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India, Pakistan Trade Angry Accusations At UN General Assembly


Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi
Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi

India's foreign minister has accused Pakistan of harboring terrorists in an angry speech before the United Nations General Assembly.

Speaking to the UN gathering on September 29, Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj rejected the notion that India is sabotaging peace talks with Pakistan, calling it "a complete lie."

Hours after her speech, Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi responded in his speech to the General Assembly by declaring that India "preferred politics over peace."

Swaraj pointed to the fact that Osama bin Laden lived quietly in Pakistan before he was found and killed by a U.S. Navy SEAL team.

She also said the mastermind of a 2008 attack that killed 168 people in Mumbai, India, "still roams the streets of Pakistan with impunity." Pakistan says there is not enough evidence to arrest the suspect.

"In our case, terrorism is bred not in some faraway land but across our border to the west," Swaraj told the UN. "Our neighbor's expertise is not restricted to spawning grounds for terrorism. It is also an expert in trying to mask malevolence with verbal duplicity."

Swaraj and Qureshi were supposed to meet on the sidelines of the UN gathering this week.

But India called off the meeting one day after it was announced, following the killing of an Indian border guard in the disputed region of Kashmir.

Qureshi said it was the third time that the current Indian administration had called off talks, "each time on flimsy grounds."

Based on reporting by Reuters and AFP

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