US expects Pakistan will be responsible security stakeholder

Washington, Jun 24: The US expects Pakistan will be a responsible stakeholder on security issues and believes that India and Pakistan should resolve all their differences peacefully without any involvement of a third party, a senior American official has said.

"Our expectation continues to be that Pakistan will be a responsible stakeholder on security issues, in particular the nuclear issue," State Department spokesman John Kirby told reporters at his daily news conference yesterday.

Kirby said America was concerned about the growing tensions between India and Pakistan and it was precisely the reason US Secretary of State John Kerry spoke with Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif last week.

"You heard Secretary Kerry talk to this very issue of concerns about tensions between India and Pakistan right now and our continued belief that both sides need to work these issues out peaceably and on their own," he said.

Kerry made a call to Sharif soon after Prime Minister Narendra Modi had spoken to his Pakistani counterpart and greeted him on the eve of holy month of Ramadan.

"I talked with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif regarding a recent increase in the tensions publicly between India and Pakistan. It's of enormous concern to all of us for all the obvious reasons," Kerry had said.

"These are two very, very important countries playing a critical role with respect to regional interests, and it's very, very important that there be no misinterpretation or miscalculation with respect to any of the back-and-forth and the empowerment some entities might feel as a result of that," Kerry had told reporters in Boston.

PTI