US Says It Will Use All Its Resources to Ban Masood Azhar

China has put the proposal of the US on hold, the UK and France to list Pakistan based Jaish e Mohammed or JeM chief and founder Masood Azhar under the 1267 Al Qaeda Sanctions Committee of the Council. The United States has circulated a draft resolution to the powerful 15-nation Council to blacklist Masood Azhar and to subject him to a travel ban, an assets freeze and an arms embargo.

The move by the US, which has also threatened to utilize all available resources to ensure to ban Masood Azhar as a “global terrorist” has infuriated China, which says the move is going to complicate the issue and is not conducive to peace and stability in South Asia.

China has criticised the US for directly taking the issue of listing Masood Azhar as global terrorists to the UN Security Council to declare him a global terrorist in the UN’s 1267 Sanctions Committee, which deals with the issues of counter-terrorism.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang told a media briefing recently, that China is adopting a constructive and reasonable stand to resolve the issue properly. As he was responding to a question about State Department spokesman’s declarations that the United States is going to utilize all available resources to blacklist Masood Azhar.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman also said that the vast majority of the members in the United Nations Security Council believe that the efforts should be made under the 1267 Sanctions Committee and to solve this issue of designation through dialogue and consultation, instead of pushing the draft resolution at the UNSC.

As he said, “China has been working hard with relevant sides and is making positive results. The US knows that very well. Under such circumstances the US still insists on pushing the draft resolution doesn’t make any sense”.

China has blocked the move to designate Masood Azhar as a ‘global terrorist’ for the four times in recent years.

On being asked, that India has evidence on the involvement of JeM in the terror attack in Pulwama, the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman said, “On the recent incident in Kashmir, China has stated its position. We hope South Asia could maintain peace and stability and we hope India and Pakistan will engage in dialogue and through dialogue and consultation resolve outstanding issues”.

India has handed over a dossier to Pakistan on February 27 with specific details of the Pakistan based terror group JeM’s involvement in the Pulwama attack in which 40 CRPF personnel were martyred on February 14. It has also given the details about the presence of JeM terror camps and its leadership in Pakistan. Though Pakistan has so far denied and said they have not found any link between the JeM and the Pulwama terror attack and demanded more information and evidence from India.