Welcomed Donald Trump's offer of mediation on Indo-Pak tensions: Pakistan

Islamabad: Pakistan on Thursday said it has welcomed an earlier offer of mediation by US president-elect Donald Trump to reduce Indo-Pak tensions as it expressed the desire to work closely with the new Trump administration.

Foreign Office (FO) spokesman Nafees Zakaria said this while responding to questions at the weekly news briefing here about Trump's victory in the general elections yesterday.

"The US president-elect had offered mediation between Pakistan and India on Kashmir dispute during his campaign and we had welcomed that offer," he said, though reports had not mentioned Trump making a specific mention to Kashmir.

The 70-year-old real estate tycoon had last month described tensions between India and Pakistan as a "very, very hot tinderbox" and offered to be "the mediator or arbitrator" if it was necessary and if the two countries wanted him to, following which the Foreign Office had welcomed such an offer.

Radio Pakistan also quoted Zakaria as saying today that people of Kashmir had given sacrifices for their right to self-determination and that Pakistan is concerned over continued atrocities by Indian forces in Kashmir.

He said Pakistan will continue to raise Indian brutalities and human rights violations at international fora besides continuing to extend moral, political and diplomatic support to the just cause of Kashmiris.

The spokesman said that Pakistan was looking forward to work closely with the new US administration for mutual benefits of both the countries.

Pakistan will continue the endeavour to promote and strengthen the existing relationship, he added.

"Pakistan has multidimensional and strategic relationships with the US including economic, defence, Science and Technology, education, strategic issues, counter-terrorism and wants to strengthen them further," he said.

To a question regarding any violation of Indus Waters Treaty by India, Zakaria said Pakistan has approached the World Bank for establishing a Court of Arbitration.

Pakistan is looking forward to establishment of the court at the earliest in line with the Indus Waters Treaty, he said.

Zakaria added that India has not fulfilled its promise of investigation into Samjhauta Express incident.

He said perpetrators of the incident had made public confession in which eight serving army officers were involved.

Zakaria said India did not share anything with us and that Pakistan time and again raised this issue bilaterally and on various forums.