Centre may send IUML leader for Iraq hostages' release

Modi advised MEA to choose a non-BJP leader for negotiation

The Centre is considering a proposal to send a politician from a party other than the ruling BJP to Iraq to help secure the release of the 40 Indians held captive by the Islamic State.

Given his experience on West Asia and vast network of contacts in the region, former Minister of State for External Affairs E Ahamed, is understood to be the first choice of the government for the job, although he is at present recuperating after a cataract surgery in Kerala. If he is unable to visit Iraq, the government may look for any other politician, preferably the ones having some experience about the region.

The government’s move to send a politician from a party outside the ruling coalition is apparently intended to blunt criticism over its inability to get the hostages home. As five months passed after they were kidnapped by the Islamic State militants from Mosul in northern Iraq, the government may come under attack from the opposition in Parliament during the winter session commencing from November 24 next.

Sources told Deccan Herald that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had advised External
Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to consider sending a politician to Iraq. He also told her that the politician should be from a party other than the BJP.

The politician is likely to first visit Baghdad where the Embassy of India will arrange his meetings with top officials of the new Iraqi government headed by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi. He will later visit to Erbil in northern Iraq to meet senior functionaries of the autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government.

The Kurdish Peshmerga forces are on the frontline of the war against the IS and New Delhi has been in constant touch with Kurdish Regional Government ever since the
40 Indian construction workers were kidnapped from Mosul on June 15 – just days after the city was taken over by the militants.

The politician may also travel to other countries in the region, like Saudi Arabia and Qatar. India has been relying on intelligence inputs shared by the governments of Saudi Arabia and Qatar, which purportedly conveyed to New Delhi that the kidnapped Indians were still in the custody of the IS, but had not been harmed anyway. Inputs received from the Syrian government also corroborated that the hostages remained unharmed although they were being forced to work in construction of certain facilities for the IS.

‘No comments’

When contacted, Ahamed, a Lok Sabha MP from Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), told Deccan Herald from Kozhikode that it would not be fair for him to comment on the issue.
Ahamed played a significant role in helping the government to bring back home
the 46 Indian nurses who were holed up for several days in a hospital in Tikrit – another
jihadist-held city in central Iraq.

Suresh Reddy, New Delhi’s former envoy to Baghdad, had been sent to help incumbent ambassador Ajay Kumar shortly after the kidnap. Reddy is understood to be now camping in Erbil in Kurdistan and is coordinating with Kurdish authorities as well as Iraqi government and other agencies to secure the release of the abducted.