The United States on Saturday approved the appointment of Masood Khan as Pakistan’s new ambassador, three months after the latter’s appointment by the federal government.

According to a source within the diplomatic community, “US has approved the appointment of Ambassador Masood Khan as Pakistan’s new Envoy to the United States and has granted him the diplomatic agreement commonly known as Agreema.”

The development comes a couple of days after a few media reports, which reported the delay in Masood’s appointment to the country. Masood, who served as Azad Jammu and Kashmir’s president till last August, was nominated as ambassador to the US in November. He had previously served as Pakistan’s permanent representative to the United Nations in Geneva and New York and as envoy to China.

Later in the day, Foreign Office spokesperson Asim Iftikhar Ahmad had said: "The US government has conveyed its Agre’ment to the appointment of Sardar Masood Khan as the Ambassador of Pakistan to the United States."

The statement added that Ambassador Masood was a seasoned diplomat, who has served Pakistan with "distinction and honour." He would assume his responsibilities in Washington DC. in due course of time, it read.

Reacting to the news about the delay in his appointment, the Foreign Office spokesperson Asim Iftikhar Ahmad on February 1 said that India was using “fake news to make baseless” allegations.

“This is a part of the wider Indian disinformation campaign to malign Pakistan and those who represent Pakistan, by using fake news to make scandalous claims and baseless allegations,” FO spokesperson Iftikhar was quoted as saying in a statement.

He was responding to a question about the reports carried by “Indian media” on the government’s decision to appoint Masood as Pakistan’s envoy to the US.

The official handout read that Ambassador Masood was a “highly accomplished” diplomat with 40 years of experience in both multilateral and bilateral diplomacy. “His Agrement is being processed in the US system.”