UNITED NATIONS: Taking a dig at Pakistan, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on Saturday asked its leaders to introspect as to why India is recognised as a global IT superpower while Pakistan is infamous as the “pre- eminent export factory for terror”.
In her address to the 72nd UN General Assembly session, Swaraj accused Pakistan of waging a war against India and said a country that has been the world’s greatest exporter of havoc, death and inhumanity became a champion of hypocrisy by preaching about humanity from this podium.
She was referring to Pakistan Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi’s speech on Thursday wherein he accused India of violating human rights and state-sponsored terrorism.
“I would like today to tell Pakistan’s politicians just this much, that perhaps the wisest thing they could do is to look within. India and Pakistan became free within hours of each other. Why is it that today India is a recognised IT superpower in the world, and Pakistan is recognised only as the pre-eminent export factory for terror?” Swaraj asked. India had ripped into Pakistan on Friday, describing it as ‘terroristan’ and a land of ‘pure terror’ that hosts a flourishing industry to produce and export global terrorism.
Speaking in Hindi for the second consecutive year at the annual UNGA session, Swaraj said India has risen despite being the principal destination of Pakistan’s nefarious export of terrorism. “There have been many governments under many parties during 70 years of Indian freedom, for we have been a sustained democracy. Every government has done its bit for Indias development,” she said, highlighting India’s achievements in the fields of education, health, space etc.
“We established scientific and technical institutions which are the pride of the world. But what has Pakistan offered to the world and indeed to its own people apart from terrorism?” she said.
“We produced scientists, scholars, doctors, engineers. What have you produced?You have produced terrorists...you have created terrorist camps, you have created Lashkar-e- Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammed, Hizbul Mujahideen and Haqqani network,” she said, adding that if Pakistan had spent on its development what it has spent on developing terror, both Pakistan and the world would be safer and better-off today.
She said the terrorist groups created by Pakistan is not only harming India, but also hurting its neighbours - Afghanistan and Bangladesh - as well. She said that for the first time in the UN history, Pakistan sought right to reply and then it had to simultaneously respond to three nations.
