Pressure is mounting on the Indian government to save an Indian man sentenced to death in Pakistan for spying, with his family members threatening to commit suicide and several lawmakers urging the prime minister to intervene.
The death sentence against Sarabjit Singh, who has been held in a Pakistani jail for the past 15 years, was upheld last week by Pakistan's Supreme Court. Singh was convicted of spying and involvement in a string of bomb blasts in Pakistani cities.
But his family denies he was a spy, and insists he had strayed accidentally into Pakistani territory in August 1990 while farming his land, which lies near the border. Singh's wife and two daughters have threatened to commit suicide unless his life is spared.
High-level talks
On Tuesday, a group of lawmakers and politicians from Singh's native Punjab state met with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and urged him to take up the matter with Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf.
"The prime minister assured us that he would speak to President Musharraf on the issue," said Shamsher Singh Dullo, Punjab state president of the ruling Congress party.
Relatives of the condemned man also met the Indian foreign minister.
"I have been assured the government will help," said Dalbir Kaur, Singh's sister.
Kaur said she planned to meet the prime minister and the Pakistani ambassador later on Tuesday.
The prime minister's office had no immediate comment. But Sriprakash Jaiswal, India's junior home minister, said, "The government will provide all possible help in accordance with the law and diplomatic protocol."
`Confessed'
In Islamabad, a Pakistani official insisted Singh had been treated properly.
"Due process of law has been completed," said Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammed Naeem Khan. Singh "has confessed to carrying out bombings in Lahore, Kasur and Faisalabad," he said, listing cities in eastern Pakistan.
But he noted that Singh can appeal to Musharraf to spare his life.
"I will personally try to bring it to the notice of President Musharraf that this case has come up," Pakistan Foreign Minister Khursheed Kasuri told New Delhi Television in an interview from the Pakistani capital, Islamabad.
Kasuri said that Singh was in good health in a prison in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore.
Indian diplomats have asked for permission to see Singh, officials said in both countries. Khan said they are likely to get permission to visit him.
For years, longtime rivals India and Pakistan regularly accused people who strayed across the border of espionage. Dozens of people remain in jails in both countries, though both have freed several prisoners in recent months as part of an improvement in relations.
Kaur said the family was informed of the verdict by Islamabad-based attorney Rana Abdul Hamid, who represented Singh in court.
Review request
Hamid told them on Friday that he would seek a review of the court decision, the Press Trust of India news agency quoted Kaur as saying.
No date has been set for Singh's hanging in Pakistan.
KINGPIN: Marset allegedly laundered the proceeds of his drug enterprise by purchasing and sponsoring professional soccer teams and even put himself in the starting lineups Notorious Latin American narco trafficker Sebastian Marset, who eluded police for years, was handed over to US authorities after his arrest on Friday in Bolivia. Marset, a Uruguayan national who was on the US most-wanted list, was passed to agents of the US Drug Enforcement Administration at Santa Cruz airport in Bolivia, then put on a US airplane, Bolivian state television showed. “The arrest and deportation were carried out pursuant to a court order issued by the US justice system,” Bolivian Minister of Government Marco Antonio Oviedo told reporters. The alleged kingpin was arrested in an upscale neighborhood of Santa
FAKE NEWS? ‘When the government demands the press become a state mouthpiece under the threat of punishment, something has gone very wrong,’ a civic group said The top US broadcast regulator on Saturday threatened media outlets over negative coverage of the Middle East war, after US President Donald Trump slammed critical headlines from the “Fake News Media.” The US president since his first term has derided mainstream media as “fake news” and has sued major outlets over what he sees as unfair coverage. Brendan Carr, head of the US Federal Communications Commission — which oversees the nation’s radio, television and Internet media — said broadcasters risked losing their licenses over news coverage. “The law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest, and they will
SCANDAL: Other images discovered earlier show Andrew bent over a female and lying across the laps of a number of women, while Mandelson is pictured in his underpants A photograph of former British prince Andrew and veteran politician Peter Mandelson sitting in bathrobes alongside late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was unearthed on Friday in previously published documents. The image is believed to be the first known photograph of the two men with Epstein. They are currently engulfed in scandal in the UK over their ties to their mutual friend. The undated photograph, first reported by ITV News, shows King Charles III’s disgraced brother and former British ambassador to the US sitting barefoot outside on a wooden deck. They appear to have mugs with a US flag on them
INFLUTENTIAL THEORIST: Habermas was particularly critical of the ‘limited interest’ shown by German politicians in ‘shaping a politically effective Europe Jurgen Habermas, whose work on communication, rationality and sociology made him one of the world’s most influential philosophers and a key intellectual figure in his native Germany, has died. He was 96. Habermas’ publisher, Suhrkamp, said he died on Saturday in Starnberg, near Munich. Habermas frequently weighed in on political matters over several decades. His extensive writing crossed the boundaries of academic and philosophical disciplines, providing a vision of modern society and social interaction. His best-known works included the two-volume Theory of Communicative Action. Habermas, who was 15 at the time of Nazi Germany’s defeat, later recalled the dawn of
RSS