Moscow:
The recent conflict between India and Pakistan was among the issues discussed during a phone call between Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump, according to a Kremlin aide.
During their conversation on Wednesday, the two leaders discussed Ukraine and also touched on some other issues, Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov told a briefing.
“They also touched upon the Middle East and the armed conflict between India and Pakistan, which was stopped with the personal participation of President Trump,” Ushakov was quoted as saying by Russia’s state-run TASS news agency.
Ushakov, however, didn’t share the details.
Trump has repeatedly claimed that he stopped India and Pakistan from fighting.
However, India has been maintaining that the understanding on cessation of hostilities with Pakistan was reached following direct talks between the Directors General of Military Operations (DGMOs) of the two militaries.
Meanwhile, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has urged President Putin to assist in resolving the conflict with India, his special aide Syed Tariq Fatemi said.
Fatemi, who met Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Moscow on Tuesday, handed over a letter from Sharif for Putin.
His visit came days after a highly successful tour of a multi-party parliamentary delegation led by DMK MP Kanimozhi Karunanidhi, who spread awareness about Pakistan-sponsored cross-border terrorism and got solid Russian backing for India’s zero-tolerance policy against terrorism.
“I met with Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov. I gave him a letter from our prime minister to Mr. Putin. We asked…[him] to use his influence to make sure that India and Pakistan sit down at the negotiating table and reach a diplomatic solution,” Fatemi said on Wednesday.
He also emphasised that Pakistan awaits any initiative from Russia that would help reduce the degree of tension with India, TASS reported.
“We are here to see support from Russia to any initiative that would ease tensions. Pakistan and India must sit down at the negotiating table,” he was quoted as saying by the Russian news agency.
“We are ready to sit down with them at the negotiating table and let them solve the problem,” he added.
Tensions between India and Pakistan escalated after the Pahalgam terror attack, with India carrying out precision strikes on terror infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir in the early hours of May 7.
Pakistan attempted to attack Indian military bases on May 8, 9, and 10. The Indian side responded strongly to the Pakistani actions.
The on-ground hostilities ended with an understanding of stopping the military actions following talks between the directors general of military operations of both sides on May 10.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
