'We must be ready to fight if war is imposed', says Fawad Chaudhry

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Science and Technology Fawad Chaudhry asserted on Tuesday that if war is imposed from India, Pakistan must be ready to respond to it.

In a statement on Twitter, the minister said the Modi government is trying to make Kashmir another Palestine by changing the population demography and bringing settlers into Kashmir.

He urged that parliamentarians must stop fighting on trivial issues. “Let’s respond [to] India by blood, tears, toil and sweat, we must be ready to fight if war is imposed.”

Modi Govt is trying to make Kashmir another Palestine by changing the population demography and bringing settlers into Kashmir, Parliamentarians must stop fighting on trivial issues lets respond India by blood, tears, toil and sweat, we must be ready to fight if war is imposed

— Ch Fawad Hussain (@fawadchaudhry) August 6, 2019

A day earlier, India’s BJP government moved a bill in the upper house of the parliament (Rajaya Sabha) to remove Article 370 from the Indian constitution amid opposition members’ protest. It was later signed by Indian President Ram Nath Kovind, stripping the state of Kashmir off its special status and turning it a Union Territory with the legislature.

Denouncing the move of the Indian government to repeal Article 370 for occupied Jammu and Kashmir, Pakistan declared to “exercise all possible options to counter the illegal steps.”

In a statement issued on Monday, the Foreign Office strongly condemned and rejected the announcements by the Indian government regarding the Indian Occupied Jammu & Kashmir.

The foreign office stressed that the Indian Occupied Jammu & Kashmir is an internationally recognized disputed territory. “No unilateral step by the Government of India can change this disputed status, as enshrined in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions. Nor will this ever be acceptable to the people of Jammu & Kashmir and Pakistan.”