0
ISLAMABAD, July 9: The president and the prime minister have strongly condemned the assassination of three Chinese nationals by unknown assailants in Peshawar on Sunday night and have ordered immediate inquiry into the incident that is seen as an attempt to strain relations between the two countries.
Announcing this at the outset of a weekly news briefing here on Monday, Foreign Office spokesperson Tasnim Aslam declared: “The government of Pakistan will make all-out effort to arrest the criminals who are involved in this dastardly act and punish them… The government is making all efforts to provide security to the Chinese nationals in Pakistan.”
She told the news briefing that President Gen Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz had also sent messages of condolence to their Chinese counterparts.
Asked if the killing of Chinese nationals was a fallout of the Lal Masjid standoff in Islamabad, she said: “That would be premature to say. The investigations are continuing and at the moment I cannot make a connection or rule out any connection between the two.”
To a question regarding the perception about a ‘conspiracy’ by some elements to harm Pakistan-China friendship, she observed: “I would not like to attribute it to some grand design or conspiracy but certainly there have been a number of incidents and obviously those who are involved do not care about Pakistan-China relations.”
However, the spokesperson was confident that it would not affect the bilateral relations and emphatically stated: “This is a friendship, a relationship which is strong enough to pass such tests and trials.”
In response to a query about the additional security measures taken for the Chinese nationals, she said security around the foreign missions and the consulates in other cities had been beefed up as it had been at designated places where the Chinese were working.
According to her, the number of Chinese nationals working in Pakistan could be anywhere between 2,000 and 3,000.
THE STANDOFF: On the Chinese government’s statement welcoming the ongoing operation against the Lal Masjid militants, spokesperson Aslam underlined that it was in the context of the recent kidnapping of Chinese nationals by students of the seminary.
When an Indian journalist asked if there were any Chinese militants inside the Lal Masjid compound and whether the Chinese government had raised the matter with Pakistan, Ms Aslam snapped back: “Whatever gave you the idea that there were any (Chinese) terrorist extremists and militants inside the
Lal Masjid?” She then went on to say: “No, they have not raised it and we have no confirmation that any Chinese extremist is present inside.”
Responding to another question about the likely presence of foreign militants inside the Lal Mosque and if foreign governments had established contact with Pakistan to check whether their nationals were among them, she said: “No, there has been no such contact.”
