UNITED NATIONS: UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has urged Pakistan and India to “come together and seriously discuss their problems”, reminding the two nuclear-armed countries that any military confrontation between them would be “a disaster of unmitigated proportions,” Dawn News reported.

At his first news briefing of 2021 in New York on Thursday, the UN chief also emphasised the need to “fully respect” human rights in the India-administered regions of Jammu and Kashmir, the report said.

“Now, things have not moved in the right direction. Our good offices are always available, and we will insist within it on finding peaceful solutions for problems that have no military solution,” Mr Guterres said.

“It is clear, when seeing Pakistan and India, any military confrontation between the two would be a disaster of unmitigated proportions for both countries and for the whole world,” he warned according to the report.

Mr Guterres was responding to a question by a correspondent of the APP news agency on tensions between India and Pakistan over the situation in Kashmir. The question also referred to Mr Guterres’ August 2019 statement, which called for a resolution of the Kashmir dispute in accordance with relevant UN resolutions and the UN charter.