UN stresses on engagement, dialogue between India, Pakistan on Kashmir

United Nations, July 14 (IANS) UN chief Antonio Guterres has reiterated the need for engagement and dialogue between India and Pakistan for peaceful resolution of the Kashmir issue.

The remarks were made by Guterres' spokesman Stephane Dujarric during a press briefing on Thursday.

When asked: "Was the Secretary-General going to pay any attention to what is happening over there (Kashmir)?" or "we are just waiting for some sort of big tragedy to occur for the Secretary-General to take attention", the spokesperson replied: "... We reiterate the need for the parties to find a peaceful solution through engagement and dialogue."

"...in terms of paying attention, I think the Secretary-General answered in his own words that question during the press conference," the spokesman said referring to the Secretary General's first ever press conference on June 20.

When asked by a reporter at the June conference at the UN headquarters if Guterres was involved in bringing about a dialogue between the two countries to resolve the Kashmir dispute, he had replied: "Why do you think I met three times the Prime Minister of Pakistan and two times the Prime Minister of India?"

"For someone accused of doing nothing it is quite a number of meetings," he added as he responded to criticism that he was not doing anything in the face of rising tensions in the subcontinent.

However, Guterres did not expand on what his efforts have been.

The Secretary-General met Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in St Petersburg last month, while he met Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif at the World Economic Forum at Davos in January and in Astana, Kazakhstan in June.