Pak claims India tortured cricket fan, wants answer

Islamabad: Pakistan has asked India to explain why one of its nationals, who went to India to watch a cricket match in 2005, was arrested and later died in an Indian prison, a Foreign Office spokesman said on Wednesday.

Khalid Mahmood, 30, died on February 12 but his family in Pakistan was only informed of his death on March 4, according to family members, who said he had been imprisoned as a spy and was tortured to death.

"He had gone to India to watch a match in early 2005 where he lost his passport and ended up in an Indian jail on spying charges," Mahmood's brother, Fateh Mohammad Sadiq, said.

"Without a passport, he could not return and was arrested months later after his relatives in India refused to shelter him out of fear because he did not have a passport," Sadiq added.

A Foreign Office spokesman said Indian authorities had not informed Pakistan about Mahmood's arrest until he died in what the spokesman said were mysterious circumstances.

"The death of Khalid Mahmood in custody should be condemned in the strongest terms," the Foreign Office spokesman told a regular briefing.

"We approached ... Indian authorities to give us a detailed report of the circumstances, the reasons for which he was arrested, the circumstances of his death," he said.

Mahmood's body was sent back to Pakistan on Monday and one of his brothers said on Tuesday that Indian authorities had not informed the family how his brother died but his body bore signs of torture.

Mahmood's family was informed about his death on the same day that Pakistan released an Indian, Kashmir Singh, who spent 35 years on death row in Pakistan on spying charges but was released after President Pervez Musharraf accepted his mercy plea.

The spokesman said Singh had been released on humanitarian grounds and Pakistan had hoped the gesture would be reciprocated.

"It is very unfortunate that soon we received a dead body of a Pakistani national from India," he said. But the incident would not affect a peace process the neighbours launched in early 2004, the spokesman added.

As part of the peace process, both sides began sending cricket teams to each other's country and thousands of fans have travelled back and fourth to watch the teams clash since then.