DATE=1/6/2000
TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT
TITLE=PAK / FREED MILITANT (L)
NUMBER=2-257824
BYLINE=SCOTT ANGER
DATELINE=ISLAMABAD
CONTENT=
VOICED AT:
INTRO: A Pakistani religious leader freed by India in
exchange for more than 150 hostages aboard a hijacked
Indian airliner says the hijackers were Indian. As V-
O-A's Scott Anger reports, the cleric faced
journalists for the first time since arrived from
neighboring Afghanistan, after being released as part
of a deal to end the hijacking of the Indian Airlines
plane.
TEXT: At a Thursday news conference in Karachi,
Maulana Masood Azhar said the five gunmen who held
passengers hostage for eight days were Indian citizens
and have returned to India. Earlier, Mr. Azhar
identified the hijackers as Muslims sympathetic toward
Kashmiri separatism.
Wednesday, hundreds of people gathered to hear a
speech by Mr. Azhar at a mosque in Pakistan's southern
port city. Armed men stood guard as he told the large
crowd he will not rest until Kashmir is liberated from
Indian rule. He says there is jihad -- or holy war --
being fought in the Himalayan region.
The cleric had been released from an Indian jail along
with two other militants as part of a deal to end the
hijacking standoff, late last month.
Reports say one of the other two militants -- Mushtaq
Ahmed Zargar -- has been seen in Muzaffarabad, the
capital of Pakistani Kashmir. The whereabouts of the
third militant is unknown.
After the hijacking, the militants and the five
hijackers were driven by Taleban authorities from the
airport in Kandahar. The Taleban gave the group 10
hours to leave Afghanistan. Pakistan put its border
security forces on alert and said it would arrest the
hijackers if they entered the country.
The re-emergence of the two militants comes amid
rising tension between India and Pakistan. India has
accused its arch-rival of being behind the hijacking
and has urged the international community to declare
Pakistan a terrorist state. Pakistan denies the
charge and has challenged India to provide evidence to
support its accusations.
For more than a decade, India has been battling
militant Islamic secessionists in a bloody conflict
that has claimed hundreds of lives in Indian Kashmir.
Groups are demanding either outright independence or
union with Islamic Pakistan, which controls a third of
Kashmir. India controls the rest and has accused
Pakistan of supporting the Islamic groups with men,
weapons and training. Pakistan strongly denies the
allegation and says it only provides moral, political
and diplomatic support to the independence movement.
(SIGNED)
NEB/SA / WD
06-Jan-2000 04:10 AM EDT (06-Jan-2000 0910 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
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