Members of the Indian delegation at the hearing of Kulbhushan Jadhav case at International Court of Justice at The Hague snubbed their Pakistani counterparts by refusing to shake hands with them, reflecting the heightened chill in the bilateral relations in the wake of Pulwama terror attack.
A curt namaste was all that the senior Indian diplomats Deepak Mittal, joint secretary heading the Pakistan division in the external affairs ministry, and Venu Rajamoney, India’s Ambassador to the Netherlands, offered when Pakistan’s Attorney General Anwar Mansoor Khan wanted to shake hands ahead of the hearing.
This was the clear reflection of increased chill in the Indo-Pak ties in the aftermath the killing of nearly 40 Central Reserve Police Force personnel in ghastly Pulwama terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir on February 14.
The attack was orchestrated by Jaish-e-Mohammad, which is based in Pakistan and backed by Islamabad.
Kulbhushan Jadhav, the 48-year-old former naval officer, was sentenced to death by a Pakistani military court on charges of espionage and terrorism on April 11, 2017, following which India moved the ICJ, challenging the verdict.
Subsequently, on May 18, 2017, a 10-member bench of the ICJ restrained Pakistan from executing Jadhav till the adjudication of the case.