Pak ministers fumble on global media and make false claims, get fact-checked

The terror attack in Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir, which killed 26 people, mostly tourists, has left Pakistan red-faced on the international stage.

As India launched retaliatory military strikes targeting terror infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir, codenamed Operation Sindoor, hitting Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad camps, Pakistani ministers scrambled to control the damage, but fumbled badly on global television.

They have been facing a storm of international embarrassment, not just over the country’s continued patronage of terrorism, but also for their gaffes on live television.

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Defence minister’s gaffe

Pakistan’s defence minister Khawaja Asif made an unsubstantiated claim during an interview with CNN, asserting that Pakistan shot down five Indian jets, including Rafales, during Operation Sindoor.

When pressed for evidence, Asif pointed vaguely to “Indian social media” and images circulating online. “It is all on social media, and Indian social media, not our social media. The debris of the jets fell on their side. It is all over the Indian media,” Asif told the journalist

However, India’s Press Information Bureau quickly fact-checked and debunked the claim, revealing that the image used by Pakistani social media handles was from a 2021 IAF MiG-21 fighter jet crash in Punjab, unrelated to the current conflict.

Asif further added that while Pakistan was attempting to avoid a full-blown war, it was “ready” for an all-out conflict.

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Information minister cornered

Adding to the embarrassment, Pakistan’s information and broadcasting minister Attaullah Tarar faced sharp questioning during a Sky News interview with journalist Yalda Hakim.

During the interview, Tarar faced repeated fact-checks and rebuttals while trying to defend Pakistan’s position.

As Tarar insisted that Pakistan harboured no terrorist camps and was itself a victim of terrorism, Hakim pointedly reminded him that his own colleague, Khawaja Asif, had admitted just a week earlier that Pakistan had historically supported terror groups as proxies against India.

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Hakim also cited previous statements made by former leaders like Pervez Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto and even quoted Bilawal Bhutto’s recent admission that supporting terror outfits had historically been part of Pakistan’s policy.

With no convincing reply, Tarar fell back on post-9/11 rhetoric and even invited Hakim to visit Pakistan. His final statement was a hard-hitting reminder: “Let’s not forget, Osama bin Laden, the mastermind behind 9/11, was found hiding in Abbottabad, right there in Pakistan.”