India called on the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday to investigate the fatal shooting of an Indian fisherman by a US navy ship in waters off Dubai.
Indian Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna called the incident “unfortunate” and said he hoped that “the necessary action will be initiated”.
The government of Dubai “has filed a case against this incident. They are proceeding according to the laws of that country,” Krishna told reporters in the Indian capital.
Foreign ministry spokesman Syed Akbaruddin said India’s ambassador to the oil-rich country “has requested UAE authorities probe the circumstances of the tragic incident”.
New Delhi has been in touch with US agencies and has been promised “a full investigation”, while the US ambassador to New Delhi Nancy Powell had telephoned “to convey her regret for the loss of life”, he added.
Analysts say Washington will be keen to contain any diplomatic damage to its relations with India, which it has been seeking to promote as a key Asian ally to counterbalance Chinese influence and as a new export market for US companies.
One Indian fisherman was killed and three others were wounded on Monday when a US navy ship opened fire on their vessel near the port of Jebel Ali in the tense waters of the southern Gulf.
US defence officials said the fishing boat had ignored warnings not to approach the refuelling ship USNS Rappahannock, and that sailors on board the American vessel feared it could pose a threat.
“Since 2000 we’ve been very concerned about small boats,” a defence official in Washington told AFP, referring to the year of a deadly suicide bomb attack against the destroyer USS Cole in the Yemeni port of Aden.
The US embassy in the Indian capital issued a statement conveying “its condolences to the families of the crew” of the boat, but said the fishermen had “disregarded non-lethal warnings and rapidly approached the US ship”.
The latest incident has echoes of another shooting that caused a diplomatic spat between Italy and India.
Two Italian marines guarding an oil tanker shot dead two Indian fishermen in February off the coast of the southern Indian state of Kerala.
They have been charged with murder and are on trial in an Indian court despite their claims that the fishermen ignored warnings and approached the tanker suspiciously.
Rome has called the case against the marines illegal and claims they should be prosecuted in their home country because the shootings occurred on an Italian-flagged vessel in international waters.
Relatives of one of the injured fishermen shot on Monday — named as Muniyaraj from southern Tamil Nadu state — said he had gone to Dubai about 10 months ago shortly after getting married.
“I request both the central and state governments to save all of them. Please bring them back and give them good treatment,” the mother of the injured man told reporters in footage aired on local television.
She said the man was her only son and had been “badly injured on both legs”.
The US navy has been building up its forces in the oil-rich Gulf region amid mounting tensions with Iran over its controversial nuclear programme.
Tehran has warned it could close the Strait of Hormuz in the southern Gulf if international sanctions begin to bite, potentially disrupting shipping and world oil supplies through the strategic waterway.
Washington has deployed two aircraft carriers to the region — the USS Abraham Lincoln and the USS Enterprise — and doubled its minesweeper fleet in the area from four to eight ships on June 23.
On Monday the Pentagon confirmed that it had brought forward the deployment of a third strike group, led by the carrier USS John-Stennis, by four months, in order to further bolster its presence.
In October 2000, 17 US sailors were killed when militants in an explosives-laden skiff blew a 30-by-30-foot (10-by-10-metre) hole in the USS Cole in Aden. Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attack.
This killing of an Indian fisherman by a U.S. ship was carried out to divert attention from what I said in my press release of July 11 '12 (below) about the British killing over ten million Indians in just the ten years after 1857 in just Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Bihar because of which India remains under white colonial rule and how it will be liberated and because of my earlier press releases about an Italian ship killing Indian fishermen:-
Manmohan Singh at the G-20 meeting in Mexico on June 18 '12 pledged $10 billion to the IMF to help European countries such as Greece and Italy cope with debt but will not use the money to help tens of thousands of Indian farmers committing suicide due to indebtedness or hundreds of millions of India's malnourished children. He seeks foreign investment — that is, foreign ownership and control of India — but will not invest the hundreds of billions of dollars he has given to the United States government — in exchange for U.S. Treasury bonds — in India. This is not even counting the unlimited amount of capital available to India by simply printing the money so long as it is used for productive purposes: 'How India's Economy Can Grow 30% Per Year Or More' :HowIndiasEconomyCanGrowDOTblogspotDOTcom . An example of foreign investment trumpeted by Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma is a $5 billion investment in India announced by Coca Cola to give Indians harmful-to-health beverages and replace healthier and tastier Indian beverages. Such examples of American rule over India in economic, military and all spheres can be multiplied hundreds of times. India's nuclear forces have been accused in the past of presenting photo-shopped non-existent missiles and non-existent nuclear warheads but India's nuclear warheads emplaced in U.S. cities since then are not non-existent : 'Nuclear Supremacy For India Over U.S.' :NuclearSupremacyForIndiaOverUSDOTblogspotDOTcom . If it is the non-existence of "knowledge, intelligence, courage and character" which is responsible for their not having triggered the warheads, with a warning that additional U.S. cities will be destroyed if there is any retaliation, it is MY responsibility to provide the knowledge, intelligence, courage and character; all they have to do is obey India's legitimate ruler and it is high time they did so without further delay: 'Satyam Shivam Sundaram Satish Chandra' :SatyamShivamSundaramSatishChandraDOTblogspotDOTcom .
I have referred in 'Source of Manmohan Singh's 'Deep Love' For Bush' — SourceOfManmohanSinghsDeepLoveForBushDOTblogspotDOTcom — to the British in India having killed over ten million Indians in just the ten years after 1857; people have mistakenly assumed these to be deaths caused by famine but NO, NO, NO, these were deaths caused by the gun and sword and hangings and being blown from the mouths of cannons in just the ten years after 1857 in just Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Bihar; the deaths caused by famines during British rule were quite separate from this; see Amaresh Misra's 'India AD 1857' in two volumes totaling over two thousand pages (Delhi: Rupa & Co., 2008) which describes hundreds of the battles fought during the 1857 uprising which was thousands of times bigger and more extensive, over the entire subcontinent, than India's colonial administration — all Indian governments after 1947 have been a continuation of white colonial rule; see 'What You Should Know About RAW': WhatYouShouldKnowAboutRAWDOTblogspotDOTcom — will let Indians know; this two volume work should replace the Ramayan and Mahabharat as required daily reading in Indian homes and schools — all educational institutions at all levels should have required courses in the 1857 War of Independence studies — without which Indians cannot capture the hatred for the white man (and woman) to win India's War of Independence: 'A Note on Hate': ANoteOnHateDOTblogspotDOTcom and 'Join India's War of Independence' : JoinIndiaWarOfIndependenceDOTblogspotDOTcom . With the simultaneous nuclear destruction of New Delhi, Washington and New York, with a warning that additional U.S. cities will be destroyed if there is any retaliation, this time the result of India's War of Independence will be different. Satish Chandra
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