- News>
Pak shuts down ISI wing dealing with militants in Kashmir
Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has ordered shutdown of the wing of the military intelligence agency ISI that deals exclusively with the armed groups that Pakistan backs in Kashmir, a newspaper reported on Wednesday.
Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf has ordered shutdown of the wing of the military intelligence agency ISI that deals exclusively with the armed groups that Pakistan backs in Kashmir, a newspaper reported on Wednesday.
In future, Pakistan would limit its backing for the Kashmir freedom struggle to groups with roots in Kashmir, and rely on Kashmiris to conduct military operations, The New York Times reported quoting officials in Islamabad. Pakistan would continue to back groups with roots in Kashmir like Hizbul Mujaheedin which, it says, are dominated by the Kashmiris, the report said.
As an example of groups that would continue to get government backing, officials cited Hizbul Mujahedeen, which, the paper said, dominated the Kashmir insurgency from its beginnings in 1989 until the mid-1990s, but which rapidly lost its primacy as Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Muhammad took over. The militant groups, the times noted, shifted increasingly to political assassinations, car bombings and attacks on villages that killed large numbers of Kashmiri civilians, mostly Hindus and Sikhs as well as Muslims accused of collaborating with the Indian authorities.
Groups like Hizbul Mujahedeen, the officials said, would get moral and political support from the government in Islamabad, but not military training and weapons. They would also be required to purge all non-Kashmiri Muslims, including the arabs and Chechens who have fought in the groups accused of the Parliament attack.
In the last two years, Indian security forces have captured or killed growing numbers of foreign fighters, mostly Arabs.
Bureau Report
In future, Pakistan would limit its backing for the Kashmir freedom struggle to groups with roots in Kashmir, and rely on Kashmiris to conduct military operations, The New York Times reported quoting officials in Islamabad. Pakistan would continue to back groups with roots in Kashmir like Hizbul Mujaheedin which, it says, are dominated by the Kashmiris, the report said.
As an example of groups that would continue to get government backing, officials cited Hizbul Mujahedeen, which, the paper said, dominated the Kashmir insurgency from its beginnings in 1989 until the mid-1990s, but which rapidly lost its primacy as Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Muhammad took over. The militant groups, the times noted, shifted increasingly to political assassinations, car bombings and attacks on villages that killed large numbers of Kashmiri civilians, mostly Hindus and Sikhs as well as Muslims accused of collaborating with the Indian authorities.
Groups like Hizbul Mujahedeen, the officials said, would get moral and political support from the government in Islamabad, but not military training and weapons. They would also be required to purge all non-Kashmiri Muslims, including the arabs and Chechens who have fought in the groups accused of the Parliament attack.
In the last two years, Indian security forces have captured or killed growing numbers of foreign fighters, mostly Arabs.
Bureau Report