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NEW DELHI: Union minister Kiren Rijiju on Wednesday asked whether those who questioned India’s stand on third-party mediation on bilateral issues during Operation Sindoor would now apologise, after Pakistan acknowledged that New Delhi had refused any third-party involvement in talks.”Pakistan says that India rejected 3rd party role during Operation Sindoor. Will the people who ran a campaign to undermine India’s image apologize?” Rijiju posted on X. His remarks came a day after Pakistan’s deputy prime minister and foreign minister Mohammad Ishaq Dar stated that India had categorically turned down any mediation in resolving bilateral issues during Operation Sindoor. Dar admitted that India had rejected any third-party mediation, contradicting Trump’s claims of US-brokered peace between the two neighbors.Dar, who also holds the post of Pakistan’s deputy prime minister, made the comments in an interview with Al Jazeera in Doha.Asked about the possibility of talks with India and Pakistan’s position on third-party mediation, Dar said, “We don’t mind, but India has categorically been stating it’s a bilateral matter…”He recalled that during his meeting with US secretary of state Marco Rubio in July, he had raised the issue of dialogue with India, and the American official told him that India’s stand has consistently been that it is a “bilateral issue.” “When I met Rubio on July 25 in Washington, I asked him what happened to the dialogue? He (Rubio) said that India says it is a bilateral issue,” Dar recalled.US President Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed that he brokered a ceasefire between the two nuclear-armed neighbours.India maintains that it does not want any third-party involvement in its discussions with Pakistan on issues such as terrorism, as New Delhi believes they must remain bilateral.Tensions between India and Pakistan soared after terrorists killed 26 people, mostly civilians, in Jammu and Kashmir’s Pahalgam on April 22.India launched Operation Sindoor on May 7, targeting terror infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir in retaliation for the Pahalgam attack.India and Pakistan reached an understanding on May 10 to end the conflict after four days of intense cross-border drone and missile strikes.
