India asks ICJ to bar Pak from executing 'spy'

India asked World Court judges yesterday to order Pakistan to stay the execution of an Indian citizen Islamabad says is a captured spy, a case that has escalated tensions between the two nuclear-armed neighbours.

India argued in a preliminary hearing at the UN court, formally known as the International Court of Justice (ICJ), that Pakistan violated the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations by denying the condemned man access to legal and other assistance from India. Pakistan was to respond later yesterday.

Yesterday's hearings focused on India's request for so-called "provisional measures" that can be granted at short notice to ensure a dispute between states does not deteriorate during full ICJ proceedings, which typically take several years.

At the core of the dispute is the fate of Kulbhushan Sudir Jadhav, an Indian former naval officer who was arrested in March 2016 in the Pakistani province of Baluchistan. There has been a long-running conflict in Baluchistan between Pakistani security forces and a militant separatist movement.

According to Islamabad, Jadhav confessed to being tasked by India's intelligence service with planning, coordinating and organising espionage and sabotage activities in Baluchistan "aiming to destabilise and wage war against Pakistan".

In April, a Pakistani military court sentenced him to death.

No date was set for the execution. Pakistan has said Jadhav's conviction and sentence remain open to appeal.