NEW DELHI: India has lodged a strong protest with Turkey over President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s recent remarks on Kashmir during his visit to Pakistan last week.
“We reject such objectionable comments on matters that are internal to India. We have lodged a strong protest with the Turkish ambassador. Such unwarranted statements on India’s territorial integrity and sovereignty are unacceptable. Jammu and Kashmir is an integral part of India,” External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said.
Last week, Erdogan following his talks with Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif had said: “The Kashmir issue should be addressed according to the UN resolution through dialogue and keeping in mind the aspirations of the people of Kashmir... our state and our nation, as in the past, stands in solidarity with our Kashmiri brothers today.”
India’s stated position is that Kashmir is a bilateral issue where any third party has no role to play.
Meanwhile, during his recent meeting with Bangladesh interim government’s foreign affairs advisor Touhid Hossain in Muscat, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar conveyed that Bangladesh “should not normalise terrorism,” the spokesperson said.
The two leaders met on the sidelines of the 8th Indian Ocean Conference (IOC) in the Omani capital last week, where Hossain urged Jaishankar to consider convening a meeting of the SAARC Standing Committee.