Blitz Bureau
NEW DELHI: US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has finally reached out to the real centre of Pakistan’s power, Army Chief Asim Munir, after talks with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on May 9 to de-escalate tensions with India failed. State Department Spokesperson Tammy Bruce said on Friday, “Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke with Pakistani Army Chief Asim Munir earlier today”. The call came as Pakistan and India ratcheted up their confrontation, targeting places beyond Kashmir and further inside their territories.
“The US President wants to see the confrontation de-escalate as quickly as possible,” Donald Trump’s spokesperson Karoline Levitt said. “This is something that the secretary of state and, of course, now, as our national security advisor as well, Marco Rubio, has been very much involved in,” she said.
Bruce said that Rubio offered Munir “US assistance in starting constructive talks in order to avoid future conflicts”. She added, “He continued to urge both parties to find ways to de-escalate”. Rubio spoke to Sharif and “emphasised the need for immediate de-escalation”, Bruce said in a readout of that call. He also called India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar with a similar message urging de-escalation, while emphasising the US “commitment to work with India in the fight against terrorism”, according to the spokesperson.
After India launched ‘Operation Sindoor’, India’s National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval made the first international call to Rubio. Rubio is also the national security advisor after Mike Waltz stepped down from the job. Earlier, Bruce laid out the US priorities in dealing with the situation, saying that there should be no escalation and the two countries should talk to each other.
“America, obviously, was at the centre of this, in speaking with a variety of leaders of both countries over the last two days,” she said.
