M A I N   N E W S

Pak official expelled
Tribune News Service

NEW DELHI, Jan 19 — India today expelled a Pakistan High Commission official from here because of “activities incompatible with his official status”.

The message was conveyed through a “verbal note” to the Pakistan Deputy High Commissioner, Mr Akbar Zeb, who was summoned to the Ministry of External Affairs twice during the day.

Briefing newspersons, the Ministry of External Affairs spokesman, Mr R.S. Jassal, said that Mr Zeb was informed that Mr Shabbir Shah, a staff member of the High Commission in New Delhi, had been indulging in activities incompatible with his official status, a euphemism in diplomatic jargon for spying. He has been given a week to leave the country.

In another development, a Joint Secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs, Mrs Leela K. Ponappa, told Mr Zeb that India has unequivocally rejected the allegations against Mr P. Moses, a member of the Indian High Commission in Islamabad.

These “allegations were as fanciful and far-fetched as the so-called evidence in their support was concocted and baseless”, the Deputy High Commissioner was told by the ministry official.

“Pakistan’s actions were part of its propaganda campaign directed at covering its own involvement in cross-border terrorism”, the spokesman said.

The ministry also condemned the ‘abhorrent’ behaviour of the Pakistani authorities in extracting so-called confessions under duress from Mr P. Moses, threatening his personal safety and that of his wife and family, subjecting him to physical and mental ill-treatment and parading him in front of the media, the spokesman said.

The ministry also deplored the fact that the Pakistan Government did not consider it necessary to inform the High Commission and that the Pakistan police refused to register an FIR.

The fact that Mr Moses was not even questioned about his alleged accomplices in the High Commission indicates that the charges by the Pakistani authorities were spurious and the entire event was a transparent frame-up, part of a pattern of harassment and intimidation of members of the Indian High Commission violative of international obligations.

The Deputy High Commissioner was also reminded of a note handed over on January 15, 2000, wherein Pakistan was requested to honour its international obligations and apprehend and extradite the hijackers of the Indian Airlines aircraft IC-814.

In a parallel development, India today moved the International Council of Civil Aviation (ICAO) in accordance with the Montreal and Hague Conventions to draw its attention to the hijacking of the Indian Airline aircraft IC-814 last month.