The Foreign Ministry of Pakistan has summoned Bangladesh envoy in Islamabad Tarik Ahsan in connection with Information Minister Hasanul Haq Inu’s recent comment on Pakistani Province of Balochistan. The Bangladesh envoy was summoned at the foreign ministry by the Director General concerned at 8pm on Friday, according to multiple sources at the foreign ministry in Dhaka and Bangladesh High Commission in Islamabad. The Pakistan side wanted to know the details about the information minister’s comments and Bangladesh’s official position in this regard. “Yes, I had a meeting with officials at the Pakistan Foreign Ministry on Friday,” Bangladesh High Commissioner in Pakistan told The Independent from Islamabad over telephone. “They wanted to know about the remarks of the information minister and I said that a reply, if any, will be given after consultation with the headquarters in Dhaka,” he said.
In reply to a question, the High Commissioner said that the upcoming Foreign Office Consultations between the foreign secretaries of Bangladesh and Pakistan scheduled to be held in Dhaka either on September 1 or 2 are still on and it is unlikely that the issue will have any impact on the consultations. According to officials at the foreign ministry in Dhaka, a reply in this regard is yet to be ready as it involves a minister and requires directions from the highest level. They said that the information minister’s view is his own and does not reflect the state position of Bangladesh. Bangladesh does not believe in the interference of the internal affairs of other countries, they added.
The foreign ministry is disturbed as well as annoyed by the remarks of the information minister, said the officials.
In his Independence Day speech on Monday, according to media reports, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi accused Islamabad of suppressing the people of Azad Kashmir and Balochistan, saying that ‘Pakistan shall have to answer to the world’ for the alleged atrocities committed against the people in these regions. On Wednesday, Hasanul Haq Inu during a visit to India told The Hindu that Bangladesh backed Modi’s stand on the Balochistan issue and said that Dhaka would soon make a policy declaration on Pakistan’s human rights abuses in Balochistan. Balochistan was facing the brunt of Pakistan’s military establishment, which ‘targeted’ the Bengalis in East Pakistan in 1971 before the creation of Bangladesh, he was quoted as saying by the Indian English daily.