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Pathankot: Congress, AAP question Pakistan panel's visit

PTI3_28_2016_000056B Members of the Pakistan's Joint Investigation Team formed to probe the Pathankot airbase attack in a meeting with the officials at the National Investigation Agency headquarters in New Delhi | PTI

The Congress and the AAP on Monday questioned the government's move to give Pakistan's security and intelligence officials access to the Indian Air Force base in Pathankot to probe the January terror attack.

The five-member Pakistani team arrived in New Delhi on Sunday to probe the January 2 terror attack at the Pathankot air base in Punjab. The team will travel to Pathankot on Monday evening and question witnesses there.

'Modi should answer the nation'

"Pakistan has provided no assurance of action. Yet their team has been allowed to investigate the Pathankot terror attack (in India)," Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala told reporters.

Surjewala said Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government had not been able to "differentiate between state actors and non state actors" perpetrating anti-India cross-border terror.

"Does the move (of allowing Pakistani investigators in India) imply that the Pakistan (government) has had no involvement in spreading terror in India?" Surjewala asked.

"The prime minister should introspect properly and answer the nation. Is there a guarantee that the team will not favour the terrorists," he said.

Surjewala also questioned the possible outcome of the Pakistani investigation.

"How will the investigation be undertaken? Will the terrorists be handed over to the Indian government or will the cases against them be proceeded in Pakistani courts?"

Modi has surrendered to Pakistan: Kejriwal

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday accused Narendra Modi of surrendering to Pakistan by allowing investigators, including an ISI officer, from that country to probe the January terror attack on the Indian airbase.

Kejriwal told the media that Pakistan had been harbouring terrorism against India and asked how its security and intelligence officials were being allowed to investigate something they had sponsored.

"We were saying ISI (Pakistan's spy agency) was responsible, it was a Pakistan-sponsored terror. Has this position changed?" he asked.

"Till now, Pakistan was held responsible for spreading terror. ISI (Pakistan's spy agency) itself sent terrorists to India and the same agency has now been allowed to investigate a terror attack," the Aam Aadmi Party leader told reporters here.

Kejriwal said it should have been "the other way round".

"Indian agencies should go to Pakistan to conduct probes as India is a victim of their terrorism but the opposite is happening and I can't tolerate this," he said.

"We don't know the reason behind this move (of allowing a Pakistani team to investigate Pathankot terror attack). Without any reason, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has surrendered to Pakistan," he added.

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