India seeks consular access for youth held in Pakistan

The Indian High Commission in Islamabad has asked for consular access to Hamid Nehal Ansari, an engineering and management graduate from Mumbai, who has of late been sentenced to three years in prison in Pakistan.

Vikas Swarup, official spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs, told journalists in New Delhi on Thursday that the High Commission of India in Islamabad contacted the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Pakistan Government and sought consular access to Ansari.

Ansari was moved to the central jail at Peshawar in Pakistan after a military court in the neighbouring country convicted him of espionage and sentenced him to imprisonment for three years last Saturday. He was also convicted of entering Pakistan without any valid travel document.

The 31-year-old traveled to Pakistan in 2012 to meet a woman he befriended online. He was taken into custody by local police in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan within days of arriving in the neighbouring country.

Swarup said that the Indian High Commission in Islamabad had also requested the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Pakistan Government for details of the charges against Ansari.