Pakistan calls back its High Commissioner in India for consultations over incidents of 'harassment'

Islamabad: Pakistan on Thursday said it has decided to call back its High Commissioner in India Sohail Mahmood for consultations after repeated incidents of "harassment" of its diplomatic staff in New Delhi.

Foreign Office spokesman Muhammad Faisal said that the Indian government failed to take notice of the increasing incidents of intimidation of Pakistani diplomats, their families and staffers by its intelligence agencies.

File image of Pakistan envoy to India Sohail Mahmood. YouTube screengrab

"Our High Commissioner in New Delhi has been asked to come to Islamabad for consultations," he said.

On Tuesday, the Foreign Office had summoned India's Deputy High Commissioner JP Singh over the alleged harassment of its officials and their families in New Delhi.

The Pakistan Foreign Ministry claimed that the staff and their families have been facing "harassment, intimidation and outright violence" from Indian state agencies in recent weeks. Faisal on Thursday alleged that this deliberate continuing bullying was not confined to a single isolated event and "continues unabated despite repeated official protests lodged with the Indian High Commission here, and also with the Indian Ministry of External Affairs at the highest (level)."

He said the Pakistan High Commission shared with the External Affairs Ministry photographs identifying the individuals, who forcibly halted and took pictures of the officers but regrettably no positive action was taken by the Indian side so far.

"The total apathy and failure of the Indian government to put a halt to these despicable incidents, sparing not even young children, indicates both a lack of capacity to protect foreign diplomats posted in India or a more reprehensible, complicit unwillingness to do so," he said.

He said that under the Vienna Convention, the safety and the security of Pakistani diplomats and their families is the responsibility of the Indian government.

He claimed that in the latest incident, Indian officials stopped the car of the deputy high commissioner for 40 minutes and harassed the occupants of the vehicle.

"Pakistan will go to any limit to ensure the safety of the staff of (its) high commission in India," he said.

He said India should not drag Pakistan in its electoral politics. Faisal said that Pakistan wants peace in the region and was against an arms race.