"We shouldn't expect any hope from the second meeting of the Indo-Pakistan joint mechanism against terror because Pakistan has not yet come out with the information to help India to nab terrorists linked with Hyderabad twin bomb blasts," said A.B. Mahapatra, executive director of the Center for Asian Strategic Study, a think tank.

Mahapatra said the Oct. 22 meeting in New Delhi is unlikely to yield results because Pakistan is not acknowledging that many fugitives wanted by India roam freely on its streets; he called the ATM pointless.

Last October India and Pakistan agreed to set up a joint mechanism to fight terrorism. The first meeting was held March 7.

India says it will use the second meeting to raise the issue of the recent twin bomb blasts in Hyderabad, which Indian security agencies have linked to Jaish-e-Mohammed and Harkat-ul-Jihadi-Islami, based in Pakistan and Bangladesh; 52 people were killed in the attacks and 56 wounded.

India says it provided Pakistan information about the involvement of the groups and sought their deportation. Indian officials say they even provided specific information to Pakistani authorities that Shahid Bilal, the prime accused in the blast, was in Karachi, Pakistan.

Pakistan said Bilal was killed Aug. 30, five days after the blasts.

India says it will use the meetings to seek clarification from Pakistan on actions it has taken on the information it has been provided.

Similarly, Pakistan has accused India of not taking action on a list of fugitives submitted at the last meeting. While setting up the anti-terror mechanism, the two sides agreed to meet once every three months. The second meeting, scheduled to be held in June, was delayed because of the political turmoil in Pakistan.

India and Pakistan have accused each other of shielding wanted terrorists and criminals. In the last meeting, India submitted a long list of such criminals to Pakistan and sought immediate action. In the second meeting, while India is expected to seek clarification on Pakistani action, Islamabad might demand to see progress on the attack on the Samjhauta Express railway that connects the two countries. An attack on the train Feb. 18 killed 68 people.

India recently threatened to dismantle the mechanism on the ground it is pointless as Pakistan continues to sit on information provided to it. Indian experts on security, intelligence and terrorism are also averse to the mechanism, saying it won't bring results because the two countries differ in their definition of terrorism.

"I have always regarded the joint terror mechanism as an ill-conceived and counterproductive proposal because it equates India, a victim of terrorism, with Pakistan, a perpetrator of terrorism, that is today internationally recognized as the epicenter of global terrorism," said G. Parthasarathy, a former Indian diplomat.

On the political front, the mechanism has also evoked a sharp reaction. The opposition Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party questioned the relevance of the mechanism on the grounds that the Pakistani commitment to fight terrorism is doubtful.

"By initiating this mechanism the government has indeed curtailed all the possibility of exposing Pakistan and its links to terror groups in the world arena," said Ravi Shankar Prasad, spokesman of the party. He said this mechanism is irrelevant without Pakistan giving even a vague commitment to stop terrorism.

"It is unrealistic to expect a breakthrough in the second-round meeting of Indo-Pak joint mechanism against terrorism unless the menace is addressed in a serious manner," said Iftikhar Gilani, an expert in India-Pakistan relations at the Kashmir Times.

Community
Email This Article
Comment On This Article

Related Links
News From Across The Stans

Memory Foam Mattress Review

SPACE MEDIA NETWORK PROMOTIONS Solar Energy Solutions Tempur-Pedic Mattress Comparison ... Newsletters :: SpaceDaily :: SpaceWar :: TerraDaily :: Energy Daily XML Feeds :: Space News :: Earth News :: War News :: Solar Energy News