ON BOARD SPECIAL AIRCRAFT : Asserting that nobody can tolerate terrorism, Vice President Hamid Ansari today said the attack in Uri is totally unacceptable and these kinds of “tactics” will eventually lead to a lot of “unpleasantness”.
“It’s the view of everybody in the country and that is my view also that this (attack in Uri) is totally unacceptable, totally condemnable and this kind of tactics will eventually lead to a lot of unpleasantness. What action the government of India takes you will hear about it from the government of India,” Ansari told reporters while on his way back from Venezuela after attending the 17th NAM Summit.
Asked with terror attacks continuing unabated was India’s restraint being tested, he said, “Well I don’t know whether the term restraint is there. If one is attacked we shall respond in our own judgement and the manner of response is something that is left to the concerned authorities of the state but there is no question of restraint or tolerance. Nobody can tolerate terrorism.”
He said anybody can be a victim of terror and the whole issue is that innocent civilians are being targeted. “So tomorrow any one of us can be the victims of terror”.
Earlier, condemning the Uri attack in a statement the Vice President had said, such attacks are the result of the use of cross–border terrorism by “one particular country” in the region and India would deal with such provocations in a “befitting manner”.
Heavily-armed militants stormed a battalion headquarters of the Indian Army in North Kashmir’s Uri town in the wee hours yesterday, killing 17 jawans and injuring 19 other personnel in the attack in which all four terrorists were neutralised.
It was the worst attack on the Indian Army in many years.
Talking about India’s strategy at the UN General Assembly session, Ansari said, “It has been a part of our general approach that the question of terrorism has to be flagged on all forums.”
“I am not privy to what the External Affairs Minister is going to say, I have not seen the text but I am sure that this is a subject that will figure very prominently in her statement to the general assembly. And of course there will be…You can anticipate some form of a vicious attack from the other side, there will be rights of reply, the usual pattern which goes on in the general assembly debates,” he said.
External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj will address the General Debate on September 26.
On India’s strong protest lodged with NAM over Pakistan’s support to terrorism, Ansari said “something was said by one delegation which was contrary to the practice of NAM and specifically objectionable to us”.
He said since NAM does not have a practice of rights of reply, it was thought at best to register India’s position in a formal communication for which Minister of State for External Affairs M J Akbar has addressed the chairman of the conference.
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