MIRPUR: President Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) Masood Khan dismissed India’s objections to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) as fake and disingenuous.
The AJK president debunked India’s objections to CPEC while addressing a one-day international seminar on ‘Belt and Road Initiative: CPEC and regional integration’ organised by The Institute of International and Cultural Affairs late Saturday.
Masood questioned, ‘’Having occupied one part of Jammu and Kashmir territory, now it [India] stakes claim of ‘sovereignty’ to Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Kashmir, under what law?’’
He said the territory does not belong to India.
“Is India worried because it has moved its 700,000 troops to the Indian Occupied Kashmir to maintain its illegal occupation in Jammu and Kashmir? Or is it concerned that the people of Gilgit-Baltistan, Azad Kashmir and Pakistan will become prosperous? Or does its anxiety stem from the fear that Kashmir will be internationalised?” he asked the nuclear armed neighbour.
Masood said there was no easy way to assuage India’s concerns over the territories. India was not a stakeholder in Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Kashmir; it never was, it was known in the region as an occupier and denier of the right to self-determination of the people of Jammu and Kashmir, he told the audience of the seminar.
“The Belt and Road Initiative is an undertaking with no precedent, its scale is massive, the BRI is the most ambitious global development plan in history,” he said.
The AJK president said the ‘Belt’ comprised a series of land corridors linking China with Europe through Central Asia and the Middle East, while the ‘Road’ was a maritime route linking China’s ports to Africa, and though the Mediterranean to Europe.
