Pankaj Saran, former deputy national security adviser and ambassador to Russia, was a member of one of seven all-party delegations that was sent to international capitals to brief governments, MPs and the diaspora there on Operation Sindoor.
Saran’s delegation visited six capitals in Europe and in his view, “The message has gone down, across the length and breadth, about what we wanted to convey. I presume there will be a formal report at some point to the MEA .. but the feedback has been given.”
On the crucial point of the “false equivalence” between India and Pakistan, meaning Western capitals putting India on the same level as a terror state like Pakistan, Saran disagreed.
“The fact that there is a terrorist camp or infrastructure you want to target and it happens to be in the territory of Pakistan, it does not follow that you become an equivalent state of Pakistan,” he argued.
“I don’t think anyone in Europe tried to suggest to us or we heard something from their interventions, which would suggest we are somehow being dragged down to the level of Pakistan.”
It is understood across the globe, he said, that the two countries are on different trajectories in terms of current and future growth paths and in terms of national power.
When asked whether Pakistan’s presence in Western military alliances in the past, may have contributed to the tendency to gloss over its support for terrorism and terror groups, Ambasador Saran acknowledged some “double standards”.
But he added a caveat: “this whole question of good terrorist or bad terrorist … where you try and ingratiate yourself and curry favour with some countries largely in the West to deflect and remove pressure whereas you keep the tabs open when it comes to India … is a well established Pakistani policy and people understand this very well in Europe.”
Tune in for more in this chat with Ambassador Pankaj Saran.
