Hoax call fuels Pakistan-Indian tensions.....
A man pretending to be India's foreign minister called Pakistan's president and talked in a "threatening" manner during the Mumbai terror attacks, prompting Pakistan to put its air force on high alert, a security official and a news report said Saturday.
Indian officials were not immediately available to comment on the telephone call.
The call by a man identifying himself as Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee was put through to President Asif Ali Zardari on Nov. 28, said the security official, who declined to be identified, citing the sensitivity of the issue.
"India through diplomatic channels has informed the Pakistani Foreign Ministry that Pranab Mukherjee made no such call," he said. "Now what still needs to be checked is who made this threatening call."
A day after the call, two Pakistani security officials warned the government would pull its troops from the anti-terrorism fight along the border with Afghanistan in order to respond to any Indian military mobilization.
During a briefing, one of those officials said someone from the Indian Foreign Ministry had called "a top Pakistani personality" and threatened military action if Pakistan did not cooperate with New Delhi.
The rising tensions between the two rivals prompted an intense round of international telephone diplomacy that night and into the next day. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spoke to Zardari and Mukherjee.
Dawn reported that Rice asked Mukherjee why he took such a threatening tone with Zardari. He replied he had had no contact with the president, the newspaper reported, in what apparently led to the hoax being uncovered.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hkiMxbHNH0BqgpWA2ZG6VD...
Isn't hilarious and strange?
