Pakistan Spy Chief Will Not Appear in U.S. Court
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan ? Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani of Pakistan said Thursday there was no possibility that the head of the country?s powerful spy organization, the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate, would obey a summons requesting his appearance before a court in the United States over the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks.
Mr. Gilani made the announcement while addressing lawmakers in the National Assembly. ?ISI being an extremely sensitive and important organization would not be asked to appear before a U.S. court,? Mr. Gilani said.
The comments were in response to a wrongful death lawsuit filed last month in a federal court in Brooklyn by relatives of victims in the Mumbai attacks, which left 175 people dead including the nine attackers.
Claiming damages, the lawsuit names Lt. Gen Ahmad Shuja Pasha, the director general of ISI, and his predecessor, Lt. Gen Nadeem Taj and Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, the leader of Lashkar-e-Taiba, the banned militant group that India and the United States consider responsible for the attack on Mumbai, India?s financial capital.
The lawsuit alleges the ISI is complicit because it nurtured Lashkar-e-Taiba.
Mr. Saeed, a cleric who fought against the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980?s, formed Lashkar-e-Taiba, vowing to free the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir, which is claimed by both India and Pakistan.
Pakistani officials vehemently deny any allegations of the involvement of the ISI in the planning or execution of the attacks in Mumbai.
Earlier in the session of the National Assembly on Thursday, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, the leader of the opposition, had expressed concerns over news that that the ISI chief had been summoned by a court in the United States.
The speech by the opposition leader seemed intended to whip up the nationalist sentiment. Mr. Khan denounced the U.S. court summons as a move to pressure Pakistan. ?We will not allow any institution to be taken hostage by any international organization,? Mr. Khan said.
The ISI said through a spokesman that it bound to follow the directives of the Prime Minister?s government. ?It has made clear that nothing of the sort will happen, the spokesman said. ?Nobody can force anything on us. We are a sovereign nation.?
Source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=d6a483ce67488fa39d542b224feddd29
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