Musharraf confirms India's fear on US aid to Pak: Tharoor

New Delhi, Sep 14 (PTI) India Monday said it was not
surprised over former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf's
admission of use of US military aid against it during his
tenure and asked countries providing such help to be
"extremely responsible".

"It doesn't come as a surprise. We have for some years
now arguing that the only problem we have with the US military
aid to Pakistan is its misuse against us," India Minister of
State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor said when asked
about Musharraf's remarks Sunday in an interview.

Noting that India welcomes any support by foreign
countries to Pakistan to fight homegrown terrorism, he said
"But we do not feel that such assistance should be turned
around and used against us. We pose no threat to Pakistan and
we find this kind of diversion is neither in the interest of
the sub-continent nor in those who are giving assistance."

Confirming India's fears, Musharraf has said that
military aid provided by the US to Pakistan for the war
against terrorism was used during his tenure to strengthen
defences against New Delhi.

"The only way forward must be for those who give
assistance to Pakistan to be extremely responsible when its
come to monitoring the use of the assistance to ensure that
assistance of military nature is used for the purpose for
which it is intended and not used for the completely
irrelevant purpose of strengthening Pakistan's military
ambition against this peace-loving country," Tharoor said.



Tharoor said, "the statement by former President
Musharraf merely confirms what we have suspected all along and
what we have suggested all along."

India has been voicing its concern to the US over
diversion of aid provided to Pakistan and has been insisting
on proper monitoring of such assistance. PTI PYK

DDC