Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari has issued a fresh warning to India over the Indus Waters Treaty fallout with India after April 22 Pahalgam attack. He said that India was using the river as a “weapon”, adding that it was Pakistan’s “lifeline” and the people living by these rivers wanted “peace by dignity” and not “submission”. “Pakistan must speak clearly. The Indus is not a pressure point. The Indus is not a bargaining chip. The Indus is not a weapon to be placed in India’s hands. The Indus is a lifeline of Pakistan. And any attempt to turn that lifeline into a noose must be treated as a threat to the survival of our state. This is the message that Pakistan must deliver to India,” ANI quoted Bhutto as saying.“India had not honoured its commitments, using water resources as a weapon was dangerous,” he added.“We want peace, but peace with dignity. We want dialogue, but dialogue under law. We want coexistence, but not submission. So from this seminar, from this city, from this moment let a message go forth. Pakistan will defend its water, its people, its treaty, its sovereignty and its future,” he said.This comes a day after Pakistan’s climate change minister Musadik Malik warned of “cutting off those hands” that attempted to “touch our water”.Pakistan’s information minister Attaullah Tarar further said that “there is a tap being controlled by the prime minister of a neighbouring country. He says he will not let even a drop of water flow into Pakistan.”The remarks by Pakistan’s leadership come after India suspended the 1960 water-sharing agreement following the Pakistan-linked terror attack in Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir, that killed 26 civilians. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said last year that “blood and water cannot flow together,” asserting that the treaty will remain in abeyance until Islamabad takes credible and verifiable action against terrorist groups operating from its territory.
