NEW DELHI: Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto is unlikely to travel straight to Pakistan after participating in Republic Day celebrations, official sources said Saturday following hectic diplomatic efforts by India to convince Jakarta to not club his India visit with his proposed official travel to Islamabad.
India had last year invited Subianto as chief guest for the Republic Day parade but a formal announcement about his visit is still awaited. Amid this delay by India in announcing the name of the chief guest for the Jan 26 celebrations, reports emerged in Pakistan media this week that Subianto will arrive in Islamabad the same day for a three-day visit.
TOI first reported Friday that Indian government had raised the issue diplomatically with Jakarta as it found the President’s reported plan to fly straight to Islamabad after being honoured by India unacceptable. While R-Day is a special occasion, Indian govt has urged foreign leaders for years now to not mix their travel plans to India with Pakistan even for bilateral visits, maintaining it goes against the grain of dehyphenation that India seeks from them in their ties with the two countries.
Official sources said the Indonesian President won’t travel to Pakistan from India. Reports emerged Saturday that he might fly to Malaysia from India late on Jan 26 but there was no official confirmation. There has been no official word from Jakarta yet on Subianto’s itinerary.
It’s not clear if the President, in case he does indeed travel to Malaysia, will fly in the opposite direction again to visit Islamabad or shelve his Pakistan visit plans for now. Pakistan’s ministers were quoted as saying last week that the “landmark” visit would allow Indonesia and Pakistan to take steps to ramp up their economic ties.
The proposal for Subianto’s visit to Pakistan seems to have emerged from his meeting with Pakistan PM Shehbaz Sharif on the sidelines of a multilateral event last month.
