China defends blocking Azhar terror listing, India upset

China has defended its fourth technical hold at the UN Security Council to block the designation of Pakistan-based JeM chief Masood Azhar as a global terrorist, saying it would help the parties concerned to engage in more talks to find a “lasting solution” acceptable to all.

Asked why China once again resorted to block the move, Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang told a media briefing here that Beijing’s decision is in line with the rules of the committee. “As to the technical hold at the 1267 Committee our action is to make sure that the committee will have enough time to study the matter so that the relevant sides will have time for dialogue and consultation,” Lu said. “Only a solution that is acceptable to all sides could fundamentally provide a chance for a lasting solution to the issue. China is ready to communicate and coordinate with all sides including India to properly handle this issue,” he said.

India has taken very serious exceptions to China’s decision. Reacting sharply to Beijing’s move, New Delhi in a statement said, “We are disappointed by this outcome.  This has prevented action by the international community to designate the leader of Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), a proscribed and active terrorist organisation which has claimed responsibility for the terrorist attack in Jammu and Kashmir on February 14, 2019.”

In a similar vein, India’s permanent representative to UN, Syed Akbaruddin tweeted cryptically on March 13, 2019 that only one “big state” has held up the listing of Masood Azhar.

Even as it expressed its gratitude to all the Member States for their efforts to move the designation proposal, the statement also added, “We will continue to pursue all available avenues to ensure that terrorist leaders who are involved in heinous attacks on our citizens are brought to justice.” This is the fourth time that China has blocked an attempt to designate Masood Azhar as, the head of Jaish-e-Mohammed, since 2010.

In 2016 too, India was blistering in its attack on China, “We had expected China would have been more understanding of the danger posed to all by terrorism and would join India and others in fighting the common challenge of terrorism,” the statement had said. In 2017 too, India blamed China for blocking the same proposal.