Pak terms case against Saeed 'half-baked'; seeks improved ties

Betwa Sharma and Lalit K Jha

New York, Sep 27 (PTI) Facing flak for inaction against
Mumbai attack perpetrators, including Hafiz Mohd Saeed,
Pakistan Sunday said it does not want to take to court a
"half-baked" case against the Jamaat-ud-Dawah (JuD) chief in
the absence of "legally tenable" evidence and asked India not
to hold back the ties on a single issue.

"The question is how do we move beyond this point. The
relationship cannot be held or brought to a standstill because
of a trial or one investigation," Pakistan Foreign Secretary
Salman Bashir told PTI after his talks with his Indian
counterpart Nirupama Rao here.

Pakistan, he said, has nothing to hide. "In fact, we have
been very forthcoming on the quality of the work that has been
done by our experts in terms of investigations and the arrests
etc, and all that has been shared with India," he said.

His remarks came as India's External Affairs Minister S M
Krishna and his Pakistani counterpart Shah Mahmood Qureshi are
set to meet here later tonight for crucial talks.

Hours ahead of his talks with Krishna on the margins of
the UN General Assembly session, Qureshi said Pakistan did not
want to take to court a "half-baked" case against Saeed.

"We will certainly not hesitate for taking action
(against Saeed), but we got to have a case which is legally
tenable because if we take a case into court which is a
half-baked case and if the court sets him free, you'll say
'collusion', 'drama'. No we are not in a mood to collude with
terrorists," he told NDTV.

During the nearly two hour-long discussion between Rao
and Bashir, the Indian side maintained that they want Pakistan
to act speedily and in a transparent manner against those
responsible for the heinous 26/11 attacks.

"The Indian side asked for concerted action and the
need to complete the process of investigation of the Mumbai
attacks because the conspiracy emanated from Pakistan," Indian
officials told PTI. "There is a need to bring the
investigation to a satisfactory conclusion."

The Rao-Bashir talks marked the first high-level contact
between the two countries since the Prime Ministers of the two
countries met at Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, on July 16.

The meeting took place amid India's disappointment over
the tardy progress of Pakistan's probe into the Mumbai
attacks and its prosecution of the culprits.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has also made it clear that
Pakistan must stop using terrorism as an instrument of state
policy if it wanted normal relations with India.

Pakistan also appears to be under tremendous pressure
from the US and its allies to ensure that it convincingly
addresses India's concerns on terrorism, including Mumbai
attacks, and does nothing that derails all efforts to revive
the bilateral peace process.

President Asif Ali Zardari and Qureshi, who met several
world leaders including US President Barack Obama here, were
told in no uncertain terms that Pakistan can no longer afford
to have two different standards for terrorists – one for
terrorists targeting the West and other for terrorists who use
Pakistani soil against India, sources said. PTI BS