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Pakistan Says Extradition Not One-Way Traffic
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| Musharraf
says extradition is not one-track
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By IOL correspondent Zafarul-Islam Khan
NEW
DELHI, Jan. 20 (Islamonline) – Pakistan informed India that the extradition
issue will not be a one-way affair since India must also hand over Pakistani
nationals who have taken shelter in New Delhi after committing violence and
crimes in Pakistan.
Pakistan’s
President, General Pervez Musharraf, raised this issue in his interview with CNN
Saturday.
The News, a Karachi daily, reported Saturday that
Islamabad will present its most wanted list from India which includes members of
criminal and terrorist outfits who have fled to India.
Pakistan
has been claiming for years that these groups have training facilities and safe
houses across the border.
Islamabad
has also claimed over the years that the Indian intelligence RAW is responsible
for many incidents of violence and sabotage in Pakistan.
India
refused in the past to extradite a top Pakistani bureaucrat who is wanted in
Pakistan on corruption charges.
Musharraf
has refused to come up with any new “initiatives” to ease tension with
India. He said in his CNN interview that it was “high time he (Indian
Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee) takes some initiative also.”
Musharraf
said that Indian nationals wanted by New Delhi are nowhere in Pakistan. “There
is no cause for any of the two countries to shelter criminals from across the
border,” he said.
There
are unverified reports that India has already started to de-escalate by
withdrawing troops from the borders but the official stand remains that no
de-escalation will take place until Pakistan accepts the two main Indian
conditions: extradition of India's most wanted on the list of 20 and stoppage of
infiltration into the Indian part of Kashmir.
India’s
Home Minister, LK Advani, reiterated this demand Saturday night during a seminar
in Delhi.
In
the meantime, Daily Pioneer, which has emerged as the unofficial
organ of the ruling BJP, claimed Sunday that Musharraf will hand over the
underworld don, Dawood Ibrahim, to India within a fortnight.
Ibrahim
is believed to be living in Karachi after fleeing from India where his mafia
group, thought to be the biggest in India, is still active.
The
newspaper quoted “top sources” in the government as saying that U.S.
Secretary of State, Colin Powell, has assured India that if all goes well,
Islamabad could hand over Dawood within the coming fortnight.
The
paper added that if Dawood is extradited and other terrorists are put on trial
in Pakistan, New Delhi might review its decision and send back the Indian High
Commission to Islamabad.
Indian
media has claimed that Pakistan has transferred the Indians on the list to safe
places in Orakzai near Peshawar. Some other reports have claimed that these
people have now left Pakistan for other destinations.
India
has demanded a list of all the Kashmiris who have infiltrated into the Indian
part of Kashmir from Pakistan, according to a report published today by the
Karachi-based The News. The U.S. government is relaying Indian
demands to Islamabad.
The
Indian government has made it clear to the U.S. authorities that unless all its
demands, especially concerning Kashmir, are met, they will not withdraw their
forces from the Indian-Pakistani border and will continue to pressurize
Islamabad.
The
newest of these demands is that Pakistan must provide details of all the
fighters, who reportedly entered into held Kashmir from the Pakistani side.
This
demand, the sources said, was conveyed by Powell. According to the newspaper,
Pakistan has taken a firm stand on its position and clearly refused to oblige
India saying it had no such lists available as it never supported any armed
struggle in Kashmir militarily. Therefore, no question of such lists arises.
The sources said that Islamabad had sharply
reacted to this 'indecent' Indian demand complaining to the U.S. authorities
that Pakistan was being pushed against the wall by the Indians who had now
started to make every kind of demands irrespective of its genuineness and impact
on Islamabad.
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