KARACHI: Pakistan has always said that it would welcome the international community, including the United States, to play their role in promoting peace in the region, including facilitating dialogue and resolution of the Kashmir dispute.

This was stated by Foreign Office Spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch at a weekly briefing on Friday when a journalist asked whether Pakistan foresaw any mediatory role of the US which can provide an opportunity to open the closed doors for dialogue between Pakistan and India.

Commenting on an article claiming that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was all set to visit Pakistan last year but at the eleventh hour everything got dropped, the spokesperson dismissed the report as speculative.

She said the new land lease rules introduced in India-held Kashmir allowing non-Kashmiris to purchase agricultural land for commercial and other non-agricultural purposes was another manifestation of India’s colonial-settler mindset.

In a separate development, US Secretary of Defence Lloyd J. Austin III spoke by phone with Chief of Army Staff Gen Asim Munir on Friday, the Pentagon said.

The brief statement said that Secretary Austin congratulated Gen Munir on his appointment as army chief and “discussed areas of mutual interest as well as recent regional developments”.

Published in Dawn, January 14th, 2023