Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan held telephone talks, discussing the current crisis in relations between Islamabad and New Delhi, the Turkish presidential press service said in a statement on Thursday.
“Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan called our President Tayyip Erdogan. During the conversation, the parties discussed the escalation of tensions between Pakistan and India in recent days”, the statement reads.
This week, tensions between India and Pakistan heightened as the two countries engaged in an air battle and lost jets in it. It followed a strike by the Indian Air Force against what it said was a camp of Jaish-e-Mohammad, considered a terrorist group by India, located on the Pakistani soil across the so-called Line of Control (LoC) separating the Indian-and Pakistani-controlled parts of the Kashmir region.
The Indian airstrike came after a deadly attack by Jaish-e-Mohammad on the Indian paramilitary police force in Kashmir on 14 February. While India has accused Pakistan of supporting the militants and having a “direct hand” in the incident, Pakistan has rejected the allegations, accusing India of being responsible for human rights violations taking place in Kashmir.
Jammu and Kashmir is a region that has been disputed by India and Pakistan since 1947 when both countries gained independence from the British Empire. The two countries have gone through three wars over the region, but the conflict has not been resolved.