Shashi Tharoor, a senior Congress lawmaker and veteran diplomat, has praised the United States‘ designation of The Resistance Front (TRF), a proxy of the Pakistan-based LeT, as a worldwide terrorist organization. On Saturday, the MP from Thiruvananthapuram expressed optimism that the ruling will strengthen international pressure on Pakistan to take action against terrorist groups that operate within its borders.
Following the horrific assault in Pahalgam on April 22 that killed 26 people, US President Donald Trump made a forceful plea for justice.
“I welcome the US @StateDept’s designation of TheResistanceFront, the Lashkar proxy that claimed credit for #Pahalgam, as a terrorist organization, adding pressure on Pakistan to curb its activities & bring it to heel,” Shashi Tharoor tweeted on social networking site X.
Tharoor discussed his observations from recent discussions in Washington in a different post.
The Congress MP said, “When I asked people directly in my private conversations in Washington why the United States was still allowing Pakistan to get away with providing a safe haven to terrorist organizations, I was pointed to Pakistan’s alleged cooperation with the United States on counter-terror operations, particularly the recent surrender of the individual allegedly responsible for the Abbey Gate bombing that had killed 23 US Marines at Kabul Airport.”
“Our skepticism about the quality and sincerity of Pakistani actions against terrorism reflects our own experience with those terror agencies that are directed against us, rather than those that the US deems hostile, such as ISIS–Khorasan,” Tharoor continued, emphasizing the need for consistent international action. This is a step in the right direction to close the perceived gap between the US and us on this issue. Additionally, it will support our attempts to list TRF at the UN.
The Pahalgam incident, the biggest terrorist attack on Indian civilians since the 2008 Mumbai bombings, was attributed to the TRF. In order to convey condolences and to reaffirm US support for prosecuting the offenders, US President Trump personally called Prime Minister Narendra Modi after the incident.
TRF was officially added to the list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs) and Specially Designated Global Terrorists (SDGTs) on Thursday by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
Rubio had stated, “This action demonstrates the Trump Administration’s commitment to countering terrorism, protecting our national security interests, and enforcing President Trump’s call for justice for the Pahalgam attack.”
During recent talks with Rubio and the Quad foreign ministers’ meeting in Washington, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar brought up the matter, highlighting India’s demand for concerted international action against terror proxies such as TRF.
Last month, Shashi Tharoor led an all-party parliamentary delegation to Washington to inform US officials and lawmakers on the role of TRF and Pakistan’s ongoing support for terror infrastructure. The designation is being praised as a significant advancement in holding state sponsors of terrorism accountable and as a turning point in India-US counterterrorism collaboration.
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