Congressman To Seek Hostages’ Release Richardson, Who Has Helped Free Prisoners, Arrives In India
A U.S. congressman who has helped free political prisoners from Korea to Cuba arrived in northern India Wednesday to appeal for the release of Spokane psychologist Donald Hutchings and three other Western hostages.
Rep. Bill Richardson, D-New Mexico, planned to meet with Indian negotiators and with pro-rebel Kashmiri politicians and religious leaders during his two-day visit to Kashmir, said two officials familiar with the hostage situation.
Hutchings, German Dirk Hasert and Britons Keith Mangan and Paul Wells were kidnapped by the AlFaran militant group in July while trekking in Kashmir’s mountains.
Al-Faran - which decapitated a fifth hostage, a Norwegian - has demanded that India free 15 jailed rebels. India refuses to do that, saying it could lead to other kidnappings. Germany, the United States and Britain have supported that position.
Muslim rebel groups in JammuKashmir, the only Muslim-majority state in mostly Hindu India, have been fighting for independence since late 1989, and about 13,000 people have been killed.
Richardson arrived in Kashmir on the Muslim festival of Eid al-Fitr, which marks the end of Ramadan, the holy month of fasting. For the first time in the insurgency, the Indian army, which deploys hundreds of thousands of troops in Jammu-Kashmir, declared a unilateral 24-hour Eid cease-fire. In earlier years, an unofficial truce was in effect for the holiday.
Other Kashmiri rebel groups and the Hurriyat Conference, a coalition of pro-militant Muslim leaders and politicians, have repeatedly urged Al-Faran to release the hostages. And friends and relatives of the captives, and the Organization of Islamic Conference, also appealed for the hostages’ freedom for Eid.
Wednesday, Richardson met privately with officials in Srinagar city, including D.D. Suklani, an adviser to the state’s India-appointed governor.
Richardson did not meet with reporters, but India-controlled Radio Kashmir Srinagar quoted him as saying he appreciates what India has done to try to win the hostages’ release.
But the two officials familiar with his visit said that he does not plan to negotiate with Al-Faran. They said he merely intends to urge Al-Faran in the name of the U.S. Congress to unconditionally free the captives and to gather as much information as possible on the hostages.
Richardson has helped free other people. Two weeks ago, the well-traveled congressman helped win the release of three Cuban political prisoners after talks with President Fidel Castro. In July, he played a role in freeing two Americans from an Iraqi prison.
In 1994, he worked for the release of a U.S. helicopter pilot who had been shot down over North Korea.