Pakistan has underscored the need for strengthening the United Nations Observer Mission in India and Pakistan so that it plays a more effective role in preserving peace and security along the Line of Control in the disputed Kashmir region.

Pakistani delegate Ansar Shah told the UN Special Committee on Peacekeeping Operations that Pakistan has always fulfilled its commitments in the implementation of UNMOGIP’s mandate.

He said while Pakistan allows UN observers to monitor the LoC, India does not.

Ansar Shah sharply reacted to India’s military advisor to the Indian Mission to the UN Colonel Tarunendra Pratap Singh’s remarks, declaring that Jammu and Kashmir is not, never has been, and will never be an integral part of India.

He asserted that Jammu and Kashmir is  a disputed territory, whose ‘final disposition’ is to be decided by the people of Jammu and Kashmir through a UN supervised plebiscite, as demanded by numerous resolutions of the Security Council.

UNMOGIP was deployed in January 1949 to supervise the ceasefire between Pakistan and India in Jammu and Kashmir.