Bangla Desh seeks recognition

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32801, 29 December 1971, Page 13

Bangla Desh seeks recognition

(N.Z. Frets Auocitition—Copyright) NEW DELHI, December 28. The Foreign Minister of the Bangla Desh Government said in Dacca that the only issue concerning his country at the United Nations was to get a seat as a sovereign and independent country, the Press Trust of India (P.T.1.) announced today, United Press International reported. .

In a report from Dacca, the news agency said that Mr Khondakar Mustaque Ahmed also saidt that his Government was continuing efforts to seek formal recognition by various nations of the world community.

The P.T.I. report came after a senior Government official in New Delhi had told Indian journalists on Monday that somewhere between six to 12 nations were expected to recognise the Bangla Desh regime shortly, and that about 20 countries had expressed willingness to grant de facto recognition to it.

Two so far The official, the Foreign Secretary (Mr T. N. Kaul), did not name any of the countries. So far the only nations to extend formal recognition to the Bangla Desh Government have been India and the tiny Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan, on India’s northern border. In Rawalpindi, • meanwhile, President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto held his second meeting yesterday with the Bengali nationalist leader, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. The meetings were seen in New Delhi as an effort to recoup part of the losses caused by the surrender of Pakistani troops in East Bengal and installation of the Bangla Desh Government there. Sheikh Mujibur has been held in West Pakistan since the start of the East Pakistan civil war last March. In a background briefing for Indian news agencies and newspapers, Mr Kaul said that the start of talks between India and Pakistan about the repatriation of prisoners of war could depend on the Pakistan Government’s policies in the weeks ahead. ‘Sober policies’ The Foreign Secretary indicated that Mr Bhutto and his Government would have to adopt what were described as “sober policies” before a climate conducive to discussions was created. Mr Kaul’s remarks were taken as a reference to statements by Mr Bhutto that a settlement in the East would have to be on the basis of the integrity of Pakistan. Mr Kaul also said that India had accepted the principle of withdrawal of its

forces from occupied territory in West Pakistan, but that this also would be a subject for talks between the Indian and Pakistani Governments.

He added the proviso that the withdrawal principle did not apply to territory along the cease-fire line in the disputed northern state of Kashmir. The Indian Government position was that all of Kashmir was Indian territory, the Foreign Secretary said.

Mr Kaul also said that India would consider the laying of war crimes Charges against Pakistani prisoners of war being held by India, and that it was up to the Bangla Desh Government to place evidence against individuals in the hands of the Indian Army authorities. Courts to work Bangla Desh Government officials said in Dacca yesterday that courts throughout the country would begin functioning immeditaely to dispense justice. Local officials in East Bengal have said that trials of alleged collaborators with the West Pakistan Government would be conducted at district towns, and the Government has been reported to have started a campaign to find and arrest members of Right-wing Moslem groups

which supported the West Pakistan Government. The Indian Army Chief of Staff, General S. H. F. J. Manekshaw, told a United Press International correspondent, Kenneth Braddick, in Dacca yesterday that Pakistani prisoners were being taken to India at the rate of about 3060 a day. P.o.W. moves Genral Manekshaw said that the pace of the prisoner movements would be increased and that he hoped to have all of the approximately 100,000 troops out of East Bengal by mid-January. At that time he also hoped to be able to withdraw about 25,000 Indian troops from the area, although others would have to remain for an indefinite period. The general said that at least some of the prisoners would be kept in a relatively unpopulated area of India’s eastern state of Bihar, used to house Italian prisoners of war from the Middle East during World War 11. Additional camps for prisoners were being reported made ready in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. Cabinet grows The Bhngla Desh Government in Dacca announced yesterday the addition of five more members to its Cabinet, all of them members of Sheikh Mujibur’s Awami League, which won an overwhelming victory in National Assembly elections in December of 1970. The election victory led to strife between East anfl West which culminated in more than eight months of civil war and eventual Indian intervention to sever the East from West Pakistan. One of the five new Cabinet members was the first Hindu to be included at the ruling level of the Bangla Desh regime.