India on Saturday exercised its right to reply to Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan’s speech attacking India on Kashmir at 74th session of the United Nations General Assembly. In a strongly-worded reply, India said that Khan’s threat of unleashing nuclear devastation “qualifies as brinksmanship, not statesmanship”.

“Rarely has the General Assembly witnessed such misuse, rather abuse, of an opportunity to reflect. Words matter in diplomacy. Invocation of phrases such as ‘pogrom’, ‘bloodbath’, ‘racial superiority’, ‘pick up the gun’ and ‘fight to the end’ reflect a medieval mindset and not a 21st century vision,” Vidisha Maitra, First Secretary, Ministry of External Affairs, said.

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The official further said that what Imran Khan spoke of Pakistan was a callous portrayal of the world in binary terms.

“Us vs Them; Rich vs Poor; North vs South; Developed Vs Developing; Muslims vs Others. A script that fosters divisiveness at the United Nations. Attempts to sharpen differences and stir up hatred, are simply put – ‘hate speech'”.

She asserted that Prime Minister Khan’s justification of terrorism was “brazen and incendiary”.

“For someone who was once a cricketer, and believed in the gentleman’s game, today’s speech bordered on crudeness of a variety reminiscent of the guns of Dara Adamkhel,” Maitra said.

Now that PM Imran Khan has invited UN observers to Pakistan to verify that there are no militant organisations in Pakistan, the world will hold him to that promise, she added.

The Indian official further questioned if Pakistan can confirm the fact that it is home to 130 UN designated terrorists and 25 terrorist entities listed by the UN as of today.

“Will Pakistan acknowledge that it is the only government in the world that provides pension to an individual listed in the Al Qaeda and Daesh sanctions list. Can Pakistan explain why here in New York, its premier bank – the Habib Bank – had to shut shop after it was fined millions of dollars over terror financing. Will Pakistan deny that the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has put the country on notice for its violation of 20 of the 27 key parameters. And finally, would Prime Minister Khan deny to the city of New York that he was an open defender of Osama bin Laden,” Vidisha Maitra, First Secretary MEA asked in strong rebuttal to Khan’s speech on Friday at UNGA.

Pakistan venturing to upstream terrorism & downstream hate speech, India mainstreaming development in Jammu & Kashmir
– Vidisha Maitra @IndiaUNNewYork

Full statement https://t.co/aQlEcssL1X pic.twitter.com/TKdadPAnWS

— Syed Akbaruddin (@AkbaruddinIndia) September 28, 2019

India asserted that Pakistan was trying to play its wild card as the newfound champion of human rights.

“This is a country that has shrunk the size of its minority community from 23 per cent in 1947, to 3 per cent today, and has subjected Christians, Sikhs, Ahmadias, Hindus, Shias, Pashtuns, Sindhis, and Balochis, to draconian blasphemy laws, systemic persecution, blatant abuse and forced conversions.”

Maitra also invoked the gruesome genocide perpetrated by Pakistan against its own people in 1971, and the role played by Lieutenant General AAK Niazi – a fact that the Prime Minister of Bangladesh had reminded the assembly earlier.

India said that Pakistan’s “virulent reaction” to the removal of an outdated and temporary provision — Article 370 — that was hindering development and integration of Jammu and Kashmir stems from the fact that “those who thrive on conflict never welcome the ray of peace”.

“While Pakistan has ventured to upstream terrorism and downstream hate speech there, India is going ahead with mainstreaming development in Jammu and Kashmir.

“The mainstreaming of Jammu and Kashmir, as well as Ladakh, in India’s thriving and vibrant democracy with a millennia-old heritage of diversity, pluralism and tolerance is well and truly underway. Irreversibly so.”

The MEA First Secretary further stated that the citizens of India do not need anyone else to speak on their behalf, least of all “those who have built an industry of terrorism from the ideology of hate”.

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on Friday raised the Kashmir issue in his maiden address to the UN General Assembly and demanded that India lift the “inhuman curfew” in Kashmir and release all “political prisoners”.

Khan repeated his war rhetoric saying that if there was a face-off between two nuclear-armed neighbours, the consequences would be far beyond their borders.

Giving his scenario for war, Imran Khan said that when the “curfew” is lifted in Kashmir there will be a bloodbath.

Khan further used the forum of the UN General Assembly to openly appeal to the global Muslim sentiment on the issue of Kashmir.

In an openly radical Islamist statement, Imran Khan, who exceeded the talk time allocated to him by a fair margin, said that the Muslims in India, which has the second largest population of Muslims in the world, would get radicalised watching the Kashmiris.

Imran Khan also made the bizarre claim that “there are no militant organisations in Pakistan.”