PAKISTAN MILITARY CHIEF REACHES OUT TO US/UK/AUS TOP BRASS AMID STANDOFF WITH INDIA

Any geopolitic fags can give us a run down on this situation?

Islamabad: Pakistan's army chief, Qamar Javed Bajwa, has spoken with top military officials from Australia, Britain and the United States, a military spokesman said, amid a volatile stand-off with neighbour India in Kashmir.

The Pakistani spokesman, Major General Asif Ghafoor, said in a tweet that Bajwa had discussed the stand-off and "its impact on peace & stability in the region" in a call with US CENTCOM Commander General Joseph Votel as well as with top British and Australian military figures on Friday.

Bajwa told them Pakistan would "surely respond to any aggression in self-defence", according to the Twitter post.

Ghafoor said Bajwa had also spoken by phone with the ambassadors of China, Britain and the US.

It is unclear whether countries were asked to make a military contribution to Pakistan's side of the conflict.

The news comes as Pakistan on Friday night, local time, released the Indian pilot it had captured when it downed two Indian planes on Wednesday.

Pakistani officials brought the pilot, identified as Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman, to the border crossing with India at Wagah and handed him back to India.

On the Indian side of the border, Indian officials greeted the pilot who was in a dark blue suit, accompanied by a representative of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Islamabad has said that the handover was a gesture of peace that could defuse tensions and avoid another war between the two nuclear-armed neighbours.

https://amp.smh.com.au/world/asia/pakistani-army-chief-reaches-out-to-australia-uk-20190302-p511bx.html