India to demand action against militant groups in U.K.

By Hasan Suroor

LONDON, JAN 21. Activities of U.K.-based anti-India extremist groups are expected to figure in talks between Indian officials and British security experts in New Delhi tomorrow.

India is likely to demand action against such groups, the identity of many of whom is already known to the British Government. Although India has been consistently raising the issue, its renewed demand assumes significance in view of Britain's new tough anti-terrorism law, due to come into force next month.

The law would give the police and the Home Office sweeping powers to crack down on groups which train activists or raise funds for terrorist activities aimed at foreign countries. At present, training and fund-raising is not an offence, with the result that extremist groups have been operating with impunity.

Officials today confirmed that a team of security experts was going to India but said this was part of a regular ``dialogue'' between the two countries on a ``range'' of security-related issues. It was not related to any specific issue, they said.

Indian sources, while declining to comment on the nature of the talks, said the Indo-U.K. Joint Working Group on counter- terrorism and narcotics was due to meet in New Delhi this week. Since the objective of the group was to coordinate and strengthen cooperation in fighting terrorism, the issue of expatriate groups could come up during the talks.

The Sunday Times, meanwhile, said India was ``so angry'' about the growing activities of U.K.-based extremists that a ``private meeting has been called in the Indian capital tomorrow with representatives of the Foreign Office and MI5, the security service.'' It quoted Indian officials in New Delhi as saying that every year up to 1,800 Britons journeyed to Pakistan to take part in anti-India terrorist activities.

The British security sources, the paper said, ``disagreed'' with the Indian estimates and instead put the figure at 900. ``There are about 900 U.K. citizens who make this trip for training each year.

About 10 per cent of those stay and fight, the rest take their political and religious indoctrination and bring it back to their own communities mostly for fund- raising and recruitment,'' a source was quoted as saying.

The newspaper said it had spoken to three men in North London - all university graduates with good jobs - who claimed they had ``trained or fought in Kashmir''. One said he had just returned from Pakistan after training with ``jihad'' movements, while another said he planned to go there again next month.

``The one thing all three have in common is a fear of the Government's new anti-terrorism act... They believe it will lead to them being jailed in Britain if they continue to travel to Pakistan and Kashmir,'' the report said.

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Section  : International
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