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US asks Pakistan to ensure that its territory isn't used for planning attacks in India

Speed News Desk | Updated on: 10 February 2017, 1:49 IST

Cementing its stand on the crucial issue of terrorism, the United States told Pakistan to ensure that its territory is not used for planning attacks in India, after Prime Minister Narendra Modi said terrorism is being "incubated in India's neighbourhood".

"This is one of the steps that the US is encouraging Pakistan to take for the improvement of its relations with India," a State Department spokesman said on 9 June.

"We believe Pakistan and India stand to benefit from practical cooperation and encourage direct dialogue aimed at increasing cooperation and reducing tensions," State Department Deputy Spokesman Mark Toner said.

"And that includes steps by Pakistan to ensure that its territory is not used to plan attacks in India and that Pakistan takes steps to address or to go after, I think, all the terrorist groups that are currently using its territory," Toner stated, adding that Pakistan was one of the issues discussed between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Barack Obama.

"Certainly that was one of the discussions, frankly, that was raised in discussions with Prime Minister Modi. They talked about a wide range of regional issues, in fact," he said.

"Our bilateral relations with India and Pakistan are separate and stand on their own merits, and so I don't think it's prudent for us to view our security cooperation in the region in kind of a zero-sum game - or zero-sum terms, rather. I think it's important for the countries of the region that they all have constructive security relationships with each other. And that's Pakistan, that's India, and it's also Afghanistan," Toner asserted.

-With PTI inputs

First published: 10 June 2016, 12:14 IST