ISLAMABAD, July 1: India has taken away 30 Pakistani nationals from Afghanistan to be used against Islamabad as being Al Qaeda men, knowledgeable sources said here on Monday.

These Pakistani nationals were arrested from Kunduz on June 20, and were first held at 6-Afghan Frontier Corps headquarters. Later, they were brought to Dushanbe (Tajikistan) on two Russian MI-17 helicopters and from there they were taken to New Delhi on an Indian Airline aircraft.

The sources said the Pakistan government had taken the US government into confidence about the issue and was assured that the matter would be thoroughly investigated.

Similarly, the issue has been raised with the Tajik government by the foreign office which was assured that whosoever was involved in getting 30 Pakistanis to Dushanbe would be taken to task.

The hostile elements in the Afghan government were supporting India against Pakistan, the sources said. “However, Chairman Hamid Karzai has nothing to do with it,” another source said. He claimed that the Indians were currently torturing these 30 Pakistanis at the RAW offices in New Delhi to extract statement that they were terrorists and were involved in activities in the occupied Kashmir.

The sources said it was feared that some of these Pakistani nationals might be killed in a fake encounter with the Indian forces in the occupied Kashmir.

“Pakistan has decided to raise in the United Nations both the issues of killing of Lance Naik Maqsood by the Indians and the arrest and shifting of 30 Pakistani nationals from Afghanistan to India,” a source said.