Pakistan gives consular access to Kulbhushan today

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Sunday announced that it was providing consular access to Indian spy Commander Kulbhushan Jadhav on Monday (today).

Jadhav, 49, is a serving Indian Navy officer and RAW operative sentenced to death by a military court for espionage and terrorism in Pakistan.

The Pakistani security forces arrested him in the Balochistan province on March 3, 2016. The consular access is being granted in line with a judgment of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and the Vienna Convention on consular relations.

“Commander Jadhav remains in Pakistan’s custody for espionage, terrorism and sabotage,” Foreign Office spokesman Dr Muhammad Faisal Tweeted. There is no information about the time and place of the meeting. During his meeting with his mother and wife, Commander Jadhav had met them in a room that was specially built at the FO. Dr Faisal did not issue any statement on this development which came a day after technical teams from India and Pakistan met on the Kartarpur Corridor on Saturday and decided to meet again this week.

Earlier the spokesman had said that Pakistan was in contact with India on the matter and was awaiting a word from Delhi on firming up date for the consular access.

Speaking in Multan, Foreign Affairs Shah Mehmood Qureshi said consular access was being given to the Indian spy as Pakistan had always wanted peace in the region and did feel that war was the last option between the two countries.