Pakistan PM Rules Out Importing Food From India Due to Kashmir Dispute Despite Devastating Floods

[Abdul Rehman Majeed]

Pakistan PM Rules Out Importing Food From India Due to Kashmir Dispute Despite Devastating Floods​

Yesterday

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Islamabad has said floods have adversely impacted more than two million acres of agricultural land. Facing an imminent food crisis, Pakistan has sought onion and tomato imports from Iran, Afghanistan, and the UAE. Additionally, the UN-backed World Food Program (WFP) has intensified efforts to deliver aid to the nation.
Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has rejected the possibility of importing food items from India, a day after Finance Minister Miftah Ismail stated that trade routes with the country's neighbor would be opened to meet the shortages caused by the devastating floods.

Addressing a press briefing with representatives of foreign media on Tuesday evening, Sharif linked the “problems in trading” with India to New Delhi’s decision to scrap the semi-autonomous status of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir in 2019.
Islamabad downgraded its diplomatic and commercial ties with New Delhi over the decision and has said hat it would only resume exchanges once the Indian government rolls back its move in Jammu and Kashmir.
“Kashmir has been forcibly annexed through abolition of Article 370,” Sharif said, referring to the Indian Constitution’s revoked provision that temporarily granted the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir its semi-autonomous status, which had been in place since 1954 before being rolled back in 2019.

“I am ready to sit and talk with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. We cannot afford war. We will have to dedicate our meager resources for alleviating poverty in our respective countries but we cannot live in peace without resolving these issues,” the Pakistani prime minister stated.
New Delhi has consistently rejected Islamabad’s criticism of its 2019 decision and has maintained that anything that has got to do with Jammu and Kashmir is an “internal matter” of India.
“We shouldn’t be doing politics at this point but it is a fact that minority rights are being subjugated in India,” the Pakistani PM argued, referring to Islamabad’s oft-repeated claim that Prime Minister Modi’s government was trying to alter the demography of the predominantly-Muslim Jammu and Kashmir.
He added that peace in the subcontinent could only happen through “sensible actions,” as the Pakistani leader tried to put the onus of the current stalemate in India-Pakistan ties on New Delhi.
Separately, Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari told reporters at a press briefing on Tuesday that there were currently no plans to resume cross-border trade with India.
Bhutto’s remarks were made at the launch of the "2022 Pakistan Floods Response Plan," a joint effort with the United Nations (UN).
The clarification on the possibility of food imports from India comes against the backdrop of crippling food shortages being experienced in Pakistan owing to the flood situation.
Bhutto underlined that the floods have affected more than 33 million people and resulted in the deaths of over 1,100 across the country.
More than two million homes have been damaged owing to the floods. At least 24 people have been killed in the last 24 hours, Pakistani media reported on Wednesday.
The government has said that the reconstruction efforts could easily cost the country over $10 billion.

https://sputniknews.com/20220831/pakistan-pm-rules-out-importing-food-from-india-due-to-kashmir-dispute-despite-devastating-floods-1100204309.html