Karzai, Hasina criticize Indian citizenship act

NEW DELHI: Bangladesh and Afghanistan rejected India’s controversial law the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA),  which describes both as the two neighbors discriminated against non-Muslim communities.

Former Afghan President Hamid Karzai told the media that the law excluding Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Christians and Parsis from the three countries on citizenship rights must be applied equally to all.

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Mr Karzai said, “We have not oppressed minorities in Afghanistan. The whole country is being targeted, we have been in conflict and war for a long time. All the minorities in Afghanistan, Muslims and Hindus and Sikhs, who are our three major communities, have struggled.”

Bangladesh’s Prime Minister, Sheikh Hasina, said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had formally told her that the National Register of Citizens (NRC) initiative was an internal issue of India that would not influence her citizens, but the NRC is being introduced in Assam and is being suggested to be expanded across the country with a view to repatriating illegal Bangladeshi migrants to their homeland.

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In an interview  Sheikh Hasina has seen the action as a crucial regional supporter of India’s right-wing Hindu government also opposed the new law, adding that the new law was not appropriate.