India won’t release dozen prisoners scheduled for repatriation

In this March 2016 photograph, Pakistani journalists watch a video claiming K Jadhav to be a spy. AFP

Simran Sodhi

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, April 10

Tensions between India and Pakistan today escalated once again after Pakistan sentenced Indian national Kulbhushan Jadhav to death on charges of espionage and sabotage activities.Infuriated, India summoned Pakistan High Commissioner Abdul Basit, saying if Pakistan carried out the sentence, India would view it as a case of “pre-meditated murder”.India requested consular access to Jadhav 13 times between March 25, 2016, and March 31, 2017, but it was never granted. India has acknowledged Jadhav to be a retired Navy officer but refuted the allegations of him being a spy, pointing out that if that was the case, he would not be holding an Indian passport.India said if Pakistan went ahead with the sentence, the people and the government of India would regard this as a case of pre-meditated murder that had been “awarded without observing basic norms of law and justice”.(Follow The Tribune on Facebook; and Twitter @thetribunechd)Calling the proceedings against Jadhav “farcical”, the government, in a strongly worded demarche, said: “The proceedings that have led to the sentence against Jadhav are farcical in the absence of any credible evidence against him. It is significant that our High Commission was not even informed that Jadhav was being brought to trial.”Earlier in the day, a press release issued by the Pakistani military said Jadhav had been found guilty of “espionage and sabotage activities” and sentenced to death. The order was signed by Pakistan Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa.Sources in the Home Ministry confirmed after today’s development, India decided not to release about a dozen Pakistani prisoners, who were to be repatriated on Wednesday.Amnesty International’s South Asia Director Biraj Patnaik said: “The death sentence shows yet again how Pakistan’s military court system rides roughshod over international standards… Amnesty opposes the death penalty at all times.”Sources said Jadhav was a businessman who carried cargo to and from Iranian ports bordering Pakistan and was subsequently kidnapped by Pakistan in March last year. Later, Pakistan released his alleged video confession and held it up as proof of India’s involvement in the Balochistan province.He’s no spy: Delhi

• Kulbhushan Jadhav was ‘arrested’ in Balochistan’s Chaman, near Afghanistan border, on March 3, 2016
• India acknowledges Jadhav is a retired Indian Navy officer, but not a spy
• Pakistan claims he is a serving officer and works for India’s Research and Analysis Wing
• It claims he holds an Indian passport under assumed name ‘Hussein Mubarak Patel’ and an Iranian visa