5,000 Rally for Convicted Spy's Clemency

AMRITSAR, India-Nearly 5,000 people held a rally as shops and businesses shut down in the hometown of an Indian facing death by hanging in Pakistan for allegedly spying. They demanded clemency and his immediate return home.

Sarabjeet Singh's wife, two daughters and sister said they were prepared to hang themselves if Pakistan carried out the execution.

In New Delhi, Indian External Affairs Minister Natwar Singh met the Pakistani ambassador Thursday and formally asked Islamabad to spare Singh's life.

"Sarabjeet Singh is innocent. He has been falsely implicated by Pakistani spy agencies," said Tejvir Singh, a Congress party leader, in Bhikwind, 30 miles north of the Indian border city Amritsar.

Singh's wife, Sukhpreet Kaur, who also attended the rally, said her husband was not a spy. She said he strayed into Pakistani territory while farming his land close to the border.

Singh has spent 15 years in Pakistani jails before being sentenced to death for alleged spying and involvement in a string of bomb blasts in Pakistani cities. The death sentence was upheld last week by Pakistan's Supreme Court.

Pakistan's ambassador in India, Aziz Ahmed Khan, said after meeting the foreign minister that Sarabjeet Singh had received a fair trial.

"(The) external affairs minister has asked me to convey to Pakistani authorities if any humanitarian consideration can be extended to the case ... so, I'm going to convey that," Khan told reporters. "And as far as we are concerned, he's had a fair trial, he has been through the due process of law."

Indian foreign ministry spokesman Navtej Sarna said Natwar Singh had told the ambassador that "this is a humanitarian matter and ... there is a strong public sentiment in India for sparing the life of the individual." India also sought consular access to the prisoner.

Earlier this week, a group of lawmakers and politicians from Singh's native Punjab state met with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and urged him to take up the matter with Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf.

Pakistani Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammed Naeem Khan on Tuesday said Singh "has confessed to carrying out bombings in Lahore, Kasur and Faisalabad."

But he noted that Singh can appeal to Musharraf to spare his life.

For years, longtime rivals India and Pakistan regularly accused people who strayed across the border of espionage. Dozens remain in jails in both countries, though both have freed groups of prisoners in recent months as part of an improvement in relations.

No date has been set for Singh's hanging