US Congressman Ro Khanna on Wednesday called for Pakistan's army chief Asim Munir that there should be no retaliation to the Indian strikes on terrorist targets in Pakistani territory that took place under India's ‘Operation Sindoor’ in the wee hours of Wednesday.
India carried out military strikes and successfully neutralised nine major terrorist infrastructures inside Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK), which Islamabad said it will retaliate to. Follow Operation Sindoor live updates
Reacting to the escalating tensions between India and Pakistan, RO Khanna said the most urgent thing is de-escalation.
“Both have nuclear weapons. Well, the most urgent thing is deescalation. I mean, there was the terrorist attack in Pahalgam, innocent people were killed. India took a response that helped take out some of the terrorist networks… The important thing now is for de-escalation. I do hope that President Trump has people who understand the region,” RO Khanna said in an interview to CNN.
“The only reason I say that, as he said, they've been fighting for centuries, just historically, they haven't been around for a century. It was a British colonialism that fomented the partition, that fomented some of the divisions between Hindus and Muslims there. It's important to really understand the region and we need to be an honest broker for escalation,” he added.
Asim Munir a ‘dictator’
{{/usCountry}}“The only reason I say that, as he said, they've been fighting for centuries, just historically, they haven't been around for a century. It was a British colonialism that fomented the partition, that fomented some of the divisions between Hindus and Muslims there. It's important to really understand the region and we need to be an honest broker for escalation,” he added.
Asim Munir a ‘dictator’
{{/usCountry}}RO Khanna said, “We also have to understand that a Asim Munir is a dictator who didn't have legitimate elections was put Imran Khan in jail, and there's no honest voice right now in Pakistan, because it's a dictatorship.”
We should be calling for elections after the de-escalation, he said.
“I would like to sort of make it clear to Asim Munir that he should that's it. There should be no retaliation on either side. There should be the end of it. We have a lot of leverage with Pakistan. We give IMF loans to Pakistan. They're dependent upon that. We should be saying to Asim Munir that he needs to free Imran Khan, stop the the any retaliation and then have a fair election, because there was a rigged election,” RO Khanna said.