External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar has said that Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK) is a part of India and expects to have “physical jurisdiction” over the territory one day.

Addressing his first press conference after assuming office in the Modi 2.0 government in May, Jaishankar hit out at Pakistan, saying India has a “unique challenge” from one neighbour and it would remain a challenge until that neighbour becomes a normal one and acts against cross-border terrorism.

He also made it clear that with Pakistan, the issue is not Article 370; the issue is cross-border terrorism and the first thing that has to come to table for any talks with Pakistan has to be the terrorism issue.

Asked about remarks by some ministers that henceforth talks with Pakistan would be only about PoK and not on Kashmir, Jaishankar said, “Our position has, is and will always be very clear on PoK, that it is a part of India and we expect one day we will have physical jurisdiction over it.”

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Vice-President M. Venkaiah Naidu have made statements in this regard in the recent past after Pakistan sought to internationalise the Kashmir issue in the wake of abrogation of Article 370.

Amid concerns expressed by some countries and the UN human rights organisation over the situation in Kashmir, Jaishankar said the international audience understands what were India’s reasons for abrogating Article 370.

“It was a temporary provision which is not often used in the analysis of events. The provision had actually become dysfunctional. It was being arbitraged by some narrow set of people for their own gains. By doing so they were impeding development and feeding a sense of separatism. The separatism was being utilised by Pakistan to carry out cross-border terrorism,” he said.

Asserting that India’s position on Kashmir has been clear since 1972 and it is not going to change, he said, “Beyond a point, don’t worry too much about what people will say on Kashmir. There is a complete predictability about my position... At the end of the day, it is my issue. On my issue, my position has prevailed and will prevail.”

Last month, the government abrogated Article 370 from Jammu and Kashmir to withdraw its special status as well as announced bifurcation of the state into two Union territories - Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh. This move was criticised by Pakistan with its prime minister Imran Khan making highly provocative anti-India rhetoric.

On Khan’s remarks that there is no point talking to India, Jaishankar said part of the problem with Pakistan is that it has only been talking and not doing anything on terrorism.

“They think nice words are an answer to the real problem. The real problem is the dismantling of this (terror) industry that they have created. Show me a country in the world which will accept that its neighbour can conduct terrorism and then it will go and talk to that neighbour. Our position is completely normal, rational. They are the people whose behaviour is a set of aberration. The abnormality is theirs,” he added.

Talking about the performance of the ministry in the first 100 days, he said, one of the key achievements of the government in this period has been a strong connection between national security and foreign policy goals.

He said India’s ability and appetite to shape the foreign agenda is much more than before. “In big debates like G20, BRICS, Indian views are now heard more clearly,” he said.

On Indo-US ties, he said the “trajectory” of the relationship has been “upwards” amid various administrations in Washington, be it Bush, Obama and now Trump.

Responding to a question on commerce, he said the trade problem between the two countries is “normal”.

“As the relationship grows, there will be problems... the only way you don’t have trade problems is when you do not trade,” he said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be on a six-day visit to the US, beginning September 22.