ISLAMABAD, Pakistan: The Hague-based International Court of Justice (ICJ) will announce the verdict over detained Indian spy Kulbhushan Jadhav case on July 17, 2019.
Kulbhushan Jadhav was sentenced to death by a Field General Court Martial in Pakistan on April 10, 2017.
In May 2017, India approached the ICJ, asserting that Pakistani authorities were denying India its right of consular access to Jadhav in violation of Vienna Convention.
The ICJ proceedings began in Hague on May 15, 2017 to review the case. India and Pakistan both sent their legal teams to put forward their arguments, led by Harish Salve and Khawar Qureshi respectively.
On May 18, 2017, the International Court of Justice stayed the hanging of Kulbhushan Jadhav.
Jadhav (Yadev) requested Pakistan authorities for a meeting with his mother and wife and Pakistan allowed the meeting. Jaghav in a video message thanked Pakistan for its decision to arrange the meeting with his family.
His video message can be seen and download to click here.
Pakistan provided access of Kulbhushan Jadhav to his mother and wife in its Foreign Office in Islamabad on December 25, 2017. Jadhav thanked Pakistan for this good will gesture in a video message but lambasted Indian authorities for harassing his family.
His video message can be seen and download to click here.
Jadhav was arrested by Pakistani intelligence agencies on March 3, 2016 from Balochistan after a long, painstaking and coordinated operation.
Kulbhushan Jadhav (Kulbhushan Yadev) recorded a confessional statement in which he confessed that he planned several acts of terrorism in Pakistan and was looking after a networking of terrorists spread from Karachi to Balochistan.
Click here to watch and download his video-recorded confessional statement.
Important facts about Kulbhushan Jadhav’s case
An investigated report was published by Eurasian News Networking on April 3, 2016 which was reported by Bangladeshi journalist Syeda Munawara Qazi. Qazi while reporting from Dhaka revealed shocking information about the operations of Jadhev (Yadev) in Pakistan.
Syeda Munawara Qazi claimed in her story that the arrest of Jadhav was not a surprise to his bosses because his contact with his handlers was seized in February 2016.
While citing Indian media reports, she confirmed that Indian authorities got information that Kulbhushan Jadhav (Yadev) was arrested by Inter Service Intelligence (ISI) of Pakistan through tapping his telephonic conversation when the spy dropped his guard by starting talking with his family in local accent of Marathi and with extreme familiarity and comfort level in the language. Moreover, his life style was not in accordance with his new identity of a Muslim Adult. Yadev was using identity as ‘Husain Mubarak Patel’.
While citing a report of “Ahmedabad Mirror” newspaper, Qazi stated that top intelligence officers in India were of the view that after 14 years of working in the region, Yadev had become a bit unworried of being arrested and his confidence put him in trouble.
Munawara Qazi reported that Indian spy circles suspected that his (Yadev) phone was on surveillance by ISI when he was working in Iran and his habit to talk to his children in local accent of Marathi raised more questions about his real identity.
Munawara Qazi also claimed in her investigative report that ISI through its networking counter checked the credibility of his new identity and passport he was using for travelling and living in Iran. She further claimed that ISI might check details of passports from Thane Regional Passport Office (RPO) from where this passport was officially released but there was no record of Passport in Thane Police Station. Citing intelligence circles, Qazi stated that such information could be enough to clamp Yadev within Iran or whenever he could cross Pakistan-Iran border because Yadev was using this fake passport for getting Iranian visas that had no record in Thane RPO.
Quoting Indian media, Munawara Qazi confirmed that Thane Police Commissioner Param Bir Singh confessed that passport was not issued from Thane RPO – confirming that Yadev was travelling and living in Iran on a fake passport.
Hindi language newspapers reported that Yadev when visited Mumbai could be under watch by the Pakistani agencies network working within Mumbai.
Yadev lost the contact with his family in February 2016 and his family had fears that he might be in the custody of Pakistan or was in some serious situation.
Munawara Qazi claimed in her investigative report that two other local contacts (In Pakistan) who were supposed to provide back-up assistance to Jadhav were also missing since February 2016. It may be mentioned that the standard operating procedure is to always have some contacts on standby to be the contact persons in times of emergency or when there is total blackout of communications and inaccessibility of the person of interest.
Munawara Qazi stated that Indian diplomatic circles in Dhaka claimed that both the Indian contacts were inaccessible so there were fears that either they have (had) gone underground or have (had) already been arrested. The fallout of the Jadhav’s arrest was the frantic counter-winding operations launched by the Indian agencies in Pakistan as well as in Bangladesh.
“Operations which are connected to an operative have to be immediately erased or folded up soon after he is outed so that there is always a plausible deniability. In the event of an asset getting arrested the handlers immediately secure other related assets like Agents in Places (AIP) or regroup their operations and fold up all the ongoing or future tasks. This discontinuation of operations is far monumental a disaster than the arrest of an operative like Yadev,” commented a counter-terrorism expert when asked about the intensity of damage done by Yadev’s arrest.
What is content of video-recorded Confessional Statement of Kulbhushan Jadhav?
In a video interview (Confessional Statement) of Yadev released by Pakistan, the Indian spy said that he joined the Indian National Defence Academy in 1987 and was commissioned in the engineering branch of Indian Navy in 1991. After an attack on the Indian Parliament in New Delhi, he started gathering information and intelligence within India. After 14 years of service he launched into intelligence operations in 2003 and established a small business in Chabahar in Iran. Yadav in his confessional statement said that he entered Pakistan illegally via Iran, and was involved in subversive activities in Balochistan and Karachi.
It is pertinent to mention that Yadav when captured told Pakistanis intelligence agencies to use a code phrase to inform the Indian authorities in order to demonstrate to them who it was that they had captured. The phrase was “Your monkey is with us”.
According to Pakistani officials, Yadav entered Chabahar, Iran with a visa stamped on a fake passport numbered L9630722, in 2003 where he got a new identity: Hussain Mubarak Patel, born in August 30, 1968, from Maharashtra, India.
According to Pakistani intelligence agencies, the main target of Yadev was to strike the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) through propaganda, with Gwadar port as a special target, and also to create disharmony among the Baloch nationalist political parties. Yadav had also purchased boats at the Iranian port in Chabahar in order to target Karachi and Gwadar ports in a terrorist plot. According to Pakistani officials, Yadav is an expert at Naval fighting techniques.
Yadav, in the video released by Pakistan, said “I am still a serving officer in the Indian Navy and will be due for retirement in 2022. By 2002, I commenced intelligence operations. In 2003, I established a small business in Chabahar in Iran. As I was able to achieve undetected existence and visits to Karachi in 2003 and 2004 and, having done some basic assignments within India for RAW, I was picked up by RAW in 2013”.
