Asia Times: US spies set up shop in Pakistan


	January 30, 2002	atimes.com

India/Pakistan

US spies set up shop in Pakistan
By Syed Saleem Shahzad

KARACHI - Under gradual but pervasive United States influence, Pakistan, the only nuclear power in the Muslim world, is falling further under Washington's shadow.

Well placed sources in the corridors of power in Islamabad have explained to Asia Times Online in detail that in coming days Pakistan's internal and external policies will undergo a clear shift towards the West, rather than to the Arab-Muslim world.

In the latest developments, Pakistan has handed over parts of Karachi Airport to US forces. Officially, only the cargo area has been occupied, but in fact this is the most sensitive part of the airport where all of the installations and offices of the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) and the headquarters of Pakistan International Airline (PIA) are situated.

A few months ago, the famous Hotel Midway House, run by PIA, was evacuated by the CAA, and it stood empty. Now, US forces have been given accommodation there and they have established a radar and communication system with the capability of bugging the Pakistan Airforce's Faisal Base, which is barely a mile away, and Quaid-i-Azam International Airport in Karachi.

The Central Command of the US forces has already announced that it will not evacuate the Pakistani bases it currently has in Balochistan "in the near future", and it is seeking to make this presence permanent.

At the intelligence level, the US is steadily increasing its access in Pakistan. The recent kidnapping of the South Asian Bureau Chief of the Wall Street Journal, Daniel Pearl, is a case in point.

Initially it was thought that Pearl had been kidnapped from Karachi, where he was staying in a rented bungalow near the beach to the south of the city with his wife and an Indian women. A militant group with who he had had some contact is said to be behind the kidnapping, which occurred soon after Pearl met with US officials from the US consulate in Karachi.

In close coordination with senior intelligence agencies and police officials in Karachi, this correspondent investigated the matter, but there is no clue as to who kidnapped him. Now, almost a week after the incident, the investigations have turned from Karachi to Rawalpindi, from where it is said Pearl could have disappeared.

The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has been directly associated with investigations into the disappearance of Pearl, who is a US citizen and who his unidentified kidnappers claim is a spy. A joint investigation team comprising Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Military Intelligence, the Intelligence Bureau and the Sindh and Punjab Police Department is searching for the journalist.

An FBI team is not only following their efforts, but is directly involved. The residence of a suspected Al-Qaeda member, Sabir Shah, who was believed to be connected to the kidnapping, was raided, but Shah was not found. Instead, officials seized his mother and sister and handed them over to the FBI for interrogation.

Sources say that this incident has paved the way for the American investigation agency to penetrate directly into Pakistan, including gaining direct access to otherwise privy information in police departments, something that will allow them to intervene at the local level.

Now, with Pakistan surrounded by US interests on the domestic front, its foreign policy could follow suit.

The country's top decision makers have publicly started saying that while Pakistan has always supported Arab issues, such as Palestine, Arabs in turn have never supported Islamabad in its dispute with India over Kashmir.

A Pakistani delegation comprising retired lieutenant-general Javed Qazi and Ejaz ul-Haq, the son of former dictator Zia ul-Haq, has just returned from a visit to the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Speaking on state-run PTV, a federal minister and former director general of the ISI, Javed Qazi, said that they had tried to convince Arab nations about the plight of Kashmir, but they had received little encouragement.

Even Iran, which in recent times has prevailed on Islamabad to restrict US interests in Pakistan, is not prepared to openly give its support on Kashmir for fear of India's anger.

Sources say that the first indication of a change in Pakistani thinking is that it has not uttered a single word against Israel, or in favor of Palestine, amid growing tension in that region. And with Saudi Arabia-US relations souring, and Iran and Iraq moving to form a Muslim bloc with Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, the US will make every effort to keep Pakistan out of this camp.

Iranian President Seyed Mohammad Khatami's visit to Pakistan had been scheduled for the end of January, but the Pakistani Foreign Office told Tehran that they were preparing for President General Pervez Musharraf's visit to the US on February 12, and deferred the visit until the last week of February.

Before that, though, Musharraf might already have determined his priorities for friendship and enmity.

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