By IANS,
New Delhi : In 2001, L.K. Advani asked Pervez Musharraf to handover Dawood Ibrahim to India. A red-faced Pakistani ruler emphatically denied that the underworld don was in his country, a claim that a Pakistani official later said was a “white lie”, the veteran BJP leader wrote on his blog Sunday.
Recalling his meeting with Musharraf on the eve of the botched peace summit in 2001, Advani in his blog, wrote that he had asked Musharraf to handover the most-wanted fugitive to India for building trust between the two countries.
“Musharraf, his unease palpable, replied assertively: ‘Mr. Advani, let me tell you emphatically that Dawood Ibrahim is not in Pakistan’.”
But “later, one of the Pakistani officials who was present during the meeting, said to me, ‘What our president said about Dawood Ibrahim on that day was a white lie’,” wrote Advani.
Advani in the latest blog entry likened the “white lie” about Dawood to that Pakistanis had been feeding to Americans all these years about Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
“It was the same kind of lie that the Pakistanis have been feeding to Americans all these years about Osama,” Advani wrote.
The BJP leader said the three-floored hideout for Osama and his family in Abbottabad was constructed in 2005.
“It would thus be reasonable to believe that the decision was taken when General Musharraf was in total command of the situation in that country.”
Advani said he was the first call to call on Musharraf July 14, 2001 at the Rashtrapati Bhavan where the general had been put up.
The BJP leader said he suggested to the Pakistani ruler that divided families on the both sides have never visited their native places after migrating to this or that side.
“Isn’t it odd that this should be the case even after the passage of more than a half-century? Shouldn’t we find an enduring solution to the issues that are keeping our two countries and two peoples apart?”
Musharraf agreed. “Of course, we must. What are your ideas,” he asked Advani.
When Advani replied that the “most important thing” was to build trust in each other, Musharraf “nodded in agreement, and asked how that could be done”.
The BJP leader touched the idea of having an extradition treaty between the two countries to which Musharraf, “not quite knowing where the conversation was headed”, replied: “Yes, why not? We should have an extradition treaty between our two countries.”
Advani then asked him to make a “great contribution to the peace process if you handed over to India Dawood Ibrahim, who is the prime accused in the 1993 Mumbai serial bomb blasts case and who lives in Karachi”.
“Musharraf’s face suddenly turned red and unfriendly. Hardly able to conceal his discomfort, he said something that I regarded as quite offensive,” Advani wrote, adding the general described it as “small tactics”.