A fresh diplomatic row between Dhaka and Islamabad emerged following Dhaka's refusal to accept the new high commissioner of Pakistan to Bangladesh.

Highly placed diplomatic sources said the Pakistan foreign ministry sent a proposed nomination of its envoy to Bangladesh in early March this year but Bangladesh was yet to respond to the appointment.

Dhaka [has] neither accepted nor rejected the nomination of the new high commissioner of Pakistan, foreign ministry officials said.

“We have so far not received any response from your government at an official level,” a Pakistani diplomat told The Daily Star yesterday.

A Pakistani diplomat in Dhaka said the designated Pakistan's High Commissioner to Dhaka Saqlain Syedah had been awaiting a response from Bangladesh's foreign ministry since early March.

He further said that Bangladesh's foreign ministry had not given any reason for not accepting Pakistan's HC.

In the meantime, some print and electronic media in India and Pakistan have speculated that Islamabad was considering expulsion of the Bangladesh High Commissioner to Pakistan Tarik Ahsan following Dhaka's refusal to accept the nomination.

The Daily Times of Pakistan yesterday carried a report with the headline “Islamabad likely to expel Bangladeshi high commissioner” and said that Islamabad was considering expulsion of the Bangladesh high commissioner.

Quoting diplomatic sources, the newspaper reported that the foreign ministry in Islamabad had informed Prime Minister Imran Khan about the diplomatic row between the two countries and had recommended the expulsion.

When contacted, a top ranking official at Bangladesh's foreign ministry last night told The Daily Star that he was not aware of any such development.

Diplomatic relations between Bangladesh and Pakistan have soured since the beginning of the trial and execution of war criminals in Bangladesh.

Despite Dhaka's repeated calls to Pakistan to not interfere in the internal matters of Bangladesh, Pakistan's national and provincial parliaments adopted a resolution against the trial of war criminals.