ISLAMABAD (Monitoring Desk): PPP Chairman and former foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Friday said Pakistan had no objection to extraditing “individuals of concern” to India as a confidence-building measure, as long as New Delhi showed willingness to cooperate in the process.
Ties between Pakistan and India have remained tense, further strained after New Delhi, without presenting evidence, blamed Pakistan for the deadly April attack in occupied Kashmir’s Pahalgam. This led to a four-day military confrontation in May, with both sides dropping their guns after American intervention.
The PPP chairman has repeatedly called for India and Pakistan to engage in a dialogue to establish peace.
Speaking during an exclusive interview with Al Jazeera, the PPP chief responded to a question about extraditing Laskhar-i-Taiba (LeT) chief Hafiz Saeed and Jaish-i-Muhammad (JeM) chief Masood Azhar as possible concessions and good-faith gestures to India.
“As part of a comprehensive dialogue with Pakistan, where terrorism is one of the issues that we discuss, I am sure Pakistan would not be opposed to any of these things,” Bilawal said.
Both LeT and JeM have been banned by Pakistan, according to the National Counter Terrorism Authority (NCTA), while Saeed is currently serving a 33-year sentence for terror financing and Azhar has been proscribed by Nacta.
Bilawal added that cases prosecuted against these “individuals” were those related to Pakistan, such as terrorist financing. However, he noted that prosecuting them for cross-border terrorism was difficult due to noncompliance from Delhi.
“India is refusing to comply with certain basic elements that require that conviction to take place,” he explained. “It’s important … to present evidence within these courts, for people to come over from India to testify, to put up with whatever the counter-accusations will be.
“If India is willing to be cooperative in that process, I am sure there will be no hurdle in extraditing any individual of concern.”
