Adnan Yaqoob

Islamabad: Amb. Hamad Obaid Ibrahim Salem Al-Zaabi, Ambassador of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), called on the Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif at the Prime Minister House today.

During the meeting, the Prime Minister conveyed his warm wishes to His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, President of the UAE and thanked the UAE for its unwavering support to Pakistan, which bore testament to the historic, deep-rooted, fraternal ties between the two countries.

The Prime Minister shared Pakistan’s perspective on recent developments in South Asia since the Pahalgam incident. He said Pakistan condemned terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, as it had itself been one of the biggest victims of terrorism. Citing the enormous sacrifices in terms of 90,000 casualties and over USD 152 billion in economic losses over the years, the Prime Minister said the country was dealing with the menace of terrorism emanating from its western front. India’s recent actions and its aggressive posture was distracting Pakistan from its counter-terrorism efforts.

The Prime Minister categorically rejected the baseless accusations leveled by India in its desperate attempts to link Pakistan to the Pahalgam incident, without any evidence. He said Pakistan had nothing to do with this and emphasized that he had offered to have a credible, transparent and neutral international investigation into the incident. He shared that Pakistan was reaching out to other friendly countries to present its position on the current crisis.

While emphasizing that his Government was focused on consolidating the hard-earned economic gains of the past fifteen months, which had been made possible by the support of friendly countries including the UAE, the Prime Minister said Pakistan would never take such an action that could imperil regional peace and security.

In this regard, the Prime Minister urged brotherly countries, including the UAE to impress upon India to de-escalate and defuse tensions. He reaffirmed Pakistan’s desire for peace and stability in South Asia.

The UAE Ambassador thanked the Prime Minister for sharing Pakistan’s position and said that the UAE would work closely with Pakistan for maintaining regional peace and security.