US counters Masood Azhar in UN, China warns, says, 'Act cautiously'

As the international pressure mounts on China to declare Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Masood Azhar ‘a global terrorist,’ the United States has started to initiate the moving of a resolution but China has issued warnings.

China, in a statement has said that, the move by the US will only “complicate” the matter and it is being seen as a hint that China might maintain the position over the issue and keep the block active.

The spokesman in the Foreign Ministry of China, Geng Shuang, said, “This is not in line with resolution of the issue through dialogue and negotiations. This has reduced the authority of the committee as a main anti-terrorism body of the UNSC and this is not conducive to the solidarity and only complicates the issue. We urge the US to act cautiously and avoid forcefully moving forward this resolution draft.”

Earlier, the US, the UK and the France had moved a draft resolution to blacklist Pakistan based terrorist Masood Azhar under the 1267 committee of the council. But, due to the technical hold of China, the atempt could not succeed. India had support of 13 major nations across the globe, who have issued statements saying they want a ban on Jaish operative Masood.

In a post on Twitter, the US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said, “The world cannot afford China’s shameful hypocrisy toward Muslims. On one hand, China abuses more than a million Muslims at home, but on the other it protects violent Islamic terrorist groups from sanctions at the UN.”

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