Revival of blame game against ISI
Sajjad Shaukat
Despite Pakistan’s protests against the continued violation of country’s
sovereignty by the CIA operated drones, American media have revived its
blame game against our Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI) and army
including the elected government. For this purpose, every time new
dimensions are added to the perennial false allegations. Surprisingly,
media in Pakistan have been engaging the people towards the
unprecedented victory of the US elected President Obama, to a greater
extent, while an article entitled, “A Quiet Deal With Pakistan”,
published in the Washington Post on November 4, 2008 went unnoticed.
Regarding the recent trip of the new Director-General of ISI, Washington
Post wrote in a satiristic style, “Pakistan is publicly complaining
about U.S. air strikes. But the country’s new chief of intelligence, Lt.
Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha, visited Washington last week for talks with
America’s top military and spy chiefs, and everyone seemed to come away
smiling.”The Post alleged that behind the predator missions is “a secret
understanding between the United States and Pakistan….this accord has
been shielded in the deniable world of intelligence activities.
Officially, the Pakistanis oppose any violation of their airspace. But
that’s not the whole story. The secret accord was set after the
September visit to Washington by Pakistan’s new president, Asif Ali
Zardari. Behind the agreement was recognition by the Zardari government,
and by Pakistan’s new military chief, Gen. Ashfaq Kiyani, that the
imminent threat to Pakistan’s security comes from Islamic terrorists
rather than from arch-rival India—an example was testimony on the
terrorism threat last month to a secret session of the Pakistani
parliament by Pasha, the new ISI chief, which was widely reported.” It
elaborated, “Kiyani has cleaned house by appointing new heads of four
main directorates, in addition to the new chief” of the ISI. Especially
blaming our intelligence agency, Washington Post maintained that the
approved target list of Al-Qaeda operatives and some Afghan warlords who
were once sheltered by the ISI is now being shared by the US. On
November 5, while rejecting the baseless allegations of the Washington
Post, a Pakistan embassy spokesman in the US made it clear that there
was no secret understanding with the United States regarding predator
bombings in the tribal areas. In fact, there is no clandestine
understanding of Pakistan’s spy agency, military and civil leadership
with the US for violation of its air space. This fact could be judged
from protests and warnings from Pakistan’s top military and civil
leadership. During the recent visit of United States Central Command
Chief General David Petraeus who along with the Assistant Secretary of
State Richard Boucher met Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani and Chief of
Army Staff General Ashfaq Kayani, was told that it is “not possible to
ask our people to support the war on terror when our sovereignty is
violated every day,”
PM Gilani pointed out on November 4, 2008 that General Petraeus “looked
convinced” when he warned him that the strikes were inflaming
anti-American sentiment. He further revealed that the next US president
must halt missile strikes on in northwest Pakistan or risk failure in
efforts against terrorism. Just after the trip of General Petraeus,
American drone killed 13 people through missile attack in the northern
Waziristan on November 7. In the past four months, US unmanned aircraft
have massacred more than 150 persons in our tribal regions by violating
Pakistan’s territory and without bothering for any internal backlash.
Recently our Foreign Office summoned the US Ambassador immediately after
passing of the resolution of the Senate and conveyed strong protest in
that connection. Before it, on October 22, our parliament in a joint
session unanimously passed the 14-point resolution, declaring that such
attacks were unacceptable, and called for review of Pakistan’s
anti-terror policy, having talks with the Taliban. On October 25, Chief
of Army Staff General Kiyani, while endorsing anti-terror resolution of
the parliament said that terrorism has to be addressed with the help of
the people of Pakistan. It is noteworthy that in September this year, P.
M. Gilani and Chief of Army Staff General Kiyani had also told the
visiting US Admiral Mullen that President Bush had personally made a
commitment to respect Pakistan’s sovereignty. In response, Mullen had
also expressed similar thoughts. Contrarily to these assurances,
violation of Pakistani territory still keeps on going by the US drones
as the same is part of American coercive diplomacy and false accusations
against ISI and army in order to take advantage from the multi-faceted
crises which our country is facing at this critical hour. It is notable
that on September 10 when Admiral Mullen revealed that the US military
has revised its strategy for Afghanistan to include targeting Pakistan’s
tribal areas. Just hundred minutes after his statement, Pakistan’s Chief
of the Army Staff, General Kayani replied that the sovereignty and
territorial integrity of the country will be defended and no external
force is allowed to conduct operations inside Pakistan. He had also made
it clear that there is no secret understanding between Pakistan and the
US in this context, and he had indicated this fact on Mullen during his
meeting in a naval ship. So Washington Post’s allegations in relation to
US drones are based upon falsehood. As regards the appointment of
General Pasha as head of the ISI, it is a normal practice as a number of
generals have been deputed on this post since the creation of this
agency.
It is mentionable that even the recent trip of General Pasha has been
manipulated by the Washington Post to conceal the nefarious designs of
Washington which has been playing a double game with Islamabad by
supporting India at the cost of Pakistan to counterbalance the rising
influence of China in Asia.
However, heads of various intelligence agencies officially visit other
countries as a routine matter, but misinterpretation of his trip
including other false revelations is part of American old propaganda
campaign against our army, and its spy agency which is the first defence
line of our country. It is of particular attention that in July and
August, this year, The New York Times disclosed in a series of
allegations regarding presumed ties between our country’s intelligence
service and militants of FATA—aiding Afghan Taliban and in bombing of
Indian embassy in Kabul. While America had officially stated afterwards
that there is no evidence about the involvement of ISI in the bombing of
Indian embassy. Present fierce military operations led by Pakistan
security forces against the Taliban militants in the tribal regions,
especially Bajaur in order to the restore the writ of the government,
killing more than 1500 insurgents and arresting many foreign fighters
who have been getting support from RAW’s training centres, located in
Afghanistan, logically prove that there is no link between ISI and the
Taliban. The fact of the matter is that US-led India, Afghanistan and
Israel have intensified their covert strategic game by manipulating
Pakistan’s grave crises which they have themselves created through their
secret agencies, CIA, RAW, Khad and Mossad. By taking new shifts in
their propaganda campaign, they are acting upon anti-Pakistan agenda by
particularly distorting the image of the ISI which is thwarting their
schemes against our country.
The misdeeds of anti-ISI agencies are known to every one. In this
context, Ramzi Yousaf who was well-aware of the activities of the
American secret agencies had stated in the US court in 1997, “You are
butchers, liars, and hypocrites. You keep on talking about terrorism to
the media, but behind closed doors you support terrorism”. In the recent
past, an officially declassified document of the CIA had revealed that
during the Cold War era, the agency had tried to kill the Cuban
President Fidel Castro. As regards India, it has become fashion to blame
ISI for every mishap to conceal her own secret operations against
Pakistan. In this connection, more than 12 crude bombs were exploded on
July 26 across Ahmedabad one day after the blasts of Bangalore. Although
some Indian leaders accused Pakistan’s ISI as usual, yet reality behind
the bombing was disclosed by Sushma Swaraj, a leader of the main
opposition Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP). While indicating the
horsetrading by the Manmohan-led ruling party, she pointed out that the
blasts in two BJP-ruled states could be the handiwork of a central
agency like RAW in order to distract attention from “cash for vote
scam”, used to get vote of confidence for the PM.
Returning to our earlier discussion, Washington Post has made an attempt
to revive the blame game against ISI as part of continued propaganda
campaign against Pakistan to convince the coming US president to
continue American present double game with Pakistan. |
