ISLAMABAD, Prime Minister Imran Khan has said that the West is ignoring the atrocities in Kashmir with hundreds and thousands of Kashmiris been killed by the Indian troops.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is such a big issue in the western world as why are the people of Kashmir ignored,\u201d the prime minister said in an interview with Jonathan Swan of Axios on HBO aired on Monday.<\/p>\n
The prime minister said the Kashmir issue was \u201cmuch more relevant\u201d where 800,000 Indian troops had literally put the nine million Kashmiris under jail.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy is this not an issue?\u201d he said, referring to the apathy of the West towards the plight of Kashmiri people facing the humanitarian crisis for decades.<\/p>\n
On Islamophobia, the prime minister termed a \u201cbig communication gap\u201d between the Islamic world and the western societies as the main reason.<\/p>\n
He said after 9\/11, the term \u2018Islamic terrorism\u2019 was coined that misguided people in the West who started believing that Islam led to terrorism.<\/p>\n
He pointed that with involvement of a few Muslims in terrorist activities, the entire 1.3 billion Muslim community became the target.<\/p>\n
Asked about \u201cdoing vastly better than the United States\u201d on COVID-19, the prime minister said partial lockdown coupled with comprehensive data analysis helped his government keep the pandemic in control.<\/p>\n
Smart lockdown was the \u201cbest decision\u201d to cope with the situation, he added.<\/p>\n
Imran Khan recalled that with people in Spain and Italy ending up in hospitals as COVID-19 raged through Europe, there was a big temptation by the politicians from Opposition for a total lockdown. However, he said, he opted for smart lockdown given the problems of poor.<\/p>\n
He mentioned that an effective working of the Command and Control Centre with daily data monitoring and input by provinces, army, doctors and health specialists helped the government handle the situation.<\/p>\n
Prime Minister Imran Khan categorically said that Pakistan would \u201cabsolutely not\u201d allow any bases and use of its territory for any sort of action inside Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
\u201cAbsolutely Not. There is no way we are going to allow any bases, any sort of action from Pakistani territory into Afghanistan. Absolutely not,\u201d he said, in response to the question if he would allow the American government to have CIA conduct counter-terrorism missions in Pakistan against Al-Qaeda ISIS or the Taliban.<\/p>\n
Recently, in his address at Senate, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi ruled out the possibility of providing its military bases to the United States for counterterrorism operations in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
He rejected as unfounded the reports to this effect and made it clear that the government would never provide military bases to the US, nor would allow drone attacks inside Pakistan.<\/p>\n
Information Minister Chaudhry Fawad Hussain in a cabinet press briefing had also ruled out the possibility of any airbase of the United States in Pakistan saying as all such facilities were under Pakistan\u2019s own use.<\/p>\n
He made it clear that it was the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)-led government which ended \u2018drone surveillance\u2019 facility given to the US in the past.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll the airbases are under the use of Pakistan. Right now, no negotiations in this regard are underway as Pakistan cannot give any airbase [to any country],\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
ISLAMABAD, Prime Minister Imran Khan has said that the West is ignoring the atrocities in Kashmir with hundreds and thousands of Kashmiris been killed by the Indian troops. \u201cThis is such a big issue in the western world as why are the people of Kashmir […]<\/p>\n
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