Remove jets or won’t open airspace: Pak

Islamabad/New Delhi, July 12 

Pakistan has told India it will not open its airspace for commercial flights until New Delhi removes its fighter jets from forward IAF airbases, Pakistan’s Aviation Secretary Shahrukh Nusrat has informed a parliamentary committee.

Pakistan had closed its airspace on February 26 after the Indian Air Force (IAF) fighter jets struck a Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) terrorist training camp in Balakot following the Pulwama attack.

Aviation Secretary Nusrat informed the Senate Standing Committee on Aviation that his department had intimated Indian officials that Pakistani airspace would remain unavailable for use by India until the country withdrew its fighter jets from forward positions, a news report said.

“The Indian Government approached asking us to open the airspace. We conveyed our concerns that first India must withdraw its fighter planes placed forward,” Nusrat told the committee. This is probably the first time a senior Pakistani official has publicly stated Islamabad’s precondition for reopening its airspace after the Balakot airstrikes.

India rejected the statement, with sources pointing to two flaws. First, military deployments are a country’s sovereign choice and no other country can demand a particular military posture. Second, it is Pakistan that had first closed the airspace and, hence, must take the first initiative towards opening closed air corridors. Pakistan had last month extended the airspace ban till July 12. — PTI/TNS

Saeed moves Court against terror cases 

• Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) chief Hafiz Saeed on Friday challenged terror-financing cases lodged against him in the Lahore High Court
• Saeed, along with Amir Hamza, Abdur Rehman Makki, M Yahya Aziz and four others, filed a plea, naming the federal government, Punjab government and the counter-terrorism department as respondents
• The plea urges the court to declare the FIR against them null and void and claims Saeed has no relation with the LeT, Al-Qaida or any other such outfit