ISLAMABAD: The Foreign Office on Friday rejected an Indian allegation about a drone overflying its high commission in Islamabad as preposterous.

“These preposterous claims have no basis in fact and no proof whatsoever has been shared with Pakistan to substantiate these allegations,” FO spokesman Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri said in response to the Indian accusation.

India claimed that a drone was seen over the premises of the Indian High Commission in Islamabad on June 26.

Indian Ministry of External Affairs spokesman Arindam Bagchi had said that the concern had been conveyed to the government of Pakistan. “We expect Pakistan to investigate the incident and prevent recurrence of such breach of security,” he further said.

Spokesman Chaudhri questioned the timing of what he called the “propaganda campaign by India”.

“It is happening at a time when evidence so far collected in the Lahore blast of 23 June is increasingly pointing to external forces with a history of perpetrating state-sponsored terrorism against Pakistan,” he said while alluding to the initial findings in the investigation in Johar Town blast pointing to Indian hand in it.

India had recently also accused Pakistan of being involved in the drone attack on Jammu Air Force station on June 27.

“Pakistan rejects these patently false allegations and diversionary Indian tactics and will continue to stand by the people of IIOJK in their just struggle for the right to self-determination, as enshrined in the UNSC resolutions,” Mr Chaudhri said.

Published in Dawn, July 3rd, 2021