ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has decided not to send its high commissioner back to New Delhi the overall situation improves and Indian secret agencies stop harassing its diplomatic staff and their families.
“Our high commissioner will not return to India anytime soon,” said a senior foreign office official just hours after Sohail Mahmood returned from New Delhi on Friday.
Initially, it was thought that he would return to New Delhi after consultations with relevant authorities on the continued harassment and bullying of Pakistani diplomatic staff and their families.
According to reports, it was not possible under current circumstances for the high commissioner to operate out of New Delhi especially after children of Pakistan’s deputy high commissioner were stopped by the agents of an India secret service for 40 minutes on a Delhi’s road.
Tensions between the two countries have been already running high because of frequent clashes between the Pakistani and Indian troops along the Line of Control (LoC) and the Working Boundary.
Earlier in 2002, the two countries recalled their respective high commissioners in the aftermath of an attack on the Indian parliament in December 2001.
It was India, which first withdrew its envoy as a token of protest over Pakistan’s failure to stop alleged cross-border terrorism. New Delhi then expelled Pakistani High Commissioner Ashraf Jahangir Qazi.