Truce breaches alleged

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32819, 20 January 1972, Page 11

Truce breaches alleged

IN.Z.PA.-Reuter—Copyright > NEW DELHI, Jan. 19.

Pakistan has accused India of breaking the ceasefire and says it has asked the United Nations Security Council to consider the issue.

« Radio Pakistan quoted a spokesman for the Pakistani Ministry of Foreign Affairs as saying that not a day passed without violations of the ceasefire by India, and that India appeared to want to regain its lost territories before United Nations observers were posted.

The ceasefire on the western front came into effect on

December 17 after India’s announcement that it was ordering a unilateral ceasefire on the front following the collapse of the Pakistani Army in East Pakistan.

Indian military spokesmen reported ceasefire violations by Pakistan for a few days after it, but there have been no reports of any breaches since then. INDIAN MANIFESTO

In New Delhi, the Congress Party, which is led by the Prime Minister (Mrs Ghandi), said in a manifesto that it was determined to see that India’s strength and size should never cause aperehension among its neighours. "We are pledged not to interfere in the internal affairs of our neighbours in any way but to live, with all countries in a spirit of co-existence, equality and mutual respect,” it said.

The manifesto was prepared for the elections of several state legislatures in March.

To Bangladesh, the party promised friendship and cooperation and told Pakistan that “India wishes to live in peace and amity with her.” “All the nations of our region have one supreme challenge — the eradication of poverty,” said the manifesto. U.S. CARRIER

The Indian Minister of Defence (Mr Jagjivan Ram) said today that the Indian Navy would have sunk the American aircraft-carrier Enterprise if she had caused trouble last month in the Bay of Bengal. “Our men would have willingly sacrificed a few lives to sink the Enterprise if the fleet had created any trouble

for them,” Mr Ram told a meeting of businessmen.

America sent the Enterprise and escort ships into the Bay of Bengal during the India-Pakistan war, an action Mr Ram said was childish. The Prime Minister of Bangladesh (Sheikh Mujib Rahman) has ordered an amnesty for all people convicted and sentenced by summary and special military courts while the territory was under East Pakistan martial law.

Sheikh Mujib said persons sentenced to prison by the Pakistani military courts would be released immediately to mark the "liberation of Bangladesh.” Sheikh Mujib commuted death sentences to 14 years

rigorous imprisonment' with provision for special remissions.

Sheikh Mujib has talked to some of the leading civilian officials of the former East Pakistan Government, which has been accused of collaborating with the Pakistani Army. Sheikh Mujib went to the Dacca garrison, where the Indian Army is holding the officials. The officials he met included the former Chief Secretary, Mr Mozaffar Hossain, and the former InspectorGeneral of Police, Mr M. A. Choudhury. He did not see Dr A. M. Malik, the former Governor of East Pakistan. All three are Bengalis. Sheikh Mujib earlier said that those responsible for atrocities in Bangladesh and those who collaborated with the Pakistani Army would not go unpunished. But India so far has not said that it would allow military prisoners of war to be tried for crimes committed in the nine months of military rule in East Pakistan before Bangladesh came into existence.