US-Pakistan
relations took a new twist Tuesday when Washington
arrested the Kashmiri leader, Dr Ghulam Nabi Fai, on charges of working for the
Pakistani spy agency, Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) which purportedly gave
$4 million to Dr. Fai for years to lobby for the Kashmir
issue.
However,
Pakistan Today newspaper reported that the arrest of Washington-based Kashmiri
American Council (KAC) President Dr. Fai, seems to be an act of retaliation by
the US in response to Islamabad's refusal to set free Dr Shakil Afridi, a local
physician arrested in the wake of the May 2 Abbottabad operation on charges of
spying for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
The paper
quoted unidentified sources as saying that during July 13 visit of the ISI
chief Lt General Ahmad Shuja Pasha to Washington US officials demanded the
release of Dr. Afridi but General Pasha refused and the Americans decided to
arrest Dr Fai on charges of working as an operative for the ISI.
This was the second US allegation against the ISI within three weeks. On July 4 Washington accused the ISI of involvement in the kidnapping and killing of senior journalist Saleem Shahzad. The allegations come amid increasingly strained ties between the United States and Pakistan.
It also
sends a clear message to Islamabad and the Pakistan
Army to bring flexibility in their stance and accept the US demands, otherwise such actions
could be taken in future as well.
In an
affidavit filed in court, the FBI said Pakistan
has spent at least $4 million since the mid-1990s lobbying the U.S. Congress and
the White House through Fai and the Kashmiri American Council, also known as
the Kashmir Center, where Fai served as executive
director. The KAC was founded in 1990.
Dr Fai was
born in 1949 in Indian-administered Kashmir.
He was briefly attached to the Jamaat-e-Islami, a right-wing Islamic
organisation, in Kashmir. He left India decades ago after graduating from Aligarh Muslim
University in northern India, and worked in Saudi
Arabia for some years before moving to the US for
higher studies in 1977.
He gained a
doctorate in Mass Communications from Temple
University in Pennsylvania
and stayed on in the US.
Ten years later he became a US
citizen. Dr Fai founded the Kashmiri American Council with a view to making
American politicians and congressmen, as he put it to me once, "aware of
the Kashmir issue". He has been
addressing congressmen, academics and journalists on Kashmir
over the last 30 years. Some American academics seem to have a high regard for
him and his endeavors.
The FBI affidavit
The FBI
affidavit detailed the alleged scheme in which Fai's organization received up
to $700,000 annually from Pakistan
to make campaign contributions to U.S. politicians, sponsor
conferences and other promotions.
"Mr.
Fai is accused of a decades-long scheme with one purpose -- to hide Pakistan's involvement behind his efforts to
influence the U.S.
government's position on Kashmir," said Neil MacBride, U.S. Attorney for Eastern Virginia.
The Justice
Department has also charged (in absentia) a second man, Zaheer Ahmad, with
recruiting dummy donors for the KAC, through whom the ISI routed the funds.
Zaheer Ahmad is an American of Pakistani origin.
One
unidentified confidential witness told investigators that Pakistan's powerful military spy
agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence Agency, was behind some of the money
Fai received, according to the FBI affidavit. A second confidential witness
said the spy agency had sponsored and controlled Fai's organization and had
been directing him for the past 25 years, the court papers said.
The FBI
alleged the Dr. Fai lobbied at the Congress and the Administration on behalf of
Pakistan
without declaring himself as the a Pakistani agent. The FBI affidavit said Fai
had denied that he had lobbied, saying instead he was involved in public relations.
Federal election records showed Fai had given $23,500 to U.S. political candidates since 1997, including $250 to President Barack Obama's presidential campaign as well as $7,500 to Republican Representative Dan Burton of Indiana. Congressman Joe Pitts, a Pennsylvania Republican, also received donations from Dr Fai. However, the Justice Department said that there was no evidence that any elected officials who received the contributions from Fai or his group knew that it came from the Pakistani government.
Setback to Kashmiri
independence cause in Congress
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
