Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan was not alone in raising Kashmir at the United Nations General Assembly on Friday, his country’s “all-weather friend” China did so too.

Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi said the Kashmir dispute should be peacefully and properly addressed in accordance with the UN Charter, Security Council resolutions and the bilateral agreement.

China also said that no action should be taken that would “unilaterally change the status quo”, an obvious allusion to the revocation of Jammu and Kashmir’s special status and its scheduled bifurcation to create the Union Territory of Ladakh.

“The Kashmir issue, a dispute left from the past, should be peacefully and properly addressed in accordance with the UN Charter, Security Council resolutions and bilateral agreement,” Wang said.

“No actions that would unilaterally change the status quo should be taken. As a neighbour of both India and Pakistan, China hopes to see the dispute effectively managed and stability restored to the relationship between the two sides.”

Reacting to this on Saturday, foreign ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar objected to China’s reference to Kashmir. “The Chinese side is well aware of India’s position that Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh are an integral part of India, and that the recent developments are entirely a matter internal to us,” he said.

“We expect that other countries will respect India’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and desist from efforts to change the status quo through the illegal, so-called China-Pakistan Economic Corridor in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.”