EAM S Jaishankar makes veiled attack on Pak, calls them 'exporter of terrorism'

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Friday, precisely exposing Pakistan and its malice said that the states that have terrorism as its primary export are painting themselves as victims of terror. While addressing the Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), Jaishankar described terrorism as cancer and compared terrorism to the pandemic which affects the world at large.

“We have long known intellectually that terrorism is a Cancer that potentially affects everyone just as pandemics potentially impact all humanity. And yet in both cases, globalised focus response to either challenge have tended to emerge only when there has been sufficient disruption created by a spectacular event," he said.

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Terrorism as destructive as contagious virus

Jaishankar asserted that the world has countermeasures in place after witnessing the catastrophic acts of terrorism such as the 9/11 attack on the world trade centre in the US and the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack.

"19 years from the tragedy of 9/11 and 12 years from our own 26/11, we have today a range of mechanisms in place to contend with terrorists," he said.

He elaborated on the various control measures implemented by world body such as the United Nations to counter the terrorism across the world, however, highlighting the fact that it still lacks comprehensive measures due to some of its foundational redundant principles.

"These include the FATFs, various UN Sanctions Committees and the Counter-Terrorism Executive Directorate but we still lack a comprehensive convention on international terrorism with the membership of the UN still wrestling with certain foundational principles. All the while states that have turned the production of terrorists into a primary export have attempted by the dint of blind denials to paint themselves also as victims of terror,” he added.

Making reference to Pakistan without naming the terror-sponsoring nation, Jaishankar said the measures put in place have compelled the complicit state to acknowledge the presence of terrorists operating from its soil. 

“It has eventually compelled a state complicit in aiding, abetting, training and directing terror groups and associated criminal syndicates to grudgingly acknowledge the presence of wanted terrorists and organised crime leaders on its territory,” Jaishankar said.

He pointed out that terrorism and contagious virus such as Coronavirus are both destructive in nature and its effects cannot be localised or contained in one place while keeping other places safe, as he seemingly hinted at the failure of the World Health Organisation to recognise the magnanimity of COVID-19 so as to stop the virus from becoming a pandemic.

“If it took a heinous attack using passenger aircraft as weapons of mass destruction to underscore the age of terror, it has similarly taken a lethally contagious virus to trigger a pandemic that has brought the world to its knees,” he said, adding, “This time, however, the international warning systems, reporting protocols and response mechanisms were unable to prevent the spread beyond ground zero.”

(With PTI inputs)

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