Ex-Pak PM's granddaughter Fatima Bhutto seeks release of IAF pilot; says ‘don’t want to see soldiers die’

Fatima Bhutto, author and granddaughter of former Pakistan Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto on Wednesday urged Pak PM Imran Khan government to release an Indian Air Force pilot captured after air combat.

The IAF Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman was captured by Pakistan on Wednesday after he ejected safely from his MiG 21 Bison aircraft but landed across the Line of Control. Following which India has cautioned Pakistan and demanded "immediate and safe return" of the pilot.

"I and many other young Pakistanis have called upon our country to release the captured Indian pilot as a gesture of our commitment to peace, humanity and dignity," Ms Bhutto, wrote in an op-ed in the New York Times.

"We have spent a lifetime at war. I do not want to see Pakistani soldiers die. I do not want to see Indian soldiers die. We cannot be a subcontinent of orphans," said 36-year-old Fatima Bhutto niece of Pakistan's former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.

"My generation of Pakistanis have fought for the right to speak, and we are not afraid to lend our voices to that most righteous cause: peace," said the daughter of Murtaza Bhutto.

"But our long history with military dictatorships and experience of terrorism and uncertainty means that my generation of Pakistanis has no tolerance, no appetite, for jingoism or war," she said.

"I have never seen my country at peace with its neighbour. But never before have I seen a war played out between two nuclear-armed states with Twitter accounts," Ms Bhutto said.

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