CBI to visit Denmark for Davy's extradition

A Central Bureau of Investigation team is likely to leave for Denmark next week to help expedite the process of extradition of Purulia arms drop case prime accused Kim Davy to India and face trial.

The two-member team comprising a CBI officer and a lawyer will go to Denmark on May 14 or May 16 with all the available evidence to assist the local authorities corroborate allegations against Davy in the Danish court.

"The team is going to Denmark only to assist the local authorities with the facts and evidence collected against Davy. The case is still pending in a Danish court," said a senior CBI official who did not wish to be named.

A lower court in Denmark had ordered the extradition of Niels Christien Nielsen alias Kim Davy to India following which he approached the higher court in that country, challenging the lower court order.

The CBI had registered the case on December 28, 1995 after sophisticated arms including AK-47 assault rifles, anti-tank grenades and other weapons were dropped from a foreign  plane in the fields of Purulia in West Bengal on the night of December 17, 1995.

An Interpol Red Corner Notice was issued against Kim Davy in 1996 on the request of the agency. Since he was traced to Denmark in 2001, efforts continued to extradite him to India even though there was no extradition treaty between the two countries, the government had said adding the External Affairs Minister had taken up the issue with the Danish deputy prime minister when he had visited India recently.

The Danish government wanted India to ensure that Davy would not be given death  sentence if he is extradited, which was agreed to. The CBI had claimed that it has "clinching" evidence against Davy's alleged "act of terror" and is making all efforts to bring him to India to face trial in the case.

Davy had claimed to a private television channel last month that the then PV Narasimha Rao government had plotted the operation to destabilise the West Bengal government by arming locals in the state but this was denied by the Centre and the CBI.  

He had also claimed that India's external intelligence agency Research and Analysis Wing planned the operation with the help of its British counterpart Military Intelligence-5 on the Centre's directions.