By NNN-PTI,
Islamabad : Noting that the Mumbai attacks added to the trust deficit between India and Pakistan, members of leading Pakistani civil society groups have asked Islamabad to ensure that perpetrators of the terror strikes are brought to justice and warned it against any sort of “cover-up”.
Representatives of South Asia Human Rights and South Asia Free Media Association (SAFMA), who were part of a 22-member peace mission that recently visited India, said the Pakistan government must make public the findings of its probe and take steps to punish the culprits.
SAFMA Secretary General Imtiaz Alam told a news briefing here yesterday that Pakistan must “sincerely” investigate the Mumbai incident and share its findings with India. Any sort of “cover-up” by the government would not work, he said.
A transparent investigation by Pakistan and punishing the perpetrators would be a sign for improving ties with India, Alam said.
The suspension of the Composite Dialogue was one of the objectives of the terrorists and they had achieved this through the Mumbai attacks, he pointed out.
The initial “denial mode” by the Pakistan government had also damaged the country’s credibility as well as the bilateral relations, he said.
The Mumbai attacks increased the trust deficit between the two countries and common people in India are pessimistic about the “chances of good relations between New Delhi and Islamabad in the near future”, he said.