Pakistan minister comments on India ties

Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Asif has expressed hope for improving ties with India after the general elections in India.

Mr. Asif’s comments came days after External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar in Singapore said that Pakistan is sponsoring terrorism almost at an “industry level.”

The mood in India now is not to overlook terrorists, and it “will not skirt this problem anymore.”

“Our relations with India could be improved after elections there,” Mr. Asif said while speaking to reporters outside the Parliament House in Islamabad on April 1, adding that the bilateral ties between the two countries have their “own background.”

Voting for 543 Lok Sabha seats in India will take place in seven phases, spread between April 19 and June 4.

Pakistan has been insisting that the onus of improving the ties was on India and urging it to undo its “unilateral” steps in Kashmir as a sort of pre-condition to start the talks.

India has dismissed the suggestion and made it clear to Pakistan that the entire Union Territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh were integral and inalienable parts of the country.