The Congress said on Tuesday that if reports that Pakistan is one of the mediators between the US, Israel and Iran are true, it represents a “severe setback” and a “repulse” for India.
The opposition party claimed that despite India’s undoubted military successes in Operation Sindoor, the sad reality is that Pakistan’s diplomatic engagement and narrative management thereafter “were markedly superior to the Modi government”.
Congress Secretary-General for Communications Jairam Ramesh said that multiple reports in leading international media have identified Pakistan as one of the mediators used between the United States and Israel on the one hand and Iran on the other.
Ramesh said on Channel
“For more than a year, it has been abundantly clear that despite our undoubted military successes in Operation Sindoor, the sad reality is that thereafter, Pakistani diplomatic engagement and narrative management have become significantly superior to the Modi government,” he said.
Ramesh said that Pakistan, which was in a very precarious situation, politically, socially, economically and globally, got a new lease of life.
“President Trump has warmly and repeatedly embraced the man whose inflammatory and inflammatory rhetoric formed the backdrop to the Pahalgam terrorist attacks on April 22, 2025, and has hosted Field Marshal Asim Munir twice at the White House (including an unprecedented luncheon). The Pakistani establishment has developed a warm relationship with President Trump’s immediate circle,” he added.
“Mr. Modi’s ill-advised visit to Israel, which ended just two days before the unprovoked US-Israeli air attacks on Iran began, will go down in our political history as a uniquely disastrous choice — one that caused us to retreat from a position that we could and should have brokered,” the Congress leader said.
He said that the Prime Minister’s “arrogance” had been brutally exposed, adding that the country was forced to pay the price for this.
President Donald Trump said Monday that the United States is talking with a respected Iranian leader and claimed that the Islamic Republic is keen to reach a deal to end the war.
However, Trump refused to name the Iranian leader with whom the United States is talking to end the three-week-old war, stressing that the interlocutor was a prominent person who is highly respected in that country.
Speaking to reporters at Palm Beach International Airport in Florida, Trump made clear that the United States is not holding talks with the second supreme leader, referring to Ayatollah Khamenei’s son Mojtaba Khamenei.
According to reports, Iran denied holding talks with the United States, but admitted that some countries in the region were making efforts to reduce tensions.
The Axios news website quoted an American source as saying that Türkiye, Egypt and Pakistan passed messages between the United States and Iran during the past two days.
The American source told Axios that the foreign ministers of the three countries held separate talks with White House envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi.
The president said that Steve Witkoff, the US special envoy to the Middle East, and Jared Kushner spoke with their Iranian counterparts on Sunday.
However, Trump refused to reveal who Witkoff was speaking to, saying he did not want them killed.
Beginning on February 28, the United States and Israel launched a joint attack on Iran, killing Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The joint strikes came after days of escalation, with US President Donald Trump intensifying pressure on Tehran to agree to a new agreement on its nuclear program.
Iranian retaliation led to the escalation of the war throughout the Gulf region.
