Is David Hicks 'too hot' a potato for Delhi?
...
Before there was a Control Order in place for David Hicks, Robert
Ellis, Travancore wrote in The Age:
“… David Hicks is lucky he fell into the hands of the
Americans. If he had been kept by the Afghans or the Pakistanis, or got up
to his extracurricular tourist activities in
One could not agree with Robert Ellis more, if one were
to examine Indian government’s position on Hicks, in light of what he is
alleged to havedone in
In his own words, Hicks (in another letter to his father Terry Hicks, released to the public only recently) wrote:
(From a range of letters written by David Hicks in 2000
after training in
Dear family I spent around three months in a muslim military training camp in the mountains.I learnt about weapons such as ballistic missiles, surface to surface and shoulder fired missiles, anti aircraft and anti-tank rockets, rapid fire heavy and light machine guns, pistols, AK47s, mines and explosives. After three months everybody leaves capable and war-ready being able to use all of these weapons capably and responsibly.
That night we crossed the LOC (thought to be
Line of Control in
There is a very heavy war in the north (of
The Christians and Jews are fighting the Muslims. As a practicing Muslim with military experience I can go to help in any of those conflicts contacts are not a problem.
...
The question now is what the Indian government
wants to do about it.
If one were to believe its very vocal and avowed stance against
terrorism, the Indian government practically has no choice but to seek David
Hicks’s extradition to
Dr Gurdip Aurora, president of the oldest Indian
community organization in
When asked Should India seek extradition of David Hicks
and have him tried in
Dr Aurora’s answer is an emphatic “Most definitely” yes.
The answer remains as emphatic even if the requested person is under some ‘restriction’ or control order. In other words, Mr. Aurora finds no basis for any reluctance on part of Indian government just because David Hicks is under some control/restriction order.
Although it is up to the government of
Do they (the local Australian Indian community and its leaders like Mr. Aurora) have any role to play (in seeing through a process where an alleged terrorist is extradited to face justice) except make their sentiments known to the Indian missions here?
Dr Aurora says, ‘Local leaders can (only) make the
Indian High Commission in
The question is what, if anything is the government of
Bharat Times contacted the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
Government of India in
Back in February 2007, the Deputy High
Commissioner of
A report in The Weekend Australian on February
10, 2007 reported senior officials in
11 months and there seems to be no official position on the issue as yet.
One wonders, if it is the complexity of the decision
making process in
Could they be taking things which happened in the ‘past’ simply easy?
Whatever it may be, it is unacceptable especially (if no one else) for the sake of the families of those soldiers killed, if killed with David Hicks’s bullets, are being unnecessarily made to wait further. Their wait has already been excruciatingly long – almost 8 years.
‘
The Weekend
Australian (February 10 2007) reported the official in
"If Mr Hicks was involved with them at any level, and if he was indeed firing weapons at our troops, then, most certainly, we'd like to talk to him about it.
"We'd be interested to talk to anyone who has done that. We don't take kindly to attacks on our soldiers -- even attacks by people like Mr Hicks."
Empirically it is a nice position to state. The question is, WHEN?
Before going to print BT again spoke to the Deputy High
Commissioner in Canberra Mr. Vinod Kuamr, who confirmed he did not have
Enjoy the game of cricket if I may say, between the two
nations in the right spirit of the sport, the best you can, before the
bureaucrats in
by DM
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