India-Pakistan tension: Hopefully issue will end soon, says Trump

New Delhi  : US President Donald Trump said, “We have some reasonably decent news coming from India and Pakistan. Hopefully, the issue will end soon.” Talking on the sidelines of Hanoi Summit in Vietnam, where he was meeting North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, Trump said has the US has been in touch with the countries and that the “tensions are expected to end soon,” reported news agency Reuters. Earlier, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke with foreign ministers of both the countries and asked them to exercise restraint and avoid any military action.

The Indian Express has learnt that Pompeo spoke to External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on Wednesday, as did Admiral Philip Davidson, Commander of United States Indo-Pacific Command with Admiral Sunil Lanba, the Indian Navy Chief. Sources said that US Ambassador to India, Ken Juster also engaged with Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale. Similar engagements were also done with the Pakistani side. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres also asked both the sides to urgently take steps for a “meaningful mutual engagement”. Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi had called Guterres to inform him about India’s strike on Tuesday.

India on Tuesday conducted non-military preemptive air strikes on a terror camp in Balakot. A day later, Pakistani jets violated Indian airspace and attempted strikes in Jammu and Kashmir. India said that the attack was foiled successfully and a MiG fighter jet was shot down in the aerial confrontation and a pilot is “missing in action”. While Pakistan initially said that two IAF pilots were in its custody, later in the day, it said it had arrested “only one.”(Agencies)