Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on Wednesday said that his country wants peace with India by addressing all conflicts including border issues through talks.
Khan, who was addressing the World Economic Forum's (WEF) annual meeting, said that Pakistan "wants to talk solutions to ending conflicts." "I've always believed that the only way forward is via peace settlements. We want to mend our fences with Iran. We had some border issues with them. And then with India," he added.
The Pakistan Prime Minister also said the world cannot have two nuclear-armed nations "at such sensitive relations," apparently referring to the issue of Kashmir.
"You cannot have two nuclear-armed nations at such sensitive relations. This is why I asked for international overseers to come to the LoC," Khan said here.
WEF's annual meeting in Davos engages the world's top leaders to shape global, regional and industry agendas at the beginning of the year.
However, instead of grabbing the opportunity to divert investments for the slogging economy of Pakistan, which has led to unwanted consequences such as lack of jobs and rise in inflation, Khan once again raised the Kashmir issue that India has already notified as its 'internal matter' since the scrapping of Article 370 last year.
"With India, I am one Pakistani who has lots of friends in India. Because of the cricketing background and my relations there, I thought I was well placed to talk peace between our two countries." "I reached out to Narendra Modi, the reaction was very different. Subcontinent hosts the highest number of poor people in the world. And we could talk to reduce poverty and increase trade. I tried to talk but hit a brick wall," he added.
Khan said: "Then Pulwama happened. Then India unilaterally annexed Kashmir, revoked articles in their own constitution and since then it's gone from bad to worse..." The most surprising part of his remarks was that Khan is not bothered about the growing market opportunities and investments in India.
"Howdy Modi doesn't bother me. I understand the relationship between the US and India. India is a huge market. I am worried about the direction India is going in," he told the forum.
The Prime Minister also showed his desperation during his bilateral talks with United States President Donald Trump, the previous day, and once again urged to "help." "We're going to be talking about trade and many other things. But trade is going to be of very, very paramount importance. And we're doing more trade as it turns. And we're working together on some borders, and we're talking about Kashmir and the relation to what's going on with Pakistan and India. And if we can help, we certainly will be helping. And we've been watching that and following it very, very closely," Trump had said ahead of his meeting with Khan.
Khan, in an interview with DW, a German state-owned public international broadcaster on Friday, had admitted that there are no takers of the Kashmir issue from the international community. He said there has been a "lukewarm response" to the Kashmir issue and said that "commercial interests are more important for the Western countries."
