NEW DELHI: India on Wednesday remained firm that its legal procedure has to be allowed to go on unhindered, and that the investigation has to be completed into the incident of Italian ship personnel gunning down two Indian fishermen off the Kerala coast. Sources said there was not much headway made at the ministerial meeting on Wednesday on the technicalities of legal positions of both sides.
“They (Italians) knew that our positions remain the same. There was not really a discussion over the legal aspect. It was mainly on practical matter,” said a senior MEA official.
Meanwhile, in the next few days, Kerala will be hosting a high-level Italian presence, starting from Italy’s junior foreign minister Steffan de Mistura, who is accompanied by a senior official from the Italian foreign ministry’s crisis unit, Italian consul from Mumbai, Cultural attaché from Delhi, besides the Italian inter-ministerial delegation of legal experts. Italian Foreign Minister Giulio Terzi is slated to visit India next Tuesday.
The two arrested Italian marines will be produced before the magistrate on Thursday, after the end of their three-day police custody.