India rips Pakistan's 'preposterous' allegation dishonouring victims' memory
United Nations, Sep 30 : India has denounced Pakistan's "preposterous" attempt to exploit and dishonour the memory of the innocent victims of the 2014 Peshawar school massacre by making false allegations against New Delhi.
"The despicable insinuation made by the Foreign Minister of Pakistan (Shah Mahmood Qureshi) dishonors the memory of the innocent lives lost to terrorists that day," Eenam Gambhir, an Indian diplomat, told the General Assembly on Saturday denouncing Qureshi's claim that India was behind the attack that was carried out by the Pakistan Taliban.
"It is a desperate attempt to look away from the monster of terror that Pakistan itself has created in its quest to destabilise neighbours and covet their territory," she said while exercising the right of reply to his speech.
"Let me recollect for the new government of Pakistan the outpouring of sorrow and pain in India that followed the massacre of innocent children in 2014.
"Both houses of India's Parliament had expressed solidarity while paying respect to the memory of those killed (and) schools all over India had observed two minutes of silence in their memory," the counsellor in India's UN mission said.
Qureshi spoke at the General Assembly after India's External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj had delivered a scathing attack on Islamabad for promoting terrorism in the region and warning the world of a conflagration if it did not act against the sponsors and protectors of terrorists.
He tried to portray Pakistan as a victim of terrorism and made the claim about the Peshawar incident.
He also dragged in Kulbhushan Jadhav, an Indian that Pakistan's military courts have in violation of accepted legal norms sentenced to death on spying charges.
New Delhi has said that he did not work with India's intelligence services and had been kidnapped and falsely accused. With a fact-check, Gambhir challenged Qureshi's claim that Pakistan was making headway against terrorists.
"Can Pakistan deny the fact that it is the host and patron of 132 of the UN designated terrorists and 22 terrorist entities sanctioned under the 1267 and 1988 UN Security Council sanctions regimes as of today?" she asked.
Those Council resolutions known by their numbers impose sanctions on Islamic State, Al Qaeda, and associated individuals, groups, undertakings and entities.
"Will Pakistan deny that the UN designated terrorist Hafez Saeed enjoys a free run inside Pakistan, spews venom and sets up candidates for electoral offices," she challenged Qureshi.
Saeed is the mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai attack by the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) that killed 164 people, the 2006 Mumbai train bombings and the 2001 attack on Indian Parliament.
He is the co-founder of the LeT and the chief of Jama'at-ud-Da'wah (JuD) and an internationally designated terrorist with a US bounty or $10 million.
India had canceled the proposed talks between Qureshi and Swaraj in New York after three Indian security personnel were killed by terrorists.
Gambhir said that Qureshi "chose to term the gruesome killing of our security personnel by Pakistan-sponsored terrorists as flimsy ground" for calling off the talks.
"While it may not be the case for Pakistan, for India every loss of life counts," she said. "Hence our belief that talks and terror cannot go together."
Gambhir said that Pakistan's attempts to be a champion of human rights "is vintage verbal duplicity".
"It is evident from the recent example of Princeton economist Professor Atif Mian's apointment and removal from economic advisory council of Pakistan on grounds that he belongs to a minority," she said.
Gambhir also took issue with Qureshi citing the report on Kashmir presented by Zeid Ra'ad Al-Hussein, the former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
It was "a report no member state had asked for and none supported and on which no action was taken", she said.
"Let me make it clear to the new government of Pakistan that the entire state of Jammu and Kashmir is and will remain an integral part of India," she declared.
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B'desh: Lawyer killed in clash between security personnel, followers of Hindu leader
Dhaka, Nov 26: A lawyer was killed on Tuesday during clashes between the security personnel and followers of a Hindu community leader, who was denied bail and sent to jail by a Bangladesh court, according to local media reports.
The victim was identified as Saiful Islam, a 35-year-old assistant public prosecutor and a member of the Chattogram District Bar Association, the Dhaka Tribune newspaper reported.
Citing Dr Nibedita Ghosh, a duty doctor at the emergency department of Chittagong Medical College Hospital, the paper said that six others were injured in the clashes that erupted after Chattogram’s Sixth Metropolitan Magistrate court denied bail to prominent Hindu leader Chinmoy Krishna Das Brahmachari, arrested on sedition charges.
Nazim Uddin Chowdhury, president of the Chittagong Lawyers' Association, said that protesters dragged a lawyer from beneath his chamber and hacked him to death.
As Das was being taken away in a police van, he addressed the crowd through a hand mike, urging them to remain calm.
Around 3 pm, the law enforcement agencies resorted to sound grenades, tear gas shells, and baton charges, dispersing the protesters.
Deputy Commissioner of City Police Liaquat Ali confirmed one death but said they were still investigating the cause.
The Daily Star newspaper reported that at least 10 people, including journalists, were injured during the clash.
