{"id":5434,"date":"2025-04-28T15:04:40","date_gmt":"2025-04-28T15:04:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=5434"},"modified":"2025-04-28T15:04:40","modified_gmt":"2025-04-28T15:04:40","slug":"china-calls-on-pakistan-and-india-to-de-escalate-tensions-after-pahalgam-attack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=5434","title":{"rendered":"China calls on Pakistan and India to de-escalate tensions after Pahalgam attack"},"content":{"rendered":"
China on Monday urged India and Pakistan to \u201cexercise restraint\u201d as the two countries reportedly exchanged fire at the Line of Control (LoC) for a fourth night in a row in the wake of a deadly attack in occupied Kashmir\u2019s Pahalgam.<\/p>\n

The April 22 attack killed 26 people, mostly tourists, and was one of the deadliest armed attacks in the disputed Himalayan region since 2000. Kashmir Resistance, also known as The Resistance Front, said it \u201cunequivocally\u201d denied involvement in the attack, after an initial message that claimed responsibility.<\/p>\n

India, without offering any evidence, has implied cross-border linkages of the attackers, while Pakistan has strongly denied any involvement. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has called for a neutral probe into the incident.<\/p>\n

\u201cChina hopes that the two sides will exercise restraint, meet each other halfway, properly handle relevant differences through dialogue and consultation and jointly maintain regional peace and stability,\u201d foreign ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said.<\/p>\n

\u201cChina welcomes all measures that will help cool down the situation,\u201d Jiakun told a regular press briefing.<\/p>\n

The statement came after Pakistan and India reportedly exchanged gunfire for a fourth night in a row across the LoC, after four years of relative calm.<\/p>\n

\u201cDuring the night of April 27-28\u2026 Pakistan Army posts initiated unprovoked small arms fire across the Line of Control\u201d, the Indian army claimed in a statement.<\/p>\n

There were no reported casualties, and Islamabad did not immediately confirm the gunfire.<\/p>\n

India\u2019s defence forces have conducted several military exercises across the country since the attack. Some of these are routine preparedness drills, Reuters quoted a defence official as saying.<\/p>\n

Since the incident, the nuclear-armed nations have unleashed a raft of measures against each other.<\/p>\n

India on April 23 unilaterally suspended the critical Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) \u2014 a water-sharing agreement that was brokered by the World Bank and has endured through wars and decades of hostility.<\/p>\n

The next day, Pakistan retaliated by threatening to put the Simla Agreement in abeyance and closing its airspace for Indian flights. The National Security Committee (NSC) in Islamabad also called on India to \u201crefrain from its reflexive blame game and cynical, staged managed exploitation of incidents like Pahalgam to further its narrow political agenda\u201d.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, Hindu nationalist Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowed to pursue the attackers to the \u201cends of the earth\u201d and said that those who planned and carried out the attack \u201cwill be punished beyond their imagination\u201d.<\/p>\n

Calls have also grown from Indian politicians and others for military action against Pakistan.<\/p>\n

Defence Minister Khawaja Asif on Friday said Pakistan was \u201cready to cooperate\u201d in an international probe into the Pahalgam attack, but also warned of an \u201call-out war\u201d if India carried out any attack on Pakistan.<\/p>\n

The United Nations has urged the arch-rivals to show \u201cmaximum restraint\u201d so that issues can be \u201cresolved peacefully through meaningful mutual engagement\u201d.<\/p>\n

US in touch with India and Pakistan, urges work toward \u2018responsible solution\u2019<\/p>\n

China\u2019s call for restraint added to the United States\u2019 statement from Sunday, urging India and Pakistan to work towards what it called a \u201cresponsible solution\u201d, as Washington said it was in touch with both countries.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is an evolving situation and we are monitoring developments closely. We have been in touch with the governments of India and Pakistan at multiple levels,\u201d a US State Department spokesperson told Reuters in an emailed statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe United States encourages all parties to work together towards a responsible resolution,\u201d the spokesperson added.<\/p>\n

The State Department spokesperson also said Washington \u201cstands with India and strongly condemns the terrorist attack in Pahalgam\u201d, reiterating comments similar to recent ones made by US President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance.<\/p>\n

In public, the US government has expressed support for India after the attack but has not criticised Pakistan. While Saudi Arabia and Iran have offered to mediate, Trump last week said he was confident that India and Pakistan would \u201cget it figured out\u201d.<\/p>\n

India is an increasingly important US partner as Washington aims to counter China\u2019s rising influence in Asia while Pakistan remains a US ally, even as its importance for Washington has diminished after the 2021 US withdrawal from neighbouring Afghanistan.<\/p>\n

Michael Kugelman, a Washington-based South Asia analyst and writer for the Foreign Policy magazine, said India is now a much closer US partner than Pakistan.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis may worry Islamabad that if India retaliates militarily, the US may sympathise with its counterterrorism imperatives and not try to stand in the way,\u201d Kugelman told Reuters.<\/p>\n

Kugelman also said that given Washington\u2019s involvement and ongoing diplomatic efforts in Russia\u2019s war in Ukraine and Israel\u2019s military offensive in Gaza, the Trump administration is \u201cdealing with a lot on its global plate\u201d and may leave India and Pakistan on their own, at least in the early days of the tensions.<\/p>\n

Hussain Haqqani, a former Pakistan ambassador to the US and a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute think tank, also said that there seemed to be no US appetite to calm the situation at this moment.<\/p>\n

\u201cIndia has a longstanding grievance about terrorism emanating or supported from across [the] border. Pakistan has a longstanding belief that India wants to dismember it. Both work themselves into a frenzy every few years. This time, there is no US interest in calming things down,\u201d Haqqani said.<\/p>\n

Ned Price, a former US State Department official under the administration of former president Joe Biden, said that while the Trump administration was giving this issue the sensitivity it deserved, a perception that it would back India at any cost may escalate tensions further.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Trump administration has made clear it wishes to deepen the US-India partnership a laudable goal but that it is willing to do so at almost any cost.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf India feels that the Trump administration will back it to the hilt no matter what, we could be in store for more escalation and more violence between these nuclear-armed neighbours,\u201d Price added.<\/p>\n

2,000 detained as Indian forces continue crackdown<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Indian soldiers have blown up nine homes of pro-freedom Kashmiris and detained nearly 2,000 people since the Pahalgam attack, sparking public anger and accusations of \u201ccollective punishment\u201d.<\/p>\n

Police have launched a vast manhunt and detained a long list of suspects for questioning, including nearly 2,000 residents across the territory, a senior police official told AFP.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a revolving door in police stations as part of the ongoing investigation,\u201d the officer said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to talk to the media.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome have already been let go, and more are being summoned to police stations,\u201d the officer added. \u201cThese are not arrests, just for seeking information that could lead to the terrorists,\u201d the official insisted.<\/p>\n

Security forces have searched nearly 1,000 houses and forests hunting for the attackers in India-held Kashmir, a local police official told Reuters on Monday.<\/p>\n

Political leaders in the state have called for caution to ensure the innocent are not harmed in the government\u2019s actions against terrorism.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s time to \u2026 avoid any misplaced action that alienates people. Punish the guilty, show them no mercy but don\u2019t let innocent people become collateral damage,\u201d Omar Abdullah, the territory\u2019s chief minister said on X on Saturday.<\/p>\n

Another former chief minister made an appeal to the Indian government \u201cto take care that innocent people are not made to feel the brunt as alienation aids terrorists\u2019 goals of division and fear\u201d.<\/p>\n

Aga Ruhullah, a federal lawmaker from occupied Kashmir, said: \u201cKashmir and Kashmiris are being given a collective punishment\u201d.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

China on Monday urged India and Pakistan to \u201cexercise restraint\u201d as the two countries reportedly exchanged fire at the Line of Control (LoC) for a fourth night in a row in the wake of a deadly attack in occupied Kashmir\u2019s Pahalgam. The April 22 attack killed 26 people, mostly tourists, and was one of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5434"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5434\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}