Date:17/04/2007 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2007/04/17/stories/2007041707290100.htm

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India's "real motive" is out: Pakistan

Nirupama Subramanian

ISLAMABAD: On Day 2 of the cross-border controversy set off by Congress MP Rahul Gandhi, the official Pakistan line changed a shade to concede that India may not have been fully responsible for its 1971 division and the creation of Bangladesh, but stressed that an important leader of the Congress had outed the "real motive" of Indian intervention in East Pakistan.

"Maybe there were some circumstances. India took advantage of those circumstances to dismember Pakistan. And what the scion of the Nehru family has done is that he has accepted the real Indian motive for the intervention," spokesperson Tasnim Aslam said.

"Waste of time"

Deluged with questions at the weekly Foreign Office briefing on Mr. Gandhi's statement crediting his family for Pakistan's break-up, the spokesperson said she would not want to "waste time" on it.

"All kinds of people make all kinds of statements. There is absolutely no reason why we should give any importance to statements by such people. Today's Pakistan is very different. Today's Pakistan is capable of defending itself in every circumstance," she said when asked if it would affect the peace process between the two countries.

"Did any one of you doubt what the real intention was behind India's intervention? I don't think anybody would have believed India's claim of what its reasons were for the intervention," she said.