Motormouth Malik equates 26/11 attacks with Babri Bid To Rebuild India-Pak Ties Takes A Hit

Motormouth Malik equates 26/11 attacks with Babri

Bid To Rebuild India-Pak Ties Takes A Hit

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

New Delhi: Pakistani interior minister Rehman Malik dealt a blow to the efforts to normalize bilateral ties by raking up the Babri
issue and seeking to drawing a parallel between the destruction of the mosque and terror attacks including the 26/11 carnage in Mumbai.
    “We don’t want any 9/ 11, we don’t want any Mumbai bomb blast (attacks), we don’t want any Samjhauta Express blast and we don’t want Babri masjid issue,” Malik said, stunning his hosts into silence. Although he concluded by saying that he wanted to work for peace between the two countries and in the entire region, his reference to the Babri issue was seen as a provocation. This was the first instance that a visiting Pakistan dignitary had waded into the sensitive Babri issue.
    Malik was speaking impromptu after he, along with home minister Sushil Kumar Shinde, launched the liberalized visa regime as part of the painstaking effort to repair the relationship mauled by the ISIbacked Lashkar gang who ravaged Mumbai in November 2008.
    The foreign ministry had reservations about having Malik over at this juncture, and his conduct may validate the misgivings.
    Reacting to his comments, former Indian high commissioner to Pakistan G Parthasarthy said, “This shows the folly of inviting a Pakistani leader without any political standing who would only try to appease domestic opinion and the army.”
    The remarks Malik made earlier, at the airport on his arrival, on Captain Saurabh Kalia of Indian Army could also have been better framed. Kalia was tortured and his body mutilated after he was abducted and killed by Pakistani troops during the Kargil war in May 1999.
MALIK UNPLUGGED On 26/11
We don’t want 9/11, we don’t want Mumbai bomb blast (26/11), we don’t want Samjhauta Express blast and we don’t want Babri masjid issue
On plea of Kargil martyr Capt Saurabh Kalia’s family in UN against torture by Pak army
...When a fight is going on in the border, we really don’t know whether he died of a Pak bullet or the weather ‘Not sure if Kalia killed by bullet or weather’
New Delhi: Asked about Kalia case, Malik started alright. He pleaded ignorance of the facts of the case but said that he would be happy to meet Kalia’s father. “Whenever any human being dies nobody hesitates to say sorry for that,” he added. However, Malik went on to say that he was not aware whether the Indian died of a Pakistani bullet or just fell victim to harsh weather: a formulation which seemed insensitive considering the tell-tale marks of torture on Kalia’s body.
    The Pakistani minister said his government wanted to work on improving bilateral ties and even suggested that India should move beyond 26/11, asserting that “Pakistan would leave no stone unturned to punish those involved in Mumbai terror attack”. He further said, “We can work together not only for peace in Pakistan and India but also for the region.”
    But Malik’s remarks are not a happy augury for the patient fence-mending the two countries have been engaged in. In fact, his hosts in the home ministry looked distinctly awkward and the atmospherics tense as the Malik spoke.
    Shinde who appeared to have caught unawares gathered his nerves to tell Malik that Pakistan needed to make good its promise to bring to book the 26/11 masterminds, stressing that it has not been fulfilled yet. “You have been outspoken on all the fronts. But we India keep on talking that earlier on several occasions the promises were made and that (they) were not fulfilled. Today you have made the promise again. I am quite confident that both the countries will go forward in bilateral cooperation”.
    Importantly, however, Malik made it plain that India could not expect any concessions from Pakistan on the issue of its failure to punish Lashkar chief Hafiz Saeed and other 26/11 masterminds. He cited three court orders exhonerating Saeed. He further said that Pakistan could not go by just the statement of Kasab or India’s dossier on the Laskhar chief, ignoring India’s contention that India had given enough material to Pakistan to probe Saeed’s role. He spoke of propaganda, blamed the tension between the neighbours on non-state actors and tried to draw equivalence between Saeed and the killing of Pakistani nationals in the bomb attack on Samjhauta Express.