LONDON: Pakistan defence minister Khawaja Asif has admitted on Sky Information that Pakistan harbours and funds terror organisations, saying that it has been “doing the West’s soiled work for many years”.
He additionally stated the Pakistan-based terror teams are “not a number of organisations” however “one single organisation religiously organised with completely different faces”.
When requested by Sky’s Yalda Hakim on Thursday night time whether or not he admitted Pakistan has an extended historical past of backing, funding and coaching terror organisations, Asif replied: “Now we have been doing this soiled work for the USA for about three many years and for the West, together with Britain. That was a mistake and we suffered for that. If we had not joined the battle in opposition to the Soviet Union and the battle after 9/11, Pakistan’s observe document was unimpeachable.”
Asif stated that his nation would reply “in variety” to any assault by nuclear rival New Delhi in retaliation for Pahalgam and referred to as on US President Donald Trump to “convey sanity to the scenario”.
“Now we have already ready for it — any eventuality that takes place. We are going to measure our response to no matter is initiated by India. If there’s an all-out assault clearly there can be all-out battle.”
He stated terror teams in Pakistan have been “used as proxies by the USA”, and earlier the identical terror teams had been handled like VIPs in Washington. “Once we have been combating the battle on their aspect within the ’80s in opposition to the Soviet Union, all these terrorists of at the moment, they have been wining and eating in Washington. Then got here 9/11. Once more the identical scenario was created. I believe our govt then made a mistake.”
Asif claimed that Pakistan was not concerned within the lethal assault in Pahalgam and that India “staged it” to “create some form of disaster within the area, significantly for us”. “It was staged in Pulwama too,” he alleged.
“They by no means give you any proof for these incidents in Kashmir. They simply blame Pakistan and create a scenario for their very own benefit — it doesn’t imply Pakistan was behind it as a result of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) had some linkages to Pakistan up to now. We had nothing to do with it. LeT doesn’t exist in Pakistan anymore. It’s extinct,” he claimed.
“When President Clinton was there, there was a terror assault on Sikhs and it was blamed on some never-heard-of terror organisation. This time once more the people who find themselves being accused usually are not identified and it’s an organisation now we have by no means heard of,” he stated referring to The Resistance Entrance (TRF) who’ve claimed accountability for the Pahalgam assault.
When confronted that TRF was an offshoot of LeT, Asif stated: “If the guardian organisation doesn’t exist, how can the offshoot take start?
