ISLAMABAD: Pakistan categorically rejected India's malicious statement regarding conviction of UN-designated individual Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, leader of proscribed Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), by Anti-Terrorism Court, saying India has no locus standi to comment on independent judicial mechanisms of Pakistan.
"Pakistan categorically rejects the malicious statement by the Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), regarding conviction of UN-designated individual by an Anti-Terrorism Court in Pakistan," Foreign Office spokesperson Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri said, while responding to his Indian counterpart's statement, questioning the timing of Lakhvi's conviction.
"The timing suggests intention to convey sense of compliance ahead of APJG and FATF meets," the Indian Ministry of External Affairs said, reacting to a Pakistani anti-terrorism court's order, which sentenced Lakhvi to five years in jail in a terror financing case on Friday.
Categorically rejecting the Indian MEA's statement, Chaudhri said that India has no locus standi to comment on the independent judicial mechanisms of Pakistan.
In this regard, the only "compliance" that interests Pakistan is abiding by its own statutes and fulfillment of its international obligations, he added.
He said that the investigations, prosecutions and subsequent convictions, through due process, are a reflection of the effectiveness of Pakistan's legal system, which operates independent of any extraneous factors or influences.
"India's assertions to link Pakistan's due legal process with FATF are unfortunate. It is yet another Indian attempt to politicize FATF and use its processes against Pakistan. Pakistan reiterates its commitment to impartiality, confidentiality and technical nature of the FATF process," he added.
He said that the Indian insinuations against Pakistan are in fact a vain attempt to conceal its failures to bring to justice those blatantly involved in state terrorism and brutal suppression against the subjugated people of the IIOJK and other minority communities.
"As for the hypocritical Indian assertions regarding the "terror infrastructure" and "individual terrorists", irrefutable evidence has already been provided by Pakistan to the international community of the active aiding, abetting, planning, promoting, financing and execution of terrorist activities by India against Pakistan, with impunity," he added.
The spokesperson said that India would do well to put its own house in order and rein in its terror infrastructure that is aimed at destabilising India's neighboring countries in order to fulfill the extremist agenda of the RSS-BJP regime.
"We also expect the UN counter-terrorism bodies to proceed on the basis of concrete evidence provided by Pakistan; urge India to renounce the use of terrorism as an instrument of state policy; and play their part in securing the dismantling of the Indian terrorist infrastructure," he added.
On Friday, an anti-terrorism court in Lahore, sentenced Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, to five years imprisonment and a fine of Rs300,000 in a terrorism financing case.
In its response to the development, the United States said that it is encouraged by Lakhvi's conviction by the court and also demanded that Pakistan should also hold him accountable for his involvement in terrorist attacks, including the Mumbai attacks.
"We are encouraged by the recent conviction of Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi. However, his crimes go far beyond financing terrorism. Pakistan should further hold him accountable for his involvement in terrorist attacks, including the Mumbai attacks," US State Department's Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs Saturday said in a statement on Twitter.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2021
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