Lahore: In a major change of stance, Pakistan’s former Foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has claimed that Islamabad would be open to extraditing individuals of concern, including 26/11 Mumbai terror attack mastermind and Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) chief Hafiz Saeed, to India.
The comment from Bilawal, who heads Pakistan People’s Party, came months after his “blood would flow in rivers if water is stopped” response to New Delhi’s decision to suspend the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) post the Pahalgam terror attack.
Asked by Al Jazeera whether Hafiz and Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) founder Masood Azhar could be handed over as a sign of good faith, Bilawal said he was sure Pakistan “would not be opposed to any of these things,” adding that such a move could be part of a “comprehensive dialogue” between the two nuclear-armed countries.
Bilawal’s comment did not go down well with Hafiz’s son Talha Saeed.
Slamming Bilawal, Talha warned the former he should not make such statements.
Talha, who like his father and many others are designated global terrorists, claimed that Bilawal’s statement brought disgrace to Pakistan globally.
Both LeT and JeM are proscribed outfits, according to Pakistan’s National Counter Terrorism Authority (Nacta).
Pakistan has claimed that Hafiz is serving a 33-year sentence in a terror-financing case, but multiple videos of the Lashkar chief roaming freely with his security guards and making incendiary speeches against India keep surfacing on social media.
The 77-year-old Hafiz is wanted by India, for the 2008 Mumbai attacks and Pahalgam massacre, as well as the US.
