issues.”

    The first round of the China-Pakistan Foreign Ministers’ Strategic Dialogue took place in March 2019 in which both sides vowed to protect the $60 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) from “all kinds of threats”.

    Reports emerging on Wednesday suggested the foreign minister will “hold meetings with his Chinese counterpart and senior leadership while important decisions will be taken regarding the visit of the Chinese president to Pakistan.”

    He was also expected to call upon Chinese President Xi Jinping during the trip.

    The trip comes after PM Imran, earlier this week, said it should be clear that Islamabad’s future is tied to Beijing which has stood by Pakistan through thick and thin.

    Speaking to senior journalist Kamran Khan during a wide-ranging interview, he said that both countries recognised each other’s importance and were further strengthening mutual ties. “Unfortunately, western countries are using India against China,” he added.

    The premier also said that Chinese President Xi Jinping was scheduled to visit Pakistan in May this year but his visit was delayed due to the coronavirus outbreak. “His visit is now expected towards the end of the year.”