The Foreign Office (FO) on Saturday dismissed the Indian Ministry of External Affairs’ (MEA) so-called “concerns” about Pakistan’s Shia community, calling the remarks “cynical and diversionary” and an “exercise in deflection masquerading as concern.”
This response follows comments by India’s MEA, which cited statements it attributed to Chief of Army Staff and Chief of Defence Forces Syed Asim Munir.
CDF Munir had met with Shia clerics in Rawalpindi earlier this month, and according to a statement issued by the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the meeting focused on national security and the role of ulema in maintaining societal harmony.
The ISPR statement added that CDF Munir emphasised that religious sentiments must not be exploited to incite violence in the country.
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The Indian MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal, as quoted by Indian news agency ANI on Friday, said that the remarks reflected Pakistan’s “systemic victimisation of minorities”.
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Responding a day later, FO spokesperson Tahir Andrabi said, “Pakistan rejects India’s remarks as cynical and diversionary — an exercise in deflection masquerading as concern.”
The foreign ministry official said that India’s comments could not “mask its own record of the steady normalisation of discrimination and violence against Muslims, Christians, and other marginalised communities — from curbs on worship to mob vigilantism and the targeting of homes and livelihoods”.
“These patterns are well-documented,” MoFA’s Andrabi said, adding, “The escalating wave of mob lynchings targeting Muslims is deeply abhorrent and underscores a climate of unchecked brutality.”
In the year 2025, more than 55 Muslims were reportedly lynched in India, and since January 2026, over 19 Muslims have been killed by violent mobs, according to the spokesperson.
“Extremist groups have unlawfully sought the destruction of 11 mosques. Perpetrators of crimes against Muslims often act with impunity, enabled by state patronage, and are seldom held to account,” he said.
“Pakistan urges India to address these serious and well-documented concerns within its own borders, ensure the protection of Muslim, Christians and other communities in accordance with its constitutional and international obligations, and refrain from making unfounded and politically motivated statements about others,” the statement concluded.
