New York:
Indian-American Republican leader Nikki Haley said on Thursday that India had “every right” to retaliate and defend itself after the Pahgam terror attack, saying that Pakistan does not get to play “victims”.
India launched Operation Sindoor in vengeance for a terrorist attack in Pahgam in Jammu and Kashmir in which 26 civilians were killed.
As part of the operation, India hit nine terrorist camps in Pakistan and Pakistan -occupied Kashmir with missiles and drones.
Haley said in a post on X, “Terrorists started an attack, killing dozens of Indian citizens. India had full right to retaliate and defend. Pakistan did not have to play the role of the victim. No country does not get to support terrorist activity,” Haley said in a post on X.
Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri told reporters in New Delhi that the Indian Army launched a “measured, non-esclery, proportional and responsible” strike to destroy the terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan, which “to reduce and evacuate any further terrorist attacks”.
Addressing a packed press conference, Misri said that it was considered necessary that the criminals and planners of the April 22 attack be brought for justice, as there was no “demonstable” step from Islamabad to take action against the terrorist infrastructure in his region or region.
Haley is a former Governor of South Carolina and served as an US ambassador to the United Nations during Donald Trump’s first presidential post.
She was the first Indian-American appointed for a cabinet level position in US administration.
In 2023, he officially announced his candidature for the 2024 presidential election, but retreated from the race in March last year.
In his campaign, Haley said that if he was voted in power, the US would not pay hundreds of million dollars to “bad people” like Pakistan.
He said, “A weak America pays bad people: Pakistan, Iraq and Zimbabwe last year hundreds of millions of people. A strong America will not be the world’s ATM,” he said.
In an up-ed at the New York Post, he said that as an US ambassador to the United Nations, he strongly supported President Trump’s decision to cut Pakistan’s military aid of about 2 billion USD as that country supported terrorists who killed American soldiers.
(Except for the headline, the story has not been edited by NDTV employees and is published by a syndicated feed.)
