Pakistan condemns acquittals in Samjhauta terror attack case

Arab News Pakistan
In this Feb. 19, 2007, file photo, Indian security personnel walk past the charred coaches of Samjauta Express train, or Friendship Express, which caught fire after a blast at Dewana, about 80 kilometers north of New Delhi. An Indian court on Wednesday acquitted four Hindu hardliners charged with triggering explosions in the train heading for India’s border with Pakistan, killing 68 people, mostly Pakistani nationals. (AP)
  • Calls Indian court’s decision “a travesty of justice”
  • Says India protects terrorists with impunity

ISLAMABAD: The Indian High Commissioner, Ajay Bisaria, was summoned to the Foreign Office of Pakistan on Wednesday, as the country’s acting foreign secretary protested the acquittal of four Hindu nationalists, accused of bombing a train connecting Lahore and New Delhi in February 2007, by an Indian court.

The attack on Samjhauta Express had claimed the lives of 68 passengers, including 44 Pakistani citizens.

According to an official handout circulated by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Islamabad on Wednesday, “Pakistan had consistently raised the lack of progress and the subsequent, concerted attempts by India to exonerate the perpetrators of this heinous terrorist act.”

However, India’s Special National Investigation Agency Court ruled earlier in the day that the prosecution had failed to establish that the accused were responsible for committing the crime.

“The acquittal of the accused today, 11 years after the heinous Samjhauta Terror Attacks, makes a travesty of justice and exposes the sham credibility of the Indian Courts,” claimed Pakistan’s official statement. “It also belies the rampant Indian duplicity and hypocrisy where India reflexively levels allegations of terrorism against Pakistan, while protecting with impunity, terrorists who had publicly confessed to their odious crimes.”

Topics: Samjhauta Express Pakistan terror attack