By Imran Nasir

ISLAMABAD (TSAT) Pakistan on Tuesday rejected as “delusional” remarks of an Indian minister’s claim of integrating Pakistan occupied Kashmir into India by 2024.

“Pakistan rejects the utterly delusional and provocative remarks made by a BJP minister hoping for the ‘integration’ of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) in India under the incumbent Indian government,” FO spokesman Asim Iftikhar said in a statement.

The Indian Union Minister of state for Panvhayati Raj Kapil Patil said during a speech to public event in Maharashtra’s Thane district on Saturday that Azad Kashmir would be integrated into India by 2024.

“Hope Pakistan-Occupied Kash­mir is integrated in India by 2024 as these things can be done only by PM (Narendra) Modi. For this we’ll have to come out of (the mindset for) potato, onions, pulses,”

The Pakistani Foreign Office spokesman said Indian politicians commonly especially BJP -RSS dragged Pakistan into their domestic politics for diverting public attention from major issues and boosting hyper-nationalism and ultimately making electoral gains.

“They would be well-advised to desist from indulging in absurd fantasies and to actually take cognizance of the grave situation on ground in the Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir,” Iftikhar added.

Mr Iftikhar said that after the annexation of Occupied Jammu and Kashmir on Aug 5, 2019, under the BJP-RSS dispensation the Kashmiris’ resistance to Indian occupation has continued to strengthen.

“The BJP ministers would do well to remind themselves that Jammu and Kashmir is an internationally recognised dispute on the agenda of the UN Security Council whose numerous resolutions stipulate that the final disposition of the State of Jammu and Kashmir will be made in accordance with the will of the people expressed through the democratic method of a free and impartial plebiscite conducted under the auspices of the United Nations,” Iftikhar added.

The FO spokesperson said that  India have to vacate the occupied territories and face accountability for the human rights excesses committed by its troops in Occupied Jammu and Kashmir instead of “entertaining any notions of aggrandizement”.

“Pakistan will continue to extend all possible support to the Kashmiri people in their just struggle to realize the legitimate right to self-determination, as pledged to them under the relevant UN Security Council resolutions.” Iftikhar added