The Hindu : 'Enough evidence given to Pak.'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Mar 25, 2002

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'Enough evidence given to Pak.'

By Vinay Kumar

NEW DELHI, MARCH 24. Notwithstanding the claim by the Pakistani authorities that India had not provided ``concrete evidence'' against those named in the list of 20 wanted terrorists and criminals, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) today maintained that the evidence given to Islamabad was enough for taking action.

Well-placed CBI sources said that a number of those in New Delhi's list were Indian nationals and that there should be no difficulty in deporting them. Sources said three parameters needed to be fulfilled while assessing the evidence — establishing the identity of those wanted, details of the cases registered by the police and Interpol Red Corner Alert notices issued against them.

The list, given to the Pakistani Deputy High Commissioner here on December 31 last, includes the names of five hijackers of the IC-814 flight of the Indian Airlines commandeered to Kandahar in December 1999. All the five happened to be Pakistani nationals and their identities with details of their addresses in Pakistan had already been given to the Federal Investigating Agency (FIA) of Pakistan by the CBI through Interpol. In the case of the Pakistani nationals, the least the authorities in Islamabad could have done was to put them under arrest on the basis of the Interpol Red Corner notices. As a member-country of the Interpol, there is an international obligation upon Pakistan to arrest those against whom notice has been issued. The notice is issued by Interpol headquarters only after it is satisfied that prima facie evidence against the wanted person exists.

``The law enforcing authorities in Pakistan have shown no inclination even to arrest the hijackers of the Indian Airlines plane. The arrest is a preliminary stage after which the evidence supplied by the CBI could have been placed before an extradition court. It is for the court to decide upon extradition of wanted criminals. The court could have weighed the evidence and even decided against the extradition plea,'' CBI sources argued.

They cited the example of the Bollywood music director, Nadeem, who was named as accused in the Gulshan Kumar murder case and whose extradition was sought from the U.K. but a London court examined the evidence and turned down India's request though Mr. Nadeem was an Indian national.

All the five accused in the 1993 Bombay serial blasts, including Dawood Ibrahim, Tiger Memon and Chotta Shakeel, are Indian nationals and their deportation to India should have posed no problems, sources said. Both the cases — Bombay blasts and IC-814 hijacking — were investigated by the CBI.

Two Babbar Khalsa activists, wanted for the assassination of the former Punjab Chief Minister, Beant Singh, are also on the list. Nine of the accused are lodged in jail and are facing trial in the case probed by the CBI. The crucial factor of establishing the identity of a criminal wanted by India from another country came to the fore recently when Indian authorities failed to conclusively pin down Abu Salem's identity and passport details which prompted the UAE authorities to let him off the hook. Similarly, the delay in judicial proceedings also prove too dear. Maulana Masood Azhar and Omar Sheikh, both Pakistani nationals, who were freed in exchange for hostages in the hijacking case, had spent a number of years in Indian jails without facing a complete trial.

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