"No accommodation to terrorism": Jaishankar at G20 Foreign Ministers' Meeting stresses "reforming multilateralism"

World Friday 26/September/2025 10:51 AM
By: ANI
"No accommodation to terrorism": Jaishankar at G20 Foreign Ministers' Meeting stresses "reforming multilateralism"

New York : External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, addressing the Second G20 Foreign Ministers' Meeting in New York on Thursday, underlined the need for global unity against terrorism and called for urgent reforms in multilateral institutions, including the United Nations.

"A persistent threat to development is that perennial disruptor of peace - terrorism. It is imperative that the world display neither tolerance nor accommodation to terrorist activities. Given the extensive networking amongst terrorists, those who act against them on any front actually render a larger service to the international community as a whole," Jaishankar said.

Highlighting the multiple crises confronting the global order, the minister pointed to the failures of existing multilateral frameworks. "As we confront conflict, economic pressures and terrorism, the limitations of multilateralism and the United Nations in particular are visible. The need for reforming multilateralism has never been greater," he noted.

Jaishankar also urged the grouping to take greater responsibility amid global turbulence. "Colleagues, the international situation is today both politically and economically volatile. We, as members of G20 have a particular responsibility to strengthen its stability and give it a more positive direction. That is best done by undertaking dialogue and diplomacy, by firmly combating terrorism and by appreciating the need for stronger energy and economic security," he said.

His remarks at the G20 forum came against the backdrop of his earlier warning on July 1, when he had made it clear that India would not bow to threats or indirect coercion. On that occasion, he said India is "not going to yield to nuclear blackmail," stressing that New Delhi would no longer accept terrorists being used as proxies while the governments that support and finance them go unpunished. He had further asserted that terrorists will be treated with "no impunity" and that India "will do what needs to be done to defend its people."

"We are not going to yield to nuclear blackmail that you know there could be escalation, and therefore we should not do anything," Jaishankar said in an interview to Newsweek in Manhattan.

Jaishankar called it an "act of warfare" aimed at destroying tourism in Kashmir, which he said was the mainstay of the economy. 

Asked about India's message to global powers and international institutions on  terrorism , he said, "This morning, I was at an exhibition on terrorism at the United Nations, and this was something which our embassy, our mission to the UN, had organised and the reason we did that, we had a number of ambassadors from other countries who were there as well is because we believe that terrorism is actually a threat to everybody, that no country should use it as an instrument to further its policies because at the end of the day it comes back to bite everyone."

"If we take the view that one terrorist act or one terrorist organization or one sponsor of terrorism is justified here or you give them a free pass or you underplay it, it can easily happen, in fact, it does happen in other situations. The message to the world has to be that there should be zero tolerance for terrorism, that there should be no circumstances, no excuse, no justification, under which you would allow, support, finance, sponsor terrorist acts."

"Now in our particular case, we've unfortunately had an experience of this. The experience has been very very intense for the last four decades but actually started from the time of our independence," Jaishankar said.

"We have battled terrorism really intensively for the last four decades and and we've had some horrific cases. Everybody would remember the Mumbai attack and where really a major global metropolis was for a few days really sort of brought to a standstill with attacks on a scale which could not be contemplated and with particularly targeted foreigners especially of this country. And we've had an attack on our parliament, our parliament meeting in session, with the intent of taking lawmakers and the people governing India hostage at that time. That it was foiled was a different matter but do look at the dangerous intent and the risks inherent in this," the External Affairs Minister said.

Emphasising India's stance on dealing with terrorism, Jaishankar said, "We are very clear, there will be no impunity for terrorists that we will not deal with them any longer as proxies and spare the government which supports and finances and in many ways motivates them."

Jaishankar emphasized that India will not be deterred by the threat of nuclear weapons when it comes to responding to cross-border attacks.

"We will not allow nuclear blackmail to prevent us from responding because we've also heard this for too long that you know you are both nuclear countries therefore the other guy will come and do horrible things but you mustn't do anything because it gets the world worried. Now we're not going to fall for that you know if he's going to come and do things we are going to go there and also you know hit the people who did this. So, no yielding to nuclear blackmail, no impunity to terrorists, no more free pass that they are proxies and we will do what we have to do to defend our people," Jaishankar said.