Right of Reply by India under Agenda Item 2: Interactive Dialogue on the High Commissioner's annual report during the 59th Session of Human Rights Council (16 June – 9 July 2025) delivered by Mr. Kshitij Tyagi, Counsellor, Permanent Mission of India, Geneva, 18 June 2025
Madam Vice President,
India is constrained to exercise its right of reply to address Pakistan’s deeply troubling statement — a statement that seeks, with breathtaking audacity, to invert victim and perpetrator, as usual to deflect attention from its own record of shame. Pakistan chose to spend almost its entire speaking time not engaging with the High Commissioner’s comprehensive review of the global human rights situation, but obsessively focused on India, with its tired fabricated narrative. We have, in the past, suggested that Pakistan might serve its people better by addressing their own needs rather than making India the centerpiece of every intervention. That advice remains unheeded. Tellingly, it ignored the High Commissioner’s most vital message: the urgent need to bring terrorists to justice — no surprise, given its desperation to shield its own proteges.
On 22 April 2025, Pakistani terrorists turned a serene sanctuary in Jammu and Kashmir into a killing field — carrying out a barbaric execution of 26 Indian tourists in Pahalgam, in front of their families. The UN Security Council rightly condemned this “reprehensible act of terrorism” and called for all perpetrators, organizers, financiers, and sponsors to be held accountable. And we all know that those sponsors operate from Pakistani soil.
Pakistan’s attempt to mischaracterize Operation Sindoor, our precise and proportionate response, as “military aggression” is unconscionable. When a state harbours terrorists who massacre innocents, defensive action is not just a right — it is a solemn duty.
From hosting Osama bin Laden in its military cantonment to conducting state funerals for globally sanctioned terrorists, Pakistan never fails to disappoint. It claims victimhood while remaining the acknowledged epicenter of jihadist terror.
On the Indus Waters Treaty: despite India’s steadfast adherence for over six decades, Pakistan has misused the Treaty’s procedures to obstruct India’s legitimate projects while shredding its spirit through sustained hostility and cross-border terror.
The world has changed since 1960. Climate imperatives, technological advances, clean energy needs, and Pakistan’s persistent sponsorship of terror compel a reassessment. When a nation violates the foundation of a treaty, it forfeits the right to invoke its protections.
Madam Vice President, a nation cannot sow terror and expect to reap sympathy. The world sees through Pakistan’s theatre of deception. India will continue to act with responsibility and resolve to protect its citizens, its sovereignty, and its values — as any nation must.
Thank you.
