LONDON: Indian troops have started digging trenches at a number of points along India-East Pakistan border. … [P]reparations are also being made to protect Calcutta airport and a full battery of anti-aircraft guns was moved on the eastern perimeter of the airport. … At least three regiments from northern India, the East Punjab Regiment, the Rajputs and the Maratha Light In­­fantry, are in the vanguard on the “Jessore front”. Recoilless anti-tank guns mounted on jeeps have moved up to within 50 yards of the border, and Sikhs and Rajputs were seen within 100 yards of the frontier constructing fortifications and dugouts along the disused railway line connecting India and East Pakistan. … The Indian Army has been put on alert to take over border outposts from the para-military Border Security Forces on the borders with East Pakistan if the need arises, the Indian Parliament was told....

Indian games to stop aid

[Meanwhile, as reported by correspondent in New York,] The war scare started by Premier Indira Gandhi and incidents along East Pakistan’s border with Assam are linked by well-informed observers at the United Nations to India’s efforts to create a favourable international climate for anti-Pakistan missions to Western capitals … [T]he main purpose of the Indian Ministerial visits to the Aid Consortium countries is stopping of Western economic aid to Pakistan.

[Agencies add from Washington,] The Pakistan Ambassador in the United States, Mr Agha Hila­­ly, announced here yesterday [May 27] that a joint World Bank, International Monetary Fund team would arrive in Pakistan on June 1 to assess his country’s financial needs and to make recommendations to the International Aid-to-Pakistan Con­s­­­ortium.... Addressing a Press conference Agha Hilaly said that after the assessment the Consor­tium of World Bank and member nations would meet ... to consider what action will be taken. … Mr Hilaly criticised Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s call ... for Big Powers intervention in East Pakistan.... — Agencies

USSR-Egypt 15-year pact

CAIRO: President Anwar Sadat has won a pledge of full-scale Soviet military and political support for Egypt for at least the next 15 years in his talks here with visiting Soviet President Nikolai Podgorny. The two leaders signed a friendship and cooperation treaty... described in an official communique as an historic document.... The 15-year treaty, which provides specifically for the training of Egyptian personnel to man Soviet-supplied weapons, is seen by observers here as a bond which will link Egyptian and Soviet policies for decades to come. It will be renewed at five-yearly intervals until one of the countries gives a year’s notice of termination. The Soviet Union ... endorsed Egypt’s demand for total Israeli withdrawal from all territories occupied during the June war in 1967 ... Podgorny promised all-out military assistance....

Published in Dawn, May 29th, 2021