The world seems too distracted by the Ukraine War and the Christmas season to have noticed the nuclear sabre-rattling by a near-bankrupt Pakistan against its thriving neighbour India. This was made worse on Wednesday when Islamabad allegedly sent armed terrorists across the border into the Indian State of Jammu and Kashmir.
Four terrorists were killed in an encounter with Indian security forces near the town of Sidhra; after a gunfight erupted around 7:30 a.m. after reinforcements were rushed to the area to “neutralize the terrorists,” according to police.
Indian News Agency ANI reported the shooting began after Indian Security forces intercepted a truck for a regular roadside check. As soon as the truck was stopped, terrorists hiding inside it opened fire. Indian security present at the spot retaliated to the gunfire, immediately killing the three terrorists on the spot. The truck caught fire in the gun battle.
Seven AK-47 rifles, three pistols along with other ammunition were recovered. The truck owner is yet to be identified; it was going from Jammu to Srinagar.
This wasn’t an isolated incident on the Pakistan-India border.
Earlier on Monday, another terrorist was arrested in the Mendhar division in Jammu and Kashmir’s Poonch area in a joint search operation by police and the Indian Army.
Police said the alleged terrorist, Tayab Khan, was asked to stop by security forces while he was coming from a forested area.
And on Christmas Day, terrorists opened fire, targeting a civilian in the town of Shopian.
Senior police officers rushed to the spot on receiving the information. Preliminary investigation, according to police, revealed the terrorists had fired on a civilian, identified as Waseem Ahmad Wani, a resident of the Burihalan Heerpora area of Shopian in South Kashmir.
Had these been isolated incidents, one could ignore them as a natural outcome of a tense border between two countries that have gone to war many times since both were granted independence from Great Britain in 1947.
But in the context of Pakistan’s near-bankrupt economy, armed separatist insurrection in Balochistan and the absence of mature politicians, the clashes come in the shadow of nuclear sabre rattling by Pakistani politicians.
Just days after Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari referred to India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi as the “Butcher of Gujarat,” one of his party’s leaders, Shania Marri, threatened New Delhi with nuclear war.
In an interview with Bol News, Marri said “India should not forget that Pakistan has an atom bomb Our nuclear status is not meant to remain silent. We will not back down if the need arises.”
She threatened India, saying if the [Narendra] Modi government fought, he would get the answer. Boasting about Islamabad’s nuclear arsenal, she said, “The status of a nuclear state given to Pakistan has not been given to remain silent. Pakistan also knows how to answer.
“If you will keep making allegations against Pakistan again and again, Pakistan cannot keep listening silently; this will not happen,” she added.
Such threats of a nuclear attack on India were previously made in August 2019 by Pakistan’s former prime minister, the controversial Imran Khan, in an online op-ed in the New York Times.
Khan, who is currently embroiled in alleged scandals involving extra-marital affairs and the profiteering from the sale of three gifted watches, including a Rolex Platinum watch gifted by a member of an Arab royal family that he sold and profited for Rs.5.2 million (85,000 CDN).
With the nuclear button in the hands of such immature and incompetent individuals, who believe in all sincerity that true life for Muslims begins after they die, the border clashes in the name of Islam and Allah to eradicate all Hindus, Sikhs and Jains as outlined in the doctrine of “Ghazwa-e-Hind” (Islamic holy war to wipe out Hindus from India), we seem to have not learnt a single lesson from the 9/11 attacks or the assault on Mumbai by jihadi Pakistanis backed by their intelligence agency the ISI. The creation of the Taliban to destroy Afghanistan.
The zeal with which the Pakistani jihadi military let loose during the Bangladesh Genocide in 1970-71 and the current military action against freedom fighters in Balochistan and the Pushtun populated areas bordering Afghanistan should be a warning to the rest of the world that if this country and its military are not kept in check, a nuclear war imposed on the rest of us will happen.
The contrived self-righteousness of Pakistan’s Islamic posturing should be seen for what it is: Nuclear blackmail by a tottering state that resembles Sri Lanka before the island’s bankruptcy. Except for the fact, Sri Lanka was not capable of nuclear blackmail, while Pakistan has a track record of doing just that.
Ottawa once had a role in facilitating Pakistan’s entrance to the nuclear club. It is now our responsibility to pull the reins and warn Islamabad of the consequences of nuclear sabre rattling.
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