Author: PTI
Publication: Deccan Herald
Date: October 29, 2006
URL: http://www.deccanherald.com/deccanherald/Oct292006/update10391720061029.asp
Hitting back at Congress President Sonia Gandhi,
former External Minister K Natwar Singh today said she was behind his recent
problems with the Enforcement Directorate in the Iraqi oil-for-food scam and
attacked her foreign origins.
iSingh fears that he and his family might
be jailed and harm can come to his family members including his grandson.
d"Everything that the government did
against me was on Sonia's direction. I will not blame (Prime Minister) Manmohan
Singh," he told Star News, a releasee issued by the channel said.
lThe charges by the 75-year-old career diplomat-turned-
politician, a Nehru-Gandhi family loyalist for long, comes close on the heels
of Gandhi's attack on him in a TV interview three days ago.
eSingh was apparently referring to the setting
up of an inquiry authority to go into allegations against him and his son
in the wake of their names figuring in the Volker report on the oil-for-food
scam and the ED questioning them in this connection.
iReacting to Gandhi's accusation of her being
betrayed by Singh, he said, "Betrayed is a strong word and according
to Indian culture such words are not used for a person older than her 15 years."
hHe also said, "Those who are born in Indian soil will only understand
the country's ethos and culture. Others will not." Singh quit as External
Affairs Minister in November last year and was suspended by the Congress from
its primary membership in August this year for bringing "disrepute"
to the party.
