The Ministry of External Affairs has slammed Pakistan, especially interior minister Mohsin Naqvi, for claiming India had something to do with the blast outside a court in Islamabad.
MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said in a statement, “India unequivocally rejects the baseless and unfounded allegations being made by an obviously delirious Pakistani leadership. It is a predictable tactic by Pakistan to concoct false narratives against India in order to deflect the attention of its own public from the ongoing military-inspired constitutional subversion and power-grab unfolding within the country. The international community is well aware of the reality and will not be misled by Pakistan’s desperate diversionary ploys.”
Jaiswal’s comment comes in the wake of Pakistan’s interior minister Mohsin Naqvi saying without any evidence, that the attack was “carried out by Indian-backed elements and Afghan Taliban proxies” as per a report by Associated Press.
The attacker tried to “enter the court premises but, failing to do so, targeted a police vehicle,” Naqvi told journalists, as per AP. Earlier reports by Pakistani state-run media and two security officials said a car bomb caused the explosion.
Naqvi said the discovery nearby of a severed head, which the police said belonged to the attacker, confirmed the blast was a suicide attack. The attacker was also later spotted in CCTV footage from the site, he said.
12 people were killed in the attack. This comes amid border tensions between Pakistan and Afghanistan after Kabul accused Islamabad of attacks on October 9. A ceasefire is in place between the two countries since 19 October.
A breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban, the Jamaat-ul-Ahrar group, claimed responsibility for the attack. But shortly after, Sarbakaf Mohmand, a commander from the group, sent WhatsApp messages insisting they had not made any such claim.
Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Mohammad Asif said on X that the country is in a state of war and laid the blame with the Taliban government in Afghanistan, which Islamabad accuses of sheltering the TTP, as per an AP report.
Afghanistan “can act to stop terrorism in Pakistan, but bringing this war to Islamabad is a message from Kabul,” Asif said and warned that Pakistan “has the strength to respond fully.”
Pakistan has outlawed the TTP, also known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, while the United States and the United Nations have designated the group a terrorist organization. The Afghan Taliban takeover in Kabul in 2021 emboldened the TTP, and many of its leaders and fighters are believed to have taken refuge in Afghanistan. Kabul denies it’s protecting the TTP.