In response to a statement by the Indian defense minister, Pakistan on Sunday said that it is "fully prepared" to respond to Indian aggression, but will continue to act responsibly and work to promote peace.
"While fully prepared to respond to India's provocations and irresponsible behavior, Pakistan will continue to act responsibly and contribute to all efforts for promoting peace," read a statement issued by the Foreign Office.
It said that Pakistan "strongly rejects highly irresponsible, provocative and gratuitous remarks by the Indian Defense Minister threatening Pakistan".
On Saturday Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh said: "Pakistan makes all efforts to destabilize peace in India but we have sent a clear message to them that we will hit back."
"This is a new and powerful India," Singh added, while addressing a public gathering in Uttarakhand's Pithoragarh.
The Foreign Office, in its statement, said that his unfounded remarks "are delusional on the one hand, and reflective of India's characteristic hostility towards its neighbors on the other".
"India's smear campaign against Pakistan has been totally exposed and discredited. It has no takers in the international community," said the statement.
The Foreign Office said that it is no secret that Indian leaders "engage in falsehoods and fantasies while pointing fingers at neighbors including Pakistan".
Human rights violations in Kashmir
It added that in doing so India wants to divert the attention of the international community from the widespread violations of human rights and international humanitarian law committed by Indian occupation forces in Indian-controlled Jammu and Kashmir.
"Indian occupation forces have been committing egregious human rights violations and grave crimes against innocent Kashmiris in India-occupied Jammu Kashmir including extra-judicial killings, custodial deaths, torture, arbitrary detentions, using people including innocent children as human shield, and collective punishment by demolishing homes," the statement underscored.
It went on to state that the Dossier presented by Pakistan to the international community in September 2021 "contains incontrovertible evidence of the gross and systematic human rights violations and crimes against humanity by Indian occupation forces in India-occupied Jammu and Kashmir".
The Foreign Office said that the Indian government's frustration is evident from the fact that despite its unabated state-terrorism in India-occupied Jammu and Kashmir, it has "utterly failed to silence the peaceful voices of Kashmiris" demanding their right to self-determination promised to them by the United Nations Security Council in its various resolutions.
Kashmir tensions high after deaths of men 'used as human shields'
Tellingly, tensions in Kashmir remained on a knife edge Saturday after a shootout by the Indian authorities this week left four people dead, with families alleging the gunfight was staged and that police used innocent civilians as a "human shield".
Police initially described the incident, which took place last Monday when officers raided a shopping complex, as a counter-insurgency operation in which two 'militants' and their associates had been killed in a shootout.
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