NEW DELHI: Indian Foreign Secretary S. Jaishankar on Tuesday summoned Pakistani High Commissioner Abdul Basit and presented him ‘proof’ of alleged cross-border origins of the Uri attack.
Mr Basit rejected the claim and proposed an international investigation into the tragic incident.
Reports said that the identity of one of the slain Uri attackers was also revealed during the meeting and quoted foreign ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup as saying preliminary investigations identified the alleged militant as Hafiz Ahmed, claimed to be a native of Muzaffarabad in Azad Kashmir.
Mr Jaishankar also told Mr Basit that two ‘guides’ who were said to have helped four militants cross into the Indian side, had been apprehended by local villagers and were now in custody. The guides have been identified as Faizal Hussain, 20, and Yasin Khurshid, 19, both natives of Muzaffarabad.
Details of the militants’ alleged handlers, Mohammad Kabir Awan and Basharat, had also been obtained, Mr Swarup said.
The foreign secretary claimed that there had been continuing cross-border terrorist attacks from Pakistan against India, and described them as unacceptable.
According to an official at the Pakistan high commission, Mr Basit responded to Mr Jaishankar’s claims with four pointed contentions. He did not consider the Indian ‘proof’ as proof of anything that involved Pakistan. He said India had accused Pakistan of involvement even before the Uri attack was over, and said the hasty charge seemed strange.
Mr Basit pointed to circumstances that he believed showed that India, and not Pakistan, had gained from the attack. Pakistan’s campaign to highlight India’s role in the abuse and distress in Kashmir Valley was sought to be derailed by whoever carried out the Uri attack, he said.
And finally, he said, since there was a clear disagreement between the two countries about who might have carried out the heinous crime against unarmed soldiers, there was a reasonable case to invite an international probe into the affair.
This was the second time that Mr Basit was summoned by Mr Jaishankar since the Uri attack. On Sept 22, Mr Jaishankar had told the envoy that India had recovered several items from the slain terrorists — GPS, grenades with Pakistani markings, communication equipment, food, medicines and clothes made in Pakistan.
Delhi was ready to provide fingerprints and DNA samples of the alleged terrorists killed in Uri and Poonch if Islamabad “wishes to investigate the cross-border attacks”, he said.
Meanwhile, Defence Minister Khawaja Asif has alleged that the assault in Uri was a “plan devised by India itself”. Maintaining that no proof implicating Pakistan in the Uri attack had surfaced yet, he told DawnNews that “it was evident that the attack was a plan devised by India itself.”
The minister said: “The entire world knows now that India is not as serious about resolving the Kashmir dispute as Pakistan is”.
He said India had not received support from anywhere despite launching a diatribe against Pakistan. He added that China had, on the other hand, supported Pakistan’s viewpoint.
Published in Dawn, September 28th, 2016
