United Nations (PTI): In a strong response to Pakistan, India has said in the UN General Assembly that a country that claims to seek peace with its neighbours would never sponsor cross-border terrorism nor would it shelter planners of the horrific Mumbai terrorist attack, disclosing their existence only under pressure from the global community.

India exercised the Right of Reply in the UN General Assembly on Friday to respond sharply to Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who had raked up the issue of Jammu and Kashmir during his address to the high-level General Debate earlier in the day.

It is regrettable that the Prime Minister of Pakistan has chosen the platform of this august assembly to make false accusations against India, First Secretary in the Permanent Mission of India to the UN Mijito Vinito said in the Right of Reply.

He has done so to obfuscate misdeeds in his own country and to justify actions against India that the world considers unacceptable, the young Indian diplomat said.

In his address, Sharif reiterated that Pakistan wants to have peace with India but added that long-lasting, enduring peace can only be insured and guaranteed through a just and fair solution to the issue of Kashmir under the UN Charter and Security Council resolutions.

India responded that a polity that claims it seeks peace with its neighbours would never sponsor cross-border terrorism, nor would it shelter planners of the horrific Mumbai terrorist attack, disclosing their existence only under pressure from the international community.

Vinito said such a country would not make unjustified and untenable territorial claims against neighbours, it would not covet their lands and seek to illegally integrate them with its own.

But it is not just about the neighbourhood that we have heard false claims today. It is about human rights, about minority rights and about basic decencies, he said.

When young women in the thousands from the minority community are abducted as an SoP (Standard Operating Procedure) what can we conclude about the underlying mindset?

India asserted that the desire for peace, security and progress in the Indian subcontinent is real. It is also widely shared and it can be realised.

That will surely happen when cross-border terrorism ceases, when governments come clean with the international community and with their own people. When minorities are not persecuted and not least, when we recognise these realities before this Assembly.

Pakistan then exercised its Right of Reply in response to the comments by India.

Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.



Ranchi (PTI): Tribal icon Birsa Munda's great-grandson Mangal Munda, who was undergoing treatment at a hospital here after being injured in a road accident, died of "cardiovascular failure" on Friday, an official of the health facility said.

He was 45.

Mangal Munda breathed his last at 12.30 am at the state's apex health facility - Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences.

Munda sustained severe head injuries after he fell from the roof of a passenger vehicle in Jharkhand's Khunti district on November 25.

"Birsa Munda's kin Mangal Munda died of cardiovascular failure around 12.30 am. He was on a ventilator after being critically injured. We tried our best to save him but failed," RIMS Medical Superintendent Dr Hiren Birua told PTI.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's office, Union Health Minister JP Nadda and the Jharkhand Chief Minister's office were in touch with the RIMS authorities in connection with Munda's treatment.