BENGALURU, Oct 30: The best way forward for India and Pakistan to normalise their relations and ensure peace between the two countries can be achieved through normalising the Line of Control and ‘working boundary’, Pakistan High Commissioner in India Abdul Basit today advocated.
Speaking at the meet-the-press programme organised by Press Club of Bengaluru, he said the Nawaz Sharif Government was committed to honmour the ‘understanding’ arrived bewteen then Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and Pakistani ruler Parvez Musharaff.
”This understanding is acceptable to the present Government and it will honour it as such international understandings are arrived in true spirit of bilateral relations and no politics can be involved in such serious matters,” he stressed.
However, India had rejected any such offers of formalising the LoC or the two countries borders and even the US Government, then had expressed its reservations. Mr Basit refused to accept the reports that Pakistan was repeatedly violating ceasefire agreement on LoC but accused India of doing it. ”We stand by the 2003 ceasefire agreement between the two nations but it was the Indian army that violated the agreement and there had been 400 such violations since than that led to the killing of 40 Pakistani armymen and civilians,” he claimed.
He strongly argued that Vajpayee-Mushraff understanding should be formalised and India accept to a ‘third party’ (United Nations) monitoring of the LoC, which India had repeatedly rejected. ”There are already UN observers present on either side of the boundaries and they have a mandate. But it is time that India recognise the old understanding. If it wants to upgrade it (the understanding), we would like to hear it with an open mind,” he stated.
The envoy said the Pakistan Government had again forwarded a similar proposal and the Indian Government should act. He reiterated that noted criminal Dawood Ibrahim was not sheltered in Pakistan and the country did not know about his whereabouts.
”Even India is not sure where he is. We cannot come to a conclusion on statements made on the TV channels. India should come with concrete evidence,” he added. (UNI)
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