India Cuts Land Links With Pakistan

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Saturday, December 22, 2001

India Cuts Land Links With Pakistan

As a clear sign of deterioration of relations between India and neighboring Pakistan, New Delhi announced on Friday a termination of land links between the two countries.

As a clear sign of deterioration of relations between India and neighboring Pakistan, New Delhi announced on Friday a termination of land links between the two countries.

A statement issued here on Friday by the External Affairs Ministry said the government also decided to call back its high commissioner Vijay Nambiar from Islamabad in view of Pakistan's " complete lack" of India's concern and "its continued promotion of cross border terrorism" against India.

Under the decision made at a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security, the express train from Amritsar of India's northwest state of Punjab and Lahore in Pakistan and the bus service between Lahore and New Delhi will stop operating from January 1, next year.

The government decided not to stop the land links immediately in order to enable citizens of the two neighbors, who had travelled recently, to return to their homes, a spokesperson of the External Affairs Ministry told the media here.

The railway express began its journey 15 years ago as a gesture of goodwill by the two government while the bus service was started in February 1999, to mark the historic trip Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee made to Lahore as a major peace initiative.

However, Indian security agencies have expressed their concern over the train service on the ground that it was facilitating entry of militants and counterfeit currency into the country that affect India's economy.

The issue had come for discussion in India as early as in 1999 following the armed conflicts between the two countries in the Kargil area of Kashmir, but no action had been taken ever since.

The bus service had also ran into rough weather in Indian political circles as it was followed by Kargil conflicts.

The nosedive in Indo-Pakistan relations comes just ahead of the scheduled summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) in Kathmandu beginning from January 4, next year.

Prime Minister Vajpayee said earlier this month that he was ready to meet Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf at the sidelines of the SAARC meeting. But, New Delhi on Thursday ruled out the proposed meeting on the same ground.

The decision came amidst growing tension between the two neighbors following last week's terror attack on Indian parliament, which India claimed was carried out by Pakistan-based outfit Jaish- e-Mohammed with the involvement of another Islamic organization Lashkar-e-Taiba.

A day after the terror incident, Indian Foreign Secretary Chokila Iyer summoned Pakistan High Commissioner in New Delhi Qazi Ashraf Jehangir and issue a verbal demarche, asking Islamabad to arrest the leaders of the two groups, clamp a ban and freeze their accounts.

Islamabad has expressed its willingness to start a joint probe into the attack and asked New Delhi to provide credible evidence on the involvement of terrorist outfits operating from its soil. But the suggestions were rejected by India.

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