India evaluating Pak's proposal granting consular access to Kulbhushan Jadhav

India will respond to the offer through diplomatic channels in a timely manner

Pakistan Indian Spy

A fortnight after the ICJ verdict, Pakistan foreign ministry has offered consular access to Kulbhushan Jadhav on Friday. India has “received a proposal’’ and is “evaluating’’ it in “light of the guidelines given by International Court of Justice”.

India will respond to the offer through diplomatic channels in a timely manner, asserted the ministry of external affairs spokesperson Raveesh Kumar, at the weekly media briefing on Thursday. The MEA’s rather terse response, suggests that the Pakistani offer is not without strings attached. Under the Vienna Convention, Jadhav has the right to consular access—and must be informed of his rights. However, the modalities of how and in what manner this would happen will have to be worked out by Pakistan.

While the ICJ had ruled in India’s favour over consular access and Pakistan agreed to uphold the court order as a responsible state, a press release issued by the Pakistan foreign office read that “consular access to Commander Jadhav’’ will be granted “according to Pakistani laws”. An interpretation of the verdict, under Pakistani law, will be key to what kind of access Jadhav would be granted.

The cautious response by the MEA suggests that Pakistan has put conditions on the consular access and could possibly want an official present during the meeting. This will certainly be unacceptable for India and getting a win out of this rather difficult position will not be easy.

The back and forth of the Jadhav access saga has been going on for over two weeks now. But getting consular access to Jadhav, even with a win at the ICJ, was never going to be simple for India. The tensions and the trust deficit between the two countries continue to be high. India has also found itself suddenly in an awkward position with the US military resuming aid to Pakistan. The US approved $125 million worth of technical and logistics support for Pakistani F-16 warplanes soon after Prime Minister Imran Khan’s visit. While India was dangled a $670 million carrot in the form of sale of support equipment and services for Indian Air Force’s C-17 transport planes, it is clear that India is seething at this new development.

“We have taken up the matter with the US ambassador here in Delhi,’’ said Kumar. “As well as the government of the US in Washington through our ambassador. We have expressed our grave concern over the US military assistance to Pakistan. What we have been told by the US side is that the proposed sale doesn’t indicate any change in the US policy of maintaining a freeze in the military assistance to Pakistan.’’

With the US special envoy on Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad, after wrapping up his “most productive’’ visit to Afghanistan where the next steps of the peace process have been agreed upon, said in Doha that the agreement between the Taliban and the US is almost done. Khalilzad’s stop in Islamabad before he went to Doha is significant, as it demonstrates that Pakistan is back in a steering position, which is a concern for India.