Kashmir bilateral issue with Pakistan: India

​​​​​​​By Anadolu staff

India said Tuesday that any issue related to Jammu and Kashmir was a bilateral matter with Pakistan, after US President Donald Trump said he would work with the two South Asian neighbors on the decades-long dispute.

It is a "long-standing national position," Indian Foreign Ministry spokesman Randhir Jaiswal said at a news conference.

"That stated policy has not changed. The outstanding matter is the vacation of illegally occupied Indian territory by Pakistan," Jaiswal said when asked about Trump’s statement.

The US president said after he announced the ceasefire deal that he would "work with you both to see if, after a 'thousand years,' a solution can be arrived at concerning Kashmir."

Pakistan welcomed Trump's statement, which came on the heels of a US-mediated ceasefire on Saturday after days of heightened military tensions with missiles and drones fired across the borders of India and Pakistan.

Tensions rocketed between the two following an attack by unidentified gunmen which left 26 people dead, mostly Indian tourists, on April 22 at the Pahalgam tourist site in Indian-administered Kashmir.

New Delhi blamed Islamabad, which denied any role but offered a neutral probe.

Soon after, the two sides took several reciprocal diplomatic measures, including the unilateral suspension by New Delhi.of the Indus Waters Treaty, a decades-long water-sharing pact.

"India will keep the Indus Waters treaty in abeyance until Pakistan credibly and irrevocably abjures its support for cross-border terrorism," said Jaiswal.

Islamabad has warned that any attempt to divert or stop water would be deemed an "act of war."

Pakistan was yet to issue any response to latest statement by India on Tuesday.

Separately, India on Tuesday declared a Pakistani official, working at the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi, persona non grata for "indulging in activities not in keeping with his official status in India."