By DPA
Bangkok : Thai authorities Friday assured visiting Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee that Tamil Tiger financier Kumaran Padmanathan was not in their custody, as some media reported earlier.
“We are informed that the person concerned is not in the possession of Thai authorities,” Mukherjee told a press conference after meeting his Thai counterpart Nitya Pibulsonggram.
According to unconfirmed news reports, Interpol had arrested Kumaran, a key arms supplier for the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), here Sep 10.
Kumaran, 49, who also allegedly financed the assassination of former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, is a wanted man in both Sri Lanka and India. Kumaran is widely known as KP.
The “KP Department” is responsible for keeping the LTTE supplied with sophisticated arms and ammunition to fight its war for a separate Tamil homeland in Sri Lanka.
Thailand flatly denied reports of his so-called arrest and reiterated its denial to Mukherjee during his two-day visit.
Mukherjee’s visit to Thailand focused on boosting economic ties between the two countries, a more comprehensive free trade agreement is expected to be signed later this year.
“We’re aiming at $4 billion in trade (next year), and in three years to bring it up 70 per cent to $7 billion,” said Nitya. “We both agreed the final outcome would exceed this,” he added, after holding talks with Mukherjee.
Earlier, Mukherjee called for speeding up building a road link between India and Thailand across Myanmar for greater trade and investment between the two countries.
“Much more needs to be done in the field of transportation linkages,” Mukherjee told a seminar Friday morning where he delivered a speech on India’s ‘Look East’ policy.
India hopes the 1,400 km road link will help its eight under-developed northeastern states, which are land-locked.
“We hope that soon all of Thailand will get to know northeast India… and the trilateral highway project will change the northeast of India from being land-locked to being land-linked,” said Mukherjee.