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Pak invites families of Indian PoWs

K J M Varma in Islamabad

President Pervez Musharraf on Thursday invited the relatives of 54 missing Indian prisoners of war to visit Pakistan and see for themselves that no soldier of the 1971 Indo-Pak war was languishing in its prisons.

"The president has instructed officials to invite the family members of the 54 missing Indian soldiers to visit any Pakistani jail and scrutinise the records," defence spokesman Major General Rashid Qureshi said on Thursday.

He said those who wanted to visit the country could approach the Pakistan high commission in New Delhi and obtain the necessary travel documents.

Colonel (retd) V S Verma of the India-Pakistan Soldiers' Initiative for Peace, which is pursuing the case of the missing soldiers with the help of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, said it was difficult for Islamabad to admit to the presence of the soldiers at an official level.

"They should also be looked for in informal custody centres of the Pakistan army," he said.

According to Dr B K Suri, whose brother Major Ashok Suri went missing in the 1971 war, it would be "diplomatically inconvenient" for any country to accept that it has detained PoWs.

"The only practical solution is not to press their case as release of PoWs but just seek their release and repatriation under some other category by involving the families of the personnel concerned," he said.

Damayanti Tambay of the Relatives of Missing Defence Personnel Association said, "It is not surprising that Pakistan is denying the presence of Indian PoWs in its prisons. But it is disappointing."

In a cautious comment to Musharraf's invitation, Tambay, whose husband Flight Lieutenant V V Tambay was reportedly taken captive in the 1971 war, said Pakistan had undertaken a similar exercise in 1983, but to no avail.

"Records can be concocted. If Pakistan doesn't want to help, such issues cannot be resolved," she said.

PTI

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