New Delhi, January 19: Pakistan, which is claiming it has no legal arrangement with India for handing over terror suspects following the Mumbai attacks, is forgetting one of its own Acts which provides for transfer of such people to a country with which it has not signed an extradition treaty.
The Extradition Act, 1972 of Pakistan clearly specifies that Islamabad can hand over anyone accused of terrorism or any other criminal act in a foreign country to that Government even if there is no Extradition Treaty.
The Act underlines that a suspect, sought for any offence by a country with which Pakistan has no extradition treaty, should be "surrendered" irrespective of whether a court in Pakistan has jurisdiction to try that offence.
"Where the Federal Government considers it expedient that the persons who, being accused or convicted of offences at places within, or within the jurisdiction of, a foreign State, are or are suspected to be in Pakistan should be returned to the State (country), notwithstanding that there is no extradition treaty with that State," says Section 49(1) of the Act.
The law, enacted on September 24, 1972, says that under the Act the suspects can be handed over to a country with which there is no extradition treaty exactly like it is done in the case of a country with which Pakistan has such inked such an accord.
The Act makes it clear that "every fugitive offender shall be liable to be apprehended and surrendered in the manner provided in this Act, whether the offence in respect of which his surrender is sought was committed before or after the commencement of this Act and whether or not a court in Pakistan has jurisdiction to try that offence".
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