Author:
Publication: www.dailyexcelsior.com
Date: July 14, 2000
WASHINGTON, July 13:
The United States has said it is "actively considering" branding Pakistan-based
militant outfit Lashkar-e-Toiba, which is active in Kashmir, as a terrorist
organisation.
The question of branding
Pakistan-based Lashker-e-Toiba as a terrorist organisation is under "active
consideration," Michael Sheehan, State Department's coordinator for counter
terrorism, told the House International Relations Committee here yesterday.
He, however, said he
did not know whether the process would take weeks or months.
He said another terrorist
organisation operating in Kashmir, Harkat-ul-Ansar, (renamed as Harkat-ul-Mujahideen)
has already been branded as a terrorist organisation.
Principal Deputy Assistant
Secretary of State for South Asia Alan W Eastham told the committee that
the joint US-India working group on counter-terrorism was given added impetus
when President Bill Clinton and Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee endorsed
it in March.
India, he added, has
agreed to accept and work closely with a legal attache at the US embassy
in New Delhi. This will facilitate bilateral cooperation in law enforcement
matters, including counter-terrorism.
He said Masood Azhar,
one of the three militants released in exchange for hostages of the hijacked
Indian Airlines plane last December, is a member of Harkat-ul-Ansar and
is now in Pakistan. The terrorist group has kidnapped several foreign
tourists and murdered a Norwegian in Kashmir, he said.
Eastham said "some terrorists
and their supporters certainly continue to live in and move throughout
Pakistan. This includes the Harkat-ul-Ansar."
"We will continue to
urge Pakistan to take action against such groups and to take all steps
necessary to see that it does not become a safe haven or safe transit point
for terrorists," he said.
Sheehan said the shift
in the locus of terrorism to South Asia has serious implications for US
foreign policy towards the region.
"Because of the growing
momentum behind this trend and the threat it poses to Americans and others
in the region, terrorism is a top priority on the agenda" whenever Clinton,
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright or other officials sit down with
their South Asian counterparts.
"But when engaging other
nations on these issues, the US does not rely solely on periodic reminders
of the threat of terrorism. It actively pursues, using a number of
tools, its counter-terrorism policy goals with all of the key countries
in the region," Sheehan said.
Pakistan, he said, has
a mixed record on terrorism as its Government has cooperated in some areas,
particularly in arrests and renditions of terrorists and supporters of
terrorism.
In recent weeks, Pakistan
has arrested a number of foreigners suspected of connections with terrorism,
and the Government is expelling them, he said. (PTI)
