{"id":17991,"date":"2026-03-28T22:35:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T17:35:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/?p=17991"},"modified":"2026-03-28T22:36:04","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T17:36:04","slug":"fo-calls-indias-religiou-pakistans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/2026\/03\/28\/fo-calls-indias-religiou-pakistans\/","title":{"rendered":"FO calls India&#8217;s &#8216;religious and bigoted&#8217; comments about Pakistan&#8217;s Shia community an &#8216;exercise of deviance&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3><strong>FO calls India&#8217;s &#8216;religious and bigoted&#8217; comments about Pakistan&#8217;s Shia community an &#8216;exercise of deviance&#8217; <\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/foreignofficepk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Foreign Office<\/a> (FO) on Saturday dismissed remarks by India\u2019s Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson regarding Pakistan\u2019s Shia community as \u201ccynical and diversionary,\u201d accusing New Delhi of attempting to deflect attention from its own record on minority rights.<\/p>\n<p>The statement came after Andhir Jaiswal, India\u2019s MEA spokesperson, commented on Pakistan\u2019s Shia community and army chief during his weekly briefing on Friday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPakistan rejects India\u2019s remarks as cynical and diversionary\u2014an exercise in deflection masquerading as concern,\u201d the FO said, highlighting what it described as a steady rise in discrimination and violence against Muslims, Christians, and other marginalized communities in India.<\/p>\n<p>The statement cited a wave of mob lynchings and attacks on places of worship, calling the violence \u201cdeeply abhorrent.\u201d In 2025, over 55 Muslims were reportedly lynched in India, and since January 2026, more than 19 Muslims have been killed by violent mobs. Extremist groups allegedly targeted 11 mosques, while perpetrators reportedly acted with impunity, often with state complicity.<\/p>\n<p>The FO urged India to address these \u201cserious and well-documented concerns\u201d at home, protect all religious communities under its constitutional and international obligations, and refrain from making \u201cunfounded and politically motivated statements about others.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>FO calls India&#8217;s &#8216;religious and bigoted&#8217; comments about Pakistan&#8217;s Shia community an &#8216;exercise of deviance&#8217; The Foreign Office (FO) on Saturday dismissed remarks by India\u2019s Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson regarding Pakistan\u2019s Shia community as \u201ccynical and diversionary,\u201d accusing New Delhi of attempting to deflect attention from its own record on minority rights. The statement [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":17845,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2297,2298],"tags":[3759,3776],"class_list":["post-17991","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest-news","category-pakistan","tag-fo-spokesperson-tahire-hussain-andrabi","tag-pakistans-shia"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17991","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17991"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17991\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17994,"href":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17991\/revisions\/17994"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17845"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newspulse.com.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}