ISLAMABAD: The Foreign Office insisted on Thursday that Turkiye’s stance on the Kashmir dispute remains unchanged despite President Recep Tayyip Erdogan skipping its mention during his speech at the United Nations General Assembly.

“We should not draw any undue inferences from one statement,” Foreign Office spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch said at the weekly media briefing while responding to a question.

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In a notable departure from previous years, President Erdogan omitted the Kashmir issue from his latest United Nations General Assembly address. Turkiye has, over the years, been a vocal supporter of the Kashmir cause, with President Erdogan having regularly spoken about it at the UNGA session since 2019, when India annexed the occupied territory.

Therefore, Mr Erdogan’s omission of Kashmir from his UNGA speech on Tuesday is being interpreted as a change in Turkiye’s stance on the dispute. It is believed that Kashmir’s omission reflected Turkiye’s growing interest in strengthening ties with India, particularly in the economic sphere. Moreover, it aligns with Turkiye’s aspirations to join the BRICS grouping, where India plays a key role.

Says attack on diplomatic convoy in Swat being probed

Ms Baloch argued that Turkiye has “a consistent and principled position” on the dispute. She pointed out that Turkiye had endorsed the joint communiqué of the OIC Contact Group on Kashmir, which met on Wednesday in New York on the sidelines of UNGA.

The OIC Contact Group on Kashmir reaffirmed its support for the Kashmiri people’s rights and freedoms and condemned actions, such as banning Kashmiri political parties and confiscating properties. It urged India to respect UN resolutions and the aspirations of the Kashmiri people.

The group further emphasised that local elections in India-held Jammu and Kashmir cannot replace the right to self-determination as outlined by UN Security Council resolutions.

Besides a reference to the OIC group’s comment on local elections in Occupied Jammu and Kashmir on Wednesday, held after a decade, the spokesperson did not speak about the polls.

India had invited foreign diplomats from 15 countries to observe the elections.

Ms Baloch suggested that foreign diplomats based in Pakistan were not subject to new travel restrictions outside their posted cities after the attack on a diplomats’ convoy near Swat last Sunday. However, she hoped that they would heed the host government’s travel advice to ensure their safety and security.

Swat attack

“We encourage foreign diplomats to explore Pakistan and to follow the guidelines that have been shared with them on several occasions regarding their travel to any part of Pakistan,” she said.

A policeman lost his life in the attack, but all diplomats had remained safe.

“We are also in the process of developing guidelines to ensure that such incidents do not happen again,” she said while recalling that lapses on the part of the tour organisers — the Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry — were noted and that Foreign Office and other government agencies were investigating the matter.

Published in Dawn, September 27th, 2024