India under Prime Minister Narendra Modi would be better placed to find a solution to the Kashmir issue, feels Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan.
According to Khan, there may be a better chance of peace talks with India if Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s BJP wins the Indian general election, reports Dawn newspaper.
Khan said that if the next government were led by the Congress party, “it might be too scared to seek a settlement with Pakistan” over Kashmir, “fearing a backlash from the right”. “Perhaps if the BJP — a right-wing party — wins, some kind of settlement in Kashmir could be reached,” Khan told a small group of foreign journalists in an interview.
The Pakistan PM said Modi, like Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, was electioneering based on “fear and nationalist feeling”.
Whatever may the sceptics say the Balakot air-strike has got its impact. In the interview, Khan did seem to suggest that Islamabad was determined to dismantle all Pakistan-based terrorist outfits and that the government had full support from Pakistan’s powerful army for the programme. Those to be dismantled include groups involved in Kashmir, according to the Dawn report.
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