Against 'Terroristan', Intense Indian Diplomacy At UN

NEW DELHI. The annual high level segment of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), beginning on the third Monday of September, is traditionally a period of intense diplomatic activity, packed with meetings and networking. It is also the time when Indian and Pakistani rhetorical wrangling over Kashmir, particularly terrorism reaches its peak.

- Nilova Roy Chaudhury

This year was much the same with India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj packing in around 20 bilateral meetings and a host of trilateral and multi-lateral engagements during her week-long visit to New York for the 72nd UNGA, which began September 18.

The underlying message of most of her engagement was the need for concerted global action against terrorism, which mostly emanates from Pakistan. She repeatedly emphasized India’s core concern that Pakistan must be censured and isolated for global terrorism to end. Words were not minced and Islamabad was flayed for being “Terroristan,” a quantum leap from being called the fountainhead of “terror inc” at last year’s UNGA.

“The horror of terrorism continues to haunt global peace and security,” Ms. Swaraj said at the BRICS ministerial meeting. While none of the BRICS heads of government attended this year’s UNGA, the Doklam incident between India and China did not appear to have had any fallout on these meetings, in which terrorism was roundly condemned and sponsor states warned.

It is highly significant that all the five permanent members of the UNSC have, since the Heart of Asia conference in Amritsar in December 2016, now named and acknowledged the presence of terrible terrorist outfits in Pakistan. Islamabad’s closest ally and mentor, Beijing, also allowed such a statement to be adopted at the BRICS summit in Xiamen last month.

“Terror groups draw sustenance from support systems in South Asia,” India’s foreign minister said, adding that militants continued to find shelter in countries using terrorism as an “instrument of state policy.”