Congress MP Shashi Tharoor said that China is an “absolutely impossible factor to ignore” in the India-Pakistan conflict
Congress MP Shashi Tharoor said that China is an “absolutely impossible factor to ignore” in the India-Pakistan conflict. He noted that India’s relations with China were “seemingly making good progress” until the conflict with Pakistan arose.
Shashi Tharoor is currently leading a multi-party parliamentary delegation to the US. He spoke about these things during an interaction with people from think tanks at the Indian Embassy.
Congress MP Tharoor Speaks About China’s Role
Tharoor said, “I’m not going to mince my words, but we are aware that China has immense stakes in Pakistan.”
Tharoor said that the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is the largest single project under the Belt and Road Initiative. He also said that 81 percent of Pakistani defence supplies are from China.
He said, “Defence may be the wrong word here. Offense in many ways.”
“China is an absolutely impossible factor to ignore in what has been our confrontation with Pakistan,” Tharoor then said.
He then said, “…we had actually begun a thaw with China in September of last year, which was seemingly making good progress before this tragedy occurred.”
“We have no illusions about what the challenges are in our neighbourhood, but I want to remind you all that India has consistently chosen a path of keeping open channels of communication, even with our adversaries,” he also said.
“We have tried as much as possible to focus on development, on growth, on trade. Our trade with China is still at record levels. It’s not that we are adopting a posture of hostility, but we would be naive not to be aware of these other currents around,” Tharoor also said.
The press statement read, “The members of the Security Council underlined the need to hold perpetrators, organisers, financiers and sponsors of this reprehensible act of terrorism accountable and bring them to justice.”
Tharoor’s Earlier Statements On China
Earlier in the day, he also stated, “Frankly, the reassessment took place while the fighting was going on.”
“…So, it’s clear that assessments were taking place while the fighting was happening, and we were recalibrating our strategies in order to end as effectively as we were able to end,” he said.
Tharoor added, “The fact is China has immense stakes in Pakistan, the largest single project on the Belt and Road Initiative is the one in Pakistan – the China- Pakistan Economic Corridor. So we have no illusions about the degree of commitment that China may well be feeling towards Pakistan.”
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