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Saturday,
December 29, 2001, Chandigarh, India  
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India offers overflight to Pervez New Delhi, December 28 “If a request for overflying India is made by the Pakistan President and his delegation for the SAARC summit, it will be met,” an External Affairs Ministry spokesperson said today. The spokesperson allayed any misgivings in this regard following reports in the Pakistani media that General Musharraf might skip the SAARC summit because of India banning all overflights of Pakistan from January 1. Describing reports in the Pakistani media as “spreading some kind of a canard,” she made it clear that India had no intention of blocking General Musharraf’s overflight while returning home from the SAARC summit. Clearly, India did not want to play the role of a villain in blocking the much postponed 11th SAARC summit being hosted by Nepal. ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Friday said President Pervez Musharraf would attend the three-day SAARC summit in Kathmandu from January 4 travelling through a circuitous route following India’s decision to ban Pakistani flights over its airspace from January 1. Pakistan also feels that gatherings like SAARC could play a role in reducing tension in the region. “Of course, they (President and the delegation) have to go through a different route,” Foreign Office spokesman Aziz Ahmed Khan told reporters in the wake of reports that General Musharraf was considering cancelling his visit in view of the detour he would have to make. The Pakistani announcement came even as India offered to allow General Musharraf and his delegation to overfly India for the summit if a request came from Islamabad. PTI  |
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India unfazed by Pak reaction to offensive New Delhi, December 28 At the same time there appeared to be a cooling down of the rhetoric and the ante that had been upped along the LoC in Jammu and Kashmir. This did not necessarily give the impression that the clouds of war had thinned. “Pakistan is the epicentre of terrorism in our region and Islamabad refuses to recognise the gravity with which India views this matter,” a spokesperson for the External Affairs Ministry said here this evening. She was unambiguous in affirming that New Delhi had not found the measures taken by Pakistan as being effective in tackling the problem of cross-border terrorism. Clearly, the overbearing view here was that Islamabad continued to drag its feet in coming down heavily against terrorist outfits in that country. The spokesperson refused to comment on reports that Pakistan would not take recourse to nuclear weapons saying that she did not want to be drawn into “purely speculative debates.” German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer spoke to External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh over the telephone during the day. Mr Jaswant Singh conveyed to Mr Fischer India’s concern at the lack of meaningful action by Pakistan against terrorist outfits operating in that country. Meanwhile, India is getting its act together in the reconstruction efforts of war-ravaged Afghanistan coupled with providing food aid and training Afghans in administrative practices. Given New Delhi’s traditional ties with Kabul, necessary measures will be taken to set up a chain of schools, vocational centres and mobile hospitals. India’s special envoy to Afghanistan S.K. Lambah said India had offered a $ 100 million assistance to Afghanistan. He disclosed that a line of credit of Rs 500 crore had become operational immediately after the formation of the interim government in Afghanistan and civilian flights between the two countries will be resumed soon. |
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Cong justifies diplomatic sanctions on Pak New Delhi, December 28 The party supported the reduction of the strength of the staff in the Pakistan High Commission here by 50 per cent, ban on Pakistani aircraft overflying the country and other measures announced by India, Congress chief spokesman S Jaipal Reddy told reporters. He said the Congress expected the government to take the Opposition parties into confidence about the steps being taken to tackle terrorism. The
government had enough intelligence inputs to help it take appropriate measures, he added.
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