Reema Shaukat
With the announcement of death sentence by Pakistan to Indian spy, Kulbhushan Yadav there seems India wants to create a Pandora box from which intrigues against Pakistan will pop out time to time. Kulbhushan was arrested a year ago in the area near Baluchistan during a counter intelligence operation. The abducted spy claimed and confessed that he is an Indian spy who was earlier serving in Indian Navy and was later assigned a task for sabotaging Pakistan’s developmental projects and support sinister militant activities. Investigations about him revealed that he carried passports with fake names and was travelling easily between Iran and Pakistan for his assigned espionage chores.
Interrogation with Yadavexposed that he was working for RAW and was in contact with some Baloch separatists and fanatics who were involved in fuelling sectarian violence in the Balochistan province particularly and the Pakistan in general. He confessed that he was involved in financially supporting terrorists and admitted his involvements in Karachi’s unrest in past few years. Interrogation also revealed that naval combat training was being conferred to Baloch separatists, in an attempt to target the ports of Gwadar and Karachi. Yadav during his interrogation, gave details about his financers and plans to destabilise the Pakistan and also disclosed the presence of other Indian intelligence operatives in the country. In response to Kulbhushan confessions India accepted that an officer arrested in Pakistan served with their navy but at the same time denied that he was an agent for intelligence agency. Indian Ministry of External Affairs later explained that Yadav took premature retirement from the navy and the Indian government has no link since his retirement from the Indian Navy.India developedallegation against Pakistan that it had fabricated the documents without ascertaining discrepancies.Pakistan has previously raised concerns over involvement of foreign elements in terrorist activities in its territory but this was the first instance of India acknowledging the arrest across the border of an individual associated with its armed forces.
Recently, Indian media has started propagating case of Kulbhushan against Pakistan. Blaming military courts on this decision Indian media is claiming that India was kept in dark in case of Kulbhushan which is totally wrong. Pakistan openly showed confessional video of Yadav and has record of all his plans and tasks which he was assigned. Secondly after his arrest and during his trials he was provided with all facilities to fight for his case effectively. It is interesting to note that when last year Indian spy was arrested mostly Indian politicians and media remained mum on his arrest and their silence on the issue gave the message that India is hiding its mistake. Rather they kept on blaming Pakistan on issues of cross border terrorism. After announcement of his death sentence Indian politicians and media are creating hype in their favour maligning Pakistan. Sushma Suraj, Indian Foreign Minister claimed Yadav as “Son of soil” and said they will do anything to get their son. An Indian politician who has no idea about the case of Yadav and pronouncing his name wrongly many at times in his speech suggested that India should do what US has done in Afghanistan to save their men. One should ask that politician do any viable connection exists between Yadav case and US men in Afghanistan?The Indian Ministry of External Affairs has specified that if the death sentence is carried out then it will be considered “pre-meditated” murder by Pakistan. The India’s Ministry of External Affairs in its statement claimed that “the proceedings that led to the sentence against Yadav are farcical in the absence of any credible evidence against him”.
Indian Express Newspaper now proliferating the case of Yadav have started raising confused questions. According to newspaper sources they are confused how a person can have two passports, one on name of one in his own name Kulbhsuhan Yadav and the other one in the name of Hussein Mubarak Patel which he adopted after converting to Islam.According to the Indian Express, the second passport was originally issued in 2003 and renewed in 2014 and the passport numbers are E6934766 and L9630722. When the journalist who was trying to investigate case of Yadav, contacted MEA India he was told that the answer could be obtained only if Indian officials managed to gain access to Yadav. Investigating journalist rightly points out that MEA should check the records attached to the passport numbers as they are definitely going to tell another story.The Indian journalist query doesn’t end here as he says that why only Yadav and no other Indians who are living in Iran are arrested. So for the information of that journalist, clarity should be made that Yadav was arrested in counter intelligence operation and he confessed for his espionage activities in Pakistan particularly sabotaging CPEC and highlighted Indian frustrations over this project. Secondly, getting no proper reply from MEA indicates their inefficiency and shows that passports were issued to him by government knowing the matter internally and the kind of task Kulbhushan was assigned. Cooking up of such stories by Indian media now after announcement of death sentence definitely shows that India is trying to hoodwink itsominous plans for Pakistan. Involvement of RAW agents in sponsoring terrorism is not new and many at times proofs are found. Indian PM himself on many occasions tried to gain sympathies by saying that people of Balochistan and Gilgit Baltistan are suffering and want to be part of India which is totally wrong.
Pakistan fulfilled with its obligations under sub-clause (a) of Article 36(1) by duly notifying India of the arrest and detention of Yadav.Considering International Law, Article 2(4) of United Nations Charter states that, “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.” And similarlyArticle 29 of the Hague Regulations 1907 identifies: “A person can only be considered a spy when, acting clandestinely or on false pretences, he obtains or endeavours to obtain information in the zone of operations of a belligerent, with the intention of communicating it to the hostile party.” These clauses make the Pakistan’s standpoint valid and strong in case of Kulbhushan Yadav. However India not taking the action on time and knowing that it will be exposed in front of international community is trying to cover up by propagating this case. Pakistan clearly is in a position to defend its stand on old claims of confrontational Indian involvement inside Pakistani territory. Pakistan if carries out death sentence toYadav will give a strong missive to rest of world that those who ever try to confront with Pakistan will bear consequences like this.
