External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj shakes hands with his Iraqi counterpart, Ibrahim al-Jaafari before a meeting in New Delhi on Monday. (Source: PTI)
After a meeting with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on Monday, Iraqi Foreign Minister Dr Ibrahim Al-Eshaiker Al-Jafari told reporters that his government has no substantial evidence whether the 39 Indians who went missing in Mosul were killed or are still alive. “Not sure 100 per cent whether they are alive or not. We are doing our best,” Al-Jafari said.
Al-Jaafari, who is on a visit to India from July 24 to July 28, met with Swaraj at Jawaharlal Nehru for a discussion on bilateral relations between the two nations. His visit came just two weeks after Iraq Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi announced the liberation of country’s second largest city, Mosul, from ISIS.
Sushma Swaraj is expected to brief the Parliament today at around 5 pm on the issue. Last week, she met the relatives of the missing Indians and said they might be imprisoned in Badush region of northwest Mosul. However, a media report on Saturday claimed that the prison was reduced to a rubble during the fighting between the Iraqi coalition forces and Islamic State.
