Pakistan Expels 2 India Diplomats
The government of Pakistan on Thursday ordered two Indian diplomats to leave the country within 24 hours, state television reported. The order came after India expelled Pakistan’s senior defense attache in New Delhi and an assistant, accusing them of spying.
The television named the two Indians as B. D. Sharma, a consul in Karachi, and Rumesh Kumar, a junior diplomat at the embassy in Islamabad.
It quoted a Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying a strong protest had been lodged with the Indian ambassador in Islamabad against New Delhi’s action.
Indian External Affairs Minister P. V. Narasimha Rao told Parliament earlier Thursday that Pakistani defense attache Brig. Zahir ul-Islam Abbasi had been declared persona non grata. Indian officials said Abbasi was caught with a sensitive defense document while meeting an Indian contact in a New Delhi hotel.
The other Pakistani official expelled was identified as Abbasi’s assistant, Mohammed Ashraf Khatib, a non-diplomat.
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