Pakistan Foreign Minister Kurshid Mehmood Kasuri has extended support to Japan's bid for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council, but opposed a seat for India.
Kasuri, currently on a visit to Japan, told Japan's main opposition leader Katsuya Okada, there should be "objective criteria" for choosing members of an enlarged Security Council.
"Japan will certainly qualify under whatever criteria. In the post-Second World War period, Japan has been completely on the right side of all major issues," Pakistani Ambassador to Japan Kamran Niaz told reporters, reports here said.
"Our reservation is that India will not fit under those criteria," Niaz said. He however said the Security Council seat did not figure during Kasuri's meeting with Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi.
Japan's agreement in principle to resume yen loans to Pakistan, cut off in 1998 after New Delhi and Islamabad carried out nuclear tests, and the upcoming parliamentary elections in Afghanistan were discussed at the meeting.
According to APP news agency, Kasuri briefed the Japanese prime minister on Pakistan's "indispensability" in the global war against terrorism and also efforts with India to find a solution to the Kashmir issue.
He also assured the Japanese leaders about Pakistan's commitment to check nuclear proliferation and referred to the dismantling of the network of leading nuclear scientist AQ Khan.
{{/usCountry}}He also assured the Japanese leaders about Pakistan's commitment to check nuclear proliferation and referred to the dismantling of the network of leading nuclear scientist AQ Khan.
{{/usCountry}}The reports said the two sides also discussed North Korea and international efforts to persuade Pyongyang to give up its nuclear weapons programme.