NEW DELHI: India on Friday warned Pakistan against using nuclear weapons as a tool of political pressure, asserting that New Delhi would not bow to nuclear blackmail and that any terrorist attack against the country would invite a fitting response.Exercising its Right of Reply at the United Nations General Assembly’s First Committee, which deals with disarmament and international security, India said nuclear weapons must not be treated as “routine instruments of statecraft”.Senior Adviser (Disarmament) at India’s Permanent Mission to the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva, Anmol Sher Singh Bedi, delivered the response following remarks by Pakistan on Jammu and Kashmir.“Jammu and Kashmir is an integral and inalienable part of India,” Bedi said, rejecting Pakistan’s claims over the region.He said India’s military capabilities were defensive in nature and shaped by its security environment, rather than directed against any particular country.“We heard concerns about escalation. These are legitimate concerns. However, these are best judged by conduct over time. Nuclear weapons must not be treated as routine instruments of statecraft,” Bedi said.He warned that relying on the threat of nuclear weapons to shield activities below the threshold of conventional warfare could increase the risk of escalation rather than promote restraint.“A posture that relies on nuclear overhang to limit the consequences of subconventional activity raises the risk of escalation and not the prospect of restraint,” he said.Bedi also outlined what he described as a recurring pattern in regional crises, involving provocation, denial of responsibility and subsequent appeals for restraint after a response.“Where those in power are neither elected by people nor accountable to them, their decisions carry no risk and impose no cost for those who take them. That is how crisis becomes an instrument of power. That is how instability becomes useful, and that is how the cycle keeps on repeating,” he said.
India reiterates three red lines
India said its position on terrorism and national security remained clear, identifying three principles that would guide its response to threats.“First, any terrorist attack against India will receive a fitting response. Second, India will not bow to nuclear blackmail. Third, India will make no distinction between those who sponsor terrorism and those who mastermind it,” Bedi said.He said India’s actions in May 2025 followed a “grave provocation” and were undertaken in self-defence after the April 22 Pahalgam terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir, in which 26 civilians, mostly tourists, were killed.“These actions were measured, targeted, and designed to be non-escalatory,” Bedi said.India launched Operation Sindoor on May 7, 2025, targeting what it described as terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir in retaliation for the Pahalgam attack. The Resistance Front, a proxy of Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba, was linked to the attack.Bedi also stressed that the use of non-state actors by a country did not absolve it of responsibility for their actions.“The use of force by states under the garb of non-state actors does not erase the state’s responsibility. India’s right of self-defense remains intact,” he said.
India raises Indus Waters Treaty, nuclear proliferation
India also referred to the Indus Waters Treaty, arguing that the agreement depended on mutual trust and cooperation between the two countries.“A state cannot undermine those foundations of trust and cooperation and at the same time insist that the privileges flowing from the relationship remain untouched,” Bedi said.Following the Pahalgam attack, India announced that the treaty would be held in abeyance until Pakistan credibly and irrevocably ended its support for cross-border and other forms of terrorism.On nuclear proliferation, Bedi invoked the legacy of Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan and the international proliferation network associated with him, which supplied nuclear equipment and expertise to countries seeking to develop nuclear weapons.
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The network contributed to international concerns that led to United Nations Security Council Resolution 1540, adopted in 2004, which requires states to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery to non-state actors.“This is relevant in the context of demands for unquestioned nuclear cooperation and transfer of advanced weapons and military capabilities. We urge all states and all responsible suppliers to exercise the highest degree of vigilance, not because of India, but for their own security,” Bedi said.
