Indian traders should be treated as per law: External Affairs Minister S M Krishna

BANGALORE: Expressing concern over the ill-treatment meted out to an Indian diplomat in Shanghai, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna today said the trade- related dispute involving two Indian traders in China should be settled as per law.

"It is a trade-related dispute, so our concern is no harm should be done to the Indian nationals," Krishna told reporters here reacting to the incident over which India has lodged its protest to Chinese authorities.

Krishna said he had instructed the Indian mission in Beijing to take it (the issue) up with Chinese authorities.

"The Deputy Chief of the Chinese mission in New Delhi has been called and we are going to follow it up with the Chinese mission," Krishna said.

46-year-old S Balachandran was ill-treated and had to be hospitalised, prompting India to lodge a protest with the Chinese authorities.

Balachandran was in the court in connection with the hearing of a case related to the detention of two Indians by locals in the eastern business hub of Yiwu for alleged non-payment of dues by their company, whose owner had allegedly fled the country.

The situation had turned ugly when Balachandran, Consul of the Indian Consulate in Shanghai, was leaving the court after prolonged negotiations on the night of December 31 with regard to the release of Deepak Raheja and Shyamsunder Agrawal.

On his upcoming visit to Sri Lanka, Krishna said "we have an excellent bilateral cooperation and relationship with Sri Lanka.... We have a whole gamut of bilateral issues that we can and need to discuss".

Replying to a query, Krishna said he would be inspecting the rehabilitation programme undertaken by Sri Lanka for the Tamils there and added "it is only to update the country's aid to the programme.