INDIA KEEPS UP PRESSURE ON CHINA OVER MASOOD MOVE

NEWDELHI: India is piling pressure on China in multilateral forums to relax its objection to put Jaishe-Mohammed terrorist group chief Maulana Masood Azhar on the United Nations sanctions list.

Beijing is consistently opposing a resolution to blacklist Azhar, the Indian delegation said during a meeting of the BRICS counter-terrorism working group on May 17 and 18.

The five-nation BRICS is an acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

India said China is the lone UN Security Council permanent member not to support the move for a global ban on the Pakistanbased terrorist group’s chief.

Chinese officials countered that Azhar is a “bilateral issue” between India and Pakistan and, therefore, should be kept away from multilateral forums, sources said.

Also, they said Beijing has put the Indian resolution on “technical hold”.

A technical hold is seen as a clever diplomatic tool to block the Indian move without making the rejection permanent, which would have triggered an international outcry.

It is as good as putting the matter in a cold storage permanently as the term of a technical hold can be extended.

The JeM chief is accused of masterminding terrorist strikes in India such as the Pathankot airbase attack in January last year and a dawn raid on an army camp in Jammu and Kashmir’s Uri last September.

India wants him on the UN sanctions list, which attracts measures such as assets freeze and travel ban.

But China remained a steadfast holdout because of its friend