Belgium to act against 'Kashmir centre'

Belgium will ‘take action’ against ‘Kashmir centre’, suspected of being sponsored by Pakistan spy agency, if it indulges in criminal activities against India, Belgian deputy Prime Minister Didier Reynders said here on Wednesday.

The centre in Brussels had been flagged by the FBI as being funded and operated by Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) in a chargesheet against the Washington-based Kashmiri American Council head Syed Ghulam Nabi Fai last year. The centre has been lobbying against the Indian government for its ‘atrocities’ in Kashmir and has routinely held demonstrations in front of the Indian Embassy. To a query on the functioning of the centre, Reynders said the activities of the group were being followed carefully.

“We are following the situation to have more and more information about the activities and if there are some indications that there are criminal activities against India, we will take the necessary measures,” he said at a joint press interaction with External Affairs Minister S M Krishna.

Hurdles in FTA

Reynders, who is also the Foreign Minister, held talks with Krishna and Minister of State for External Affairs Preneet Kaur here. He noted that there are hurdles in the negotiations for a free trade agreement between India and European Union in the services sector.

“With India, we have made progress in certain areas like in field of goods. There are more difficulties in services and we are trying to solve it... We want more access for European companies to India and better access to Indian companies there,” Reynders said. He said both sides were talking to each other and a number of meetings were scheduled to hasten the process towards signing the FTA and hoped that they would soon be able to sign it.