Pakistan Scraps C'wealth Meet

The venue for Commonwealth Parliamentary Union meeting was on 20 August, 2015 shifted to New York after Pakistan announced that it would not host the meet due to tensions with India as the latter was adamant on sending the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly Speaker Kavinder Gupta. Pakistan’s National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq announced that Islamabad pulled out as the host for the 61st Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference (CPC) as India insisted on the participation of J&K Assembly speaker. Earlier, India had threatened to boycott the nine-day CPC that was to be held in Islamabad from 30 September after Pakistan refused to invite Jammu and Kashmir Assembly speaker for the meet.

  • The international conference brings together “parliamentarians and their staff [from Commonwealth nations] to identify benchmarks of good governance”. In 2015, 53 countries and 550 delegates had confirmed their participation.
  • Three South Asian states, including India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, had earlier hosted the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA), which was formed in 1911 as the British Empire’s parliamentary association with the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, Newfoundland, New Zealand and South Africa as its initial members.

India’s Stand on Terrorism

It is apparent that India has climbed down from its earlier stated positions that talks and terror cannot go together or India will talk only on terror. At the same time India has let it be known that talk on terror remains top priority and Pakistan must take action against those who are responsible for acts of terrorism against India, and that there is no role for any third party in resolving India-Pakistan issues which are purely bilateral in nature.

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