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India summons US envoy Nancy Powell over arrest of diplomat in New York PTI

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The United Nations has approved a request from India to accredit a New York-based diplomat after her arrest by U.S. authorities on criminal charges including visa fraud, a U.N. official said on Monday.


U.N. approves India's request to accredit diplomat charged by U.S
Reuters By Louis Charbonneau

Indian media said the request to transfer Devyani Khobragade, who was deputy consul-general in New York, to the United Nations was aimed at ending the stand-off with the United States in the hopes that her new diplomatic status could allow New Delhi to bring her home without the prosecution proceeding.


"The U.N. has processed the request to register Ms. Khobragade as a member of the Permanent Mission of India to the U.N.," a U.N. source said on condition of anonymity. "However, the final stop in the process is the U.S. (State Department)."
 
[h=2]Exemption to Devyani from personal appearance in court proceedings in New York a "good beginning," Minister tells The Hindu[/h]India has decided to extend the deadline for U.S. diplomats to surrender their identity cards by another three days, and views as a “good beginning” the exemption of Indian diplomat Devyani Khobragade from personal appearance in court proceedings in New York.


“We will give it [extension in deadline]. We are reasonable but the extension is for three days. There is no problem,” External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid told The Hindu on Monday, indicating there would be no further measures against U.S. diplomats which he described as “reciprocal.”


“Whatever we had to do we have done. It seems we were going further than what was required by reciprocity. So, we have retreated into reciprocity and that will remain,” he explained, ruling out the rolling back of the measures restricting privileges for U.S. diplomats announced last week.
 
Iran case


Instead, the U.S. claims that its laws were broken, and since a consular officer does not have the full immunity of an accredited diplomat, Ms. Khobragade was not immune from either arrest or subsequent prosecution. This, though, is not what the U.S. argued as the applicable international law when its diplomatic and consular staff were taken hostage in Iran in 1979, and the government in Tehran threatened to prosecute them for acts that were, in its view, crimes in Iranian law. The U.S. moved the International Court of Justice and in its submission, claimed inter alia that: “Pursuant to Articles 28, 31, 33, 34, 36 and 40 of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, the Government of lran is under an international legal obligation to the United States to ensure that … the consular personnel of the United States be treated with respect and protected from attack on their persons, freedom, and dignity; and that United States consular officers be free from arrest or detention. The Government of Iran has violated and is currently violating the foregoing obligations.”


The court ruled in favour of the U.S. on all points, by a large majority on most, but unanimously on the U.S. contention, examined at length in its judgment, that the Iranian threat to prosecute diplomatic and consular staff was a violation of the Vienna Conventions. The court held that: “no member of the United States diplomatic or consular staff may be kept in Iran to be subjected to any form of judicial proceedings or to participate in them as a witness.”


The U.S. therefore does not really have a case, on either moral or legal grounds. What is surprising is that it was prepared to offend a country that is now of some strategic and commercial interest to it, and so blatantly breach the Vienna Conventions that protect its diplomatic and consular agents as much as they do all others. Except, it seems, in Iran in 1979 and in the U.S. in 2013.

Breaching the Vienna Conventions - The Hindu
 
Devyani Khobragade's lawyer has said authorities here goofed up in the probe and arrest of the Indian diplomat on visa fraud charges as a federal agent made a "serious" mistake in reading the paperwork submitted regarding her maid's salary.


Daniel Arshack, Khobragade's lawyer, said Mark Smith, the Diplomatic Security Services agent handled the investigation and arrest of Khobragade and drew up and swore to the accuracy of the formal complaint in the case.


Smith "simply made an error in reading the DS-160 form which supported the visa application for the domestic worker, Sangeeta Richard," Arshack said.


"He erroneously and disastrously believed that the USD 4,500 per month salary entry on the form was Richard's expected salary when, in fact, it was clearly a reporting of the base salary to be earned by the employer, Khobragade, in the US," he said.


The lawyer said Khobagrade's base salary figure of USD 4,500 per month was required and appropriately reported on the DS-160 form, which is the online non-immigrant visa application required to be submitted by those seeking US visas.
US officials made 'serious' mistake in Devyani Khobragade's arrest: Lawyer - Indian Express
 
Consider two cases of consular officials two years apart. One shoots and kills two locals, the other pays her nanny wages below local minimum but above home rates. The same US president insists on diplomatic immunity for the first but stays silent on the second.


Had host-country law prevailed, the first - Raymond Davis, a CIA contractor in Lahore, Pakistan - could have faced the death sentence. Instead he was brought home without trial. Then senator John Kerry went to Pakistan to appease its anger. The US media managed to contain its outrage on his victims.


The second - an Indian female career diplomat, not an intelligence agent - is strip-and-cavity searched. The US media are touched by the plight of the poor maid and the sanctity of the law. No apology from Kerry, now the Secretary of State.


Guess which country they accuse of hypocrisy? Yes indeed, India. And praise which for standing up for the rule of law that must treat everyone equally? Yep, good ol' USA.
Devyani Khobragade row: US must apologise to India
 
Leading Indian-American lawyer Ravi Batra said Khobragade can sue the US for arresting her in violation of Vienna Convention as she had the diplomatic immunity in her capacity of being a member of the Indian delegation to the UN.


"If Devyani was in fact a UN-credentialed 'Advisor' to Permanent Mission of India then she had full immunity from arrest and can file a plausible federal case of an unconstitutional false arrest against the US," Batra told a news agency.
 
She checked about her special privileges ...With privileges withdrawn, US Ambassador Nancy Powell calls off Nepal visit - The Economic Times


They said the US Ambassador had informed the External Affairs Ministry about her travel plans and when she checked about her privilege of special access, she was informed that it stood withdrawn since December 19, the deadline for surrendering the special passes by the US. ​


Asserting that India withdrew this facility totally on "reciprocal" basis, the sources said when Indian Ambassador to the US travels in and out of that country, they don't get any special privilege and cited the example of Meera Shankar, former ambassador who was pulled from an airport security line and frisked by a security agent in Mississippi in 2010. ​
 
This is what happens when you keep on taking, you get taken for granted ...

https://hromedia.com/2013/12/29/diplomat-row-strong-indian-response-shocks-us-officials/
Officials in Washington, DC concede that given New Delhi’s past track record, it was never conceived by the American foreign policy makers that India would react to the arrest of its diplomat the manner it did after the December 12 incident.

​
After all, there had been precedent of Indian envoys and top past and present officials being subject to humiliating and disrespectful treatment during their US visits, mostly at the airports, and there was hardly any protest, they said.​
 
In a new twist, it has now emerged that senior Indian diplomat Devyani Khobragade enjoyed full diplomatic immunity including from personal arrest and detention on December 12 when she was taken into custody by the US authorities in a visa fraud case.


39-year-old Khobragade, who was posted as Deputy Consul General in New York, was also accredited as an "Advisor to the Permanent Mission of India to the United Nations" by the UN w.e.f. 26th August 2013 and her status as an Advisor was valid until 31 December 2013. The accreditation was for the UN General Assembly 2013.


Under the "Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations", Article 4 Section 11A specifies "Immunities from personal arrest or detention and from the seizure of their personal baggage" of all representatives of members to the UN and further the Article specifies that the expression "Representative" shall be deemed to include all Delegates, Deputy Delegates, Advisors, Technical Experts and Secretaries of delegations.


"Her arrest, therefore, on December 12th 2013 was contrary to her status on that date," sources said.
Khobragade had full diplomatic immunity at the time of arrest
 
Nara Sir,
Why do you have to quote only RSS,BJP , VHP as fundamentalist religious nationalists? Do they spread superstitions or hatred? I like your style of narration and can you share why you turned into anti sanathana dharmist? Human race started in India and if it ends, Sanatana Dharma will still stand, since withstood several milleniums.

And reg the case, I feel first time India has reacted strongly to USA. And of course, if its for votebank politics, hell with them. Since both are democracies, they are doing this way. Would they have the balls to do the same with Russia or China??
 
indianassault said:
....Why do you have to quote only RSS,BJP , VHP as fundamentalist religious nationalists? Do they spread superstitions or hatred? I like your style of narration and can you share why you turned into anti sanathana dharmist? Human race started in India and if it ends, Sanatana Dharma will still stand, since withstood several milleniums.
Click to expand...

Dear indianassault, why are you asking me this question in this thread, I don't think I talked about Hindutva folks here did I? I have no problem talking about these issues, but if I don't want to do it in this thread. So, I will just state my view and if you want to discuss further, please start a new thread. My view is, these folks mix politics and religion and want to see Hinduism declared de facto, if not de jure, state religion. I oppose this.

Your claim that "Human race started in India" is troubling to me. Do you really believe so?

And reg the case, I feel first time India has reacted strongly to USA. And of course, if its for votebank politics, hell with them. Since both are democracies, they are doing this way. Would they have the balls to do the same with Russia or China??
Click to expand...
It is true this is the first time India has taken a tough stand. This has surprised the Americans as reported in the Indian press. Americans are used to treating the rest of the world vassal states or enemies. They see India as a vassal state and India has also been acting like one. The reaction in the west was to tell India that they are acting immature and they need to act like adults. The Indians living in the U.S. invariably sided with the Americans.
 
Nara Sir, please check post no 24 and a post in page 2. You had referred to Modi and the RSS, Hindu Munnani. I would like to add a correction to my earlier post. Please read it as "civilized human race"
 
indianassault said:
Nara Sir, please check post no 24 and a post in page 2. You had referred to Modi and the RSS, Hindu Munnani.
Click to expand...
Actually, I didn't mention Modi, I should have :). Anyway, what is your objection?

I would like to add a correction to my earlier post. Please read it as "civilized human race"
Click to expand...
This makes it even worse, if you thought human race started in India that would indicate ignorance, to think "civilized human race" started in India reveals, IMO, a toxic cocktail of ignorance laced with arrogance.

If you wish to discuss this further let us take it to another thread where BJP/RSS is currently being discussed.
 
I was taught history by NCERT and they taught me Mohenjadaro, Harappan, Mayan, Chinese were the "first civilizations" of the world. Arrogance? I dont think so.
 
Indian diplomat Devyani Khobragade leaves US for home under full diplomatic immunity.
By Yashwant Raj, Hindustan Times Washignton, January 10, 2014.

This should bring to an end a crisis in relations between India and the US starting December 12, when Khobragade was arrested in New York, and strip-searched.
 
Ah so it was all showboating on all sides. I am guessing an extradition request is out of the question. The only further impact is that this probably puts paid to DK's supposed desire to immigrate to the US as has been suggested in some circles.
 
Indian Diplomat Devyani Khobragade Formally Indicted for Visa Fraud and Making False Statements
Indictment of Indian diplomat expected to escalate tension between India and the U.S.
Indian Diplomat Devyani Khobragade was indicted Thursday afternoon by a federal grand jury in New York City. The diplomat's arrest - and in particular the strip-search she underwent as a result - last month sparked outrage and protests in India.


The Federal District Court officially charged Khobragade, 39, with visa fraud and making false statements for her maid, whom she was paying below the legal minimum wage. The indictment also accuses Khobragade of attempting to "silence and intimidate the victim and her family and lie to Indian authorities and courts," The New York Times reported.

That means she can never comeback to USA.
 
Tit for tat: India asks US to withdraw diplomat from Delhi
In a swift retaliatory action, India on Friday asked the US Embassy here to withdraw an officer of a rank similar to that of Devyani Khobragade who was asked to leave the US after being indicted for visa fraud and making false statements.


Government sources said India has reason to believe that this officer was involved in processes relating to Khobragade case and subsequent unilateral action by US.


On a day of dramatic developments, Khobragade was indicted for visa fraud and making false statements by a grand jury in New York which held that the charges against her will remain even as she headed back to India after being accorded full diplomatic immunity.


The US request to India to waive her diplomatic immunity was refused following which she was asked to leave the country.


The charges against 39-year-old Khobragade will remain and she will have to face trial, if she returns to the US without diplomatic immunity, US attorney Preet Bharara said in a letter to district judge Shira Scheindlin. Bharara said the grand jury has indicted the diplomat on two counts of visa fraud and making false statements in connection with the visa application of her domestic help Sangeeta Richard.


Khobragade was granted full diplomatic immunity on January 8 under the India-US headquarters agreement.


On January 9, the US request for waiver of diplomatic immunity to Khobragade was refused by India. A 1999-batch IFS officer, Khobragade, was arrested on December 12 on charges of making false declarations in a visa application for her maid. She was released on a $250,000 bond. The diplomat was strip searched and held with criminals, triggering a row between the two sides with India retaliating by downgrading privileges of certain category of US diplomats.
The times of India.


Remember this name Preet Bharara, we must do everything possible to take him down a notch.
 
India-U.S. relations will take some time to recover from this month-long saga, which saw New Delhi withdrawing special privileges to U.S. diplomats based in this country, and the postponement of a visit by the U.S. Energy Secretary. Washington needs to introspect if it could have handled the issue differently, starting from the time that Ms. Khobragade brought to the State Department’s notice last year that her domestic employee had gone missing. Clearly, the U.S. side underestimated the Indian response to the arrest. Washington failed to anticipate that the incident would become fixated in the Indian public imagination as an issue of national pride. Considering that the U.S. and India have acknowledged that both have high stakes in strong ties, the sensible course would have been to enable a situation in which the diplomat was allowed to leave the country before charges were pressed against her. Whether or not the row was a manifestation of the drift in ties being felt on both sides long before this, it will need deft diplomatic footwork to restore a degree of calm and trust to bilateral relations. If there is one silver lining in this dismal episode, it is that the two sides now perhaps have a better measure of each other.

The Hindu -Editorial
 
USA spat on India, and India says I wiped my face clean, I won ..... so very predictable, Ecuador has more self-respect than India ......
 
U.S.A has always been anti-Indian. The rise of Pakistan as a military power is only because of the total support of U.S. This goes back to the days of Dulles. Even today Pakistan is a valuable Ally of U.S whereas India is not.

The U.S almost sent its marines to India at the time Bangladesh war.

Just because our people have started migrating to U.S on a large scale can not improve relations.

India can not become a vassal state just because that would suit the Indian Americans and the NRIs.

Things would become only worse if BJP comes to power in India. Hindu Nationalistic party. Neither Hinduism nor nationalism is popular with the Americans.
 
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