India flays Pak on Dawood flip-flop, demands actions against ‘listed individuals’

New Delhi: India has flayed Pakistan for its flip-flop talks in recent weeks on Don and ‘UN designated terrorist’ Dawood Ibrahim and said that Pakistan needs to take “credible action and ensure that the listed individuals are prosecuted”.

“Pakistan has never taken any credible and verifiable action against terror entities or listed individuals, including the most wanted ones… Pakistan must take credible action and ensure that the listed individuals are prosecuted,” MEA spokesman Anurag Shrivastava told reporters here on Thursday.

He also said – “Pakistan’s assertion that the Statutory Regulatory Orders (SRO) does not mean that it admits to the presence of listed individuals on its territory or that it would impose any new measures on these listed individuals, lays bare the insincerity of Pakistan in responding to legitimate expectations of the world that they will track down international terrorists based on its soil”.

He also pointed out that – “Pakistan has not only maintained its opposition to this international consensus but it has also chosen not to act against them”.

The remarks come in the background that Pakistan earlier this month issued a Statutory Regulatory Orders (SRO) reproducing the listed terrorist by 1267 committee of UNSC which included Masood Azhar and Dawood Ibrahim. The Pakistani foreign ministry later issued a clarification saying that the SRO does not mean acceptance of Dawood’s presence in the country.

“…the assertions made by some sections of the Indian media, as to Pakistan admitting to the presence of certain listed individuals on its territory, based on the information contained in the SRO, are baseless and misleading,” the Pak foreign ministry had said in a statement on August 22.

The UN list of terrorists, most of them being Pakistani citizens gives details such as passport number, house address. According to the list, Dawood who was listed as an international terrorist in 2003 has three houses in the port city of Karachi.

It is worth mentioning that during his December 2015 visit to India, Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan (prior to coming to power in 2018) had said that he did not know where Dawood was, but if he came to power he shall know.

In August 2017, according to media reports, former Pak President Gen Pervez Musharraf had said, “India has been accusing Pakistan for long. Why should we now become good and assist them? I don’t know where Dawood is. He must be here, somewhere”.