India has tried to play down the strong reactions from the Chinese Government on grant of visa to Chinese dissent leader and Uyghur activist Dolkun Isa to attend conference in Dharamsala next week. Now living in Germany, Isa is a leader of World Uyghur Congress (WUC), which is blamed for extending support to terrorist groups in China.
Advertisement
“Dolkun Isa is a terrorist on red notice of Interpol and the Chinese police”.
Bringing him to justice is due obligation of relevant countries, Hua was quoted by the agency saying.
The Indian government is reportedlyupset about Chinese plans to build a $46 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor announced last April. Uyghurs and other Chinese dissidents in exile are expected to attend and discuss democratic transformation in China. “I really want to visit India because I have never been (to) India”, he said.
China also dubs the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of the Tibetan community, a “separatist” and an “enemy”. Meanwhile, at the UN, Indian officials are preparing another list of terrorists, from Pakistan as well as other countries, including India, to put China on the mat, challenging Beijing’s political expediency as a result of its close ties with Pakistan. Isa was given asylum in Germany in the 1990s. I have got an electronic visa. He, however, denied having any link with any terrorist organisation.
Ministry of External Affairs, Vikas Swarup, had to say this on the issue, “We have seen media reports on his visit, at this moment we are trying to ascertain the facts”. But the World Uyghur Congress does openly espouse a separate country of East Turkestan, carved out of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in China’s northwest, home to the biggest Islamic militancy movement Beijing has ever faced.
Has India retaliated against China for Beijing’s decision to block New Delhi’s move at the United Nations to get terror outfit JeM’s chief Masood Azhar, banned by the world body? An electronic visa is only a document that entitles visitors from select countries to visas on arrival.
On Monday, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj met with her Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in Moscow on the sidelines of the Russia-India-China trilateral meeting.
Advertisement
This controversy comes close on the heels of three high-profile engagements between India and China in recent days.
