Narendra Modi asked to step in as India erupts in fury over Donald Trump’s Kashmir mediation claims

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is facing demands to address a claim by the US president that he had asked Washington to mediate in the long-running dispute with Pakistan over Kashmir

The issue is a sore point for India, which has for years championed a bilateral approach, while Pakistan favours third-party mediation

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Published: 7:49pm, 23 Jul 2019Updated: 10:33pm, 23 Jul 2019

Anger spilled in India’s parliament on Tuesday as opposition leaders demanded that Prime Minister Narendra Modi clarify his position about US President Donald Trump mediating in India’s long-running dispute with neighbouring Pakistan over Kashmir.

Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar was forced to issue a strenuous denial in the upper house of Parliament, saying Modi made no such request to Trump as the US president had claimed.

“I’d like to categorically assure the house that no such request was made by the prime minister to the US president,” Jaishankar told the Indian parliament, barely able to make his voice heard over the opposition tumult.

He insisted the conflict could only be settled bilaterally and that Pakistan had to end “cross-border terrorism” before any talks.

Trump set off a political storm in India by claiming during a meeting with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan on Monday that Modi had asked him two weeks ago to mediate in the Kashmir dispute.