Make up your mind on what kind of ties you want, EAM S Jaishankar tells Dhaka

NEW DELHI: After India called upon authorities in Dhaka to not spread negativity in the relationship, external affairs minister S Jaishankar again raised the issue of its hostile behaviour, saying Bangladesh has to make up its mind about what kind of a relationship it wants with India.
Speaking barely a week after a meeting with his counterpart Touhid Hossain in Muscat, the minister said Dhaka can't say it wants good relations with India and at the same time blame India for everything that goes wrong domestically.
"If every day someone in the interim govt stands up and blames India for everything, some of those things if you look at the reports, are absolutely ridiculous. You cannot, on the one hand, say I would now like to have good relations with you, but I get up every morning and blame you for everything that goes wrong. It is also a decision that they have to make," said Jaishankar, addressing a public event on Saturday.
He said there are two aspects to the problems that the

bilateral ties

are facing, the first being the

communal attacks on minorities

.

"The spate of attacks on minorities in Bangladesh, obviously it is something which impacts our thinking and it is something we have to speak up about, which we have done. The second aspect is they have their politics, but at the end of the day, the two countries are neighbours," he said.
"They have to make up their minds on what kind of relationship they want to have with us, going ahead. We have a long history with Bangladesh. We have a very special history with Bangladesh. It goes back to 1971," Jaishankar added. TNN