Syed Akbaruddin, Permanent Representative of India to the United Nations speaking during a debate. "They may stoop low, we soar high," will be New Delhi's strategy to counter Pakistan's propaganda at the UN General Assembly's high-level meetings next week, India's Permanent Representative Syed Akbaruddin has said.
Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has said that he will bring his Kashmir campaign to the UN and his Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi has said Khan will do so "forcefully" when he addresses the General Assembly after his Indian counterpart, Narendra Modi.
Speaking to reporters, Akbaruddin said that if they bring up Kashmir, it will be "much more of the same" as in years past.
"It is for every country to determine its trajectory of how it wants to approach global platforms" and "what they want to do is their call," he said.
Akbaruddin said: "We have seen them mainstream terrorism in the past," and now "they may want to mainstream hate speech. It is their call",
But he said that "if they want to do that, poison pens don't work for too long".
Pointing to the ambitious programmes of global cooperation India has set for UNGA where Prime Minister (PM) Modi will represent the nation, Akbaruddin declared: "They may stoop low, we soar high."
PM Modi is expected to announce India will be increasing its commitments for fighting climate change at the Climate Action Summit on 23 September.
As part of its programme of action, India will be inaugurating the Gandhi Solar Park at the UN which will generate 50 kilowatts of green electricity for headquarters.
India will be holding multilateral meetings with groups of Pacific nations and Caribbean countries to lead joint action in solving common problems and to provide assistance to them.
Pakistan has mounted attacks on India at previous UNGA meetings but all the other 192 UN members pointedly ignored it.
In 2017 its Permanent Representative Maleeha Lodhi even displayed a picture of an injured Palestinian child claiming that she was a Kashmiri.
(This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed.)
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