US cracks Kashmir racket: Fai is a fake man

IIPM Mumbai Campus

In a city where lobbyists represent scores of interests, issues, and causes from across the world, Ghulam Nabi Fai, was a familiar figure on Capitol Hill as the principal representative of the Kashmiri separatist movement. A stocky man 62-year old man with a scraggly beard sans mustache, he spoke the language of engagement and claimed to seek a peaceful resolution of the Kashmir dispute.

An FBI affidavit charging him with "conspiring to act as an agent of a foreign principle," shows that Fai was a frontman for Pakistani – and not Kashmiri – interests in the US. He took dictation from his masters in Islamabad and Rawalpindi and according to the FBI count, was funded to the tune of at least $4 million to manipulate the debate about Kashmir. The FBI recorded 4000 email and telephone exchanges with his Pakistan handlers.

Fai's career as a Pakistani ISI bagman began as far back as 1989, according to a Confidential Witness (identified as CW-2 in the FBI affidavit) who turned US informant. The ISI, CW-2 says, "created the KAC to propagandize on behalf of the government of Pakistan" and selected Fai "because he had no overt ties to Pakistan."

Indeed, Fai did come originally from India. According to community sources, Fai hails from the Kashmir Valley and came to the US in the 1980s after an MA degree from AMU. He earned a PhD in mass communication from Temple University in the US and began working as a Kashmiri and Muslim activist in the late 1980s before the ISI ensnared him.

Soon he was singing the Pakistani tune churning out exaggerated accounts of Indian atrocities in J&K and organizing conferences and seminars bankrolled by the Pakistani government through ISI.

But Fai also left a massive paper and electronic trail that the FBI diligently collected and intercepted under court-sanctioned surveillance . He made massive cash collections. He was stopped by the police in New York once and found to have $ 35,000 in cash which he tried to explain away as donations for the Kashmir cause from a Brooklyn mosque, but which the FBI determined was slush money from a straw donor in the US.

Another time, one of his ISI handlers demanded he get a laptop bag and adaptor for his boss. The wrangles finally got to one of his associates, identified as "John" in the FBI affidavit. John had a problem with Nazir Shawl, Fai's counterpart in UK as the ISI bagman, and he threatened to expose "everything and everybody."

"He ended by saying he was prepared to go to the Indian Embassy to beg forgiveness for his previous activities, even of doing so displeased his Pakistani bosses," the FBI affidavit records

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The killing of Osama bin Laden has put the ISI in a bad fix.

Was it incompetence or complicity or both? Ranjit Bhushan looks at the world’s most dreaded spy agency

In 2002, reputed French philosopher and writer Bernard- Henry Levy, purveyor of hot spots around the world, in his classic and real-life detective account ‘Who killed Daniel Pearl’ draws an alarming, well-informed and positively sinister picture of what was happening inside Pakistan’s secret service, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).

General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani

This most acclaimed of European writers – at great personal risk – retraced his steps back to the route which took American journalist Daniel Pearl to his hideous death in Pakistan, now as it turns out, at the hands of ISI operatives who had strong links with the al-Qaeda.

That trip to Pakistan took him to macabre, heavily-armed seminaries, to evening parties organised by the ISI top brass and a level of access in Pakistan which only a westerner enjoys. In Levy’s stark view, “Pakistan is the biggest rogue of all the rogue states of today. I assert that what is taking form there, between Islamabad and Karachi, is a black hole compared to which Saddam Hussein’s Baghdad was an obsolete weapons dump.’’

The killing of Osama bin Laden has put the ISI in a bad fix. Was it incompetence or complicity or both? Ranjit Bhushan looks at the world’s most dreaded spy agency Run with the hare, hunt with the hound The slaying of the world’s most hunted terrorist in the quintessential cantonment town of Abbottabad has shifted the spotlight back on the ways of what is now the planet’s most dreaded spy agency, the ISI.

Most analysts believe that the presence of Laden in a garrison town could not have escaped the attention of the ISI. “It is not possible to get accommodation in any cantonment area without the prior permission of military authorities. So to say that the ISI did not know of his whereabouts is ridiculous,’’ says former Indian high commissioner to Pakistan G Parthasarathy.

While Pakistani ISI and army officials have declined to offer a public comment on the US covert operation, the constant US accusation that Pakistan was playing a duplicitous game is bound to find resonance across the world.

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Why then did the ISI ditch Osama by not tipping him off about the movement of US special forces before the attack was launched? “Who says ISI ditched Osama? The US jammed all radars in the area and the Pakistani spies were caught napping. Left to themselves, the ISI would have whisked away Osama to safety,’’ Parthasarathy asserts.

For the first time in many years, Pakistan’s spy agency is in trouble and under global scrutiny. If its radars were jammed by the US Special Forces, then it reflects incompetence; if they were not, then the ISI stands charged of complicity and playing a dangerously dual game.

HYDRA HEADED Joint Intelligence X (JIX) It serves as the secretariat which coordinates and provides administrative support to the other ISI wings and field organisations. It also prepares intelligence estimates and threat assessments. Joint Intelligence Bureau (JIB) One of the largest and most powerful divisions of the ISI, which monitors political intelligence. The JIB consists of three subsections, with one sub-section devoted to operations involving India, anti-terrorism and VIP security. Joint Counter Intelligence Bureau (JCIB) Responsible for overseeing intelligence operations in central Asia, south Asia, Afghanistan, the Middle East, Israel and Russia. It also conducts field surveillance of Pakistani diplomats stationed abroad, and if need be, monitors foreign diplomats as well. Joint Intelligence/North (JIN) Conduct ISI operations for Jammu and Kashmir, including monitoring Indian forces deployed within the Kashmir Valley. Joint Intelligence Miscellaneous (JIM) Responsible for covert offensive intelligence operations and war time espionage operations. Joint Signal Intelligence Bureau (JSIB) It includes Deputy Directors for wireless, monitoring and photos, operates a chain of signal intelligence collection stations, and provides communication support to its operatives. It also collects intelligence through monitoring of communications channels of neighbouring countries. It has a chain of stations that track and collect intelligence signals along the Indo-Pakistani border and in Kashmir. A sizeable number of staff is from the Army Signal Corps. It is believed that it has its units deployed in Islamabad, Quetta, Karachi, Lahore and Peshawar. Joint Intelligence Technical Division (JIT) Not much is known about this particular section of the ISI. However, it is widely believed that JTI/JIT include a separate explosives section and a chemical warfare section.

But there is a good chance that the ISI was caught completely unawares. A day after the killing of Osama bin Laden and under tremendous pressure from all around, the agency actually issued a statement expressing its “great embarrassment’’ in not being able to detect the presence of the world’s biggest terrorist so close to its precincts.

Pakistan ambassador to the US, Husain Haqqani, told reporters that “intelligence failures are not unique to the ISI. We will inquire into the causes of what happened but it’s really important not to turn it into any allegation of complicity.’’

The ISI website declares itself to be “one of the best and very well organised intelligence agencies in the world.” Founded in 1948 after the partition of India when two nation-states of India and Pakistan came into being, it started off as a police agency, whose job was to collect and analyse intelligence.

But the gradual increase in the intervention of the military, which has ruled Pakistan for the better part of its 64-year history, in the country’s internal affairs and the 1965 war with India, morphed it into a military institution which has many faces.

Its primary objectives are not only to safeguard Pakistani interests, but also reinforce Pakistan’s power base in the region. The agency, with its coordinated attacks on India during the last two decades, has done just that. That the ISI has virtually no oversight in terms of civilian control in Pakistan was best brought out when the new civilian government in 2008 tried to bring the agency under its thumb but had to embarrassingly backtrack within hours of announcing the decision. The critical question is this: will the ISI be reined in under such global pressure?

Says security expert Ajai Sahni, “There is no doubt at all that there is tremendous pressure on the ISI at the moment and this pressure has actually been accumulating since the 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai.”

He adds: “Osama bin Laden was living in a safe house provided by the ISI. But the Americans are aware that to take their war on terror to its natural conclusion, they would need Pakistan, which at this stage is the only supply route to get to Afghanistan. So, unless alternative routes are found to get to Kabul, ISI will continue to get US patronage.’’ In the post-Osama scenario, it would be interesting to see which way the worm turns.

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INDIA INDUSTRIAL HAZARDS: Land of work disasters

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India is perhaps becoming the epicentre of work related health diseases. Across the nation, industrial centres are spewing toxic material that harms workers much faster and worse than it does any other group in the society. Gujarat, for example, is the epicentre of asbestos related diseases in India ' one in Alang (one of the largest ship breaking yards in the world) and the other in Ahmedabad. Lethal diseases, including lung cancer and skin diseases affect the exposed 55,000 workers in Alang, where they are exposed to toxic asbestos fiber ' and unmindful of the grave danger, they work there at their own peril. Although the International Agency for Research on Cancer is trying to develop an alternative product to asbestos because of its health risks, the fact is that right now, the material is extremely risky.

In the city of Ahmedabad, hapless workers toil in sordid conditions to produce asbestos required in the construction industry. In reality, the asbestos industry is booming in India ' factories have obtained permission forcefully from the authorities and the government is turning a blind eye to the health hazards being created. The fact that the government supports asbestos manufacturing is not without reason as it provides livelihood to thousands of people in India (annual production turnover of the industry is 1,25,000 mn metric tons).

Another example comes from the recent episode in New Delhi involving the radioactive material Cobalt 60. Six people were hospitalised in Delhi after they were exposed to Cobalt 60! Close on the heels of this comes the news that a major radioactive disaster was averted at Tarapur Atomic Power Plant, as scientists there fixed a technical snag at just the right time to save the nearby villages from a catastrophe.

The spate of calamities continue unabated ' a cylinder with chlorine gas leaked in Mumbai Port Trust (MPT) and enveloped a nearby college ' 98 people, mostly port labourers, suffered. The fire brigade was rushed in to save the situation. Post the incident, experts found and cleared more than hundred chlorine cylinders lying in the MPT area since 1997! As if that was not enough, a day after this episode, 25 people (mostly workers) were hospitalised in the steel city of Durgapur in West Bengal, as they complained of breathlessness and nausea! The happening was because of carbon monoxide leakage from the nearby steel plant.

These industry hazards not only affect the workers directly but also contaminate the natural resources. From water to air to soil ' everything in the vicinity of an industrial area is found to have traces of toxic and harmful metals.

Natural calamities can and do happen, but preventable calamities taking place because of human error or negligence. In the US, one keeps hearing about products, toys and equipment being recalled after being found to have toxic material. When was the last time such an episode occurred in India?

The closest we came to was when a US ship carrying radioactive material was sent back by Minister Jairam Ramesh late last year. But even that was caught by accident rather than by a structured process in place. Unless India develops a structured procedural action plan to catch such happenings and occurrences, India will remain flying on a plane which is guaranteed to crash ' sooner rather than later ' with untold negative effects.

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Since 2007, Jordan and the US have trained forces in policing and human rights

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When I covered the 1982 Lebanon war, I learned something surprising about wars: They attract all kinds of spectators, meddlers, do-gooders and do-badders. They use the conflict and the attention it generates to play out their own identity issues and biases. My favourite in Beirut was a gentleman who showed up in August 1982 as the Palestinian guerrillas were sailing out of Beirut harbour. His name ' I am not making this up ' was Arthur Blessitt, the 'Sunset Boulevard Preacher.' He had walked to West Beirut from Israel to pray for peace, dragging a 13-foot-long wooden cross with a little wheel on the bottom.

Arthur was harmless; some of the others, though, were mendacious, which prompted me to promulgate this rule: I adore the Israelis and Palestinians, but God save me from some of their European and American friends. Their grandstanding interventions like those blockade-busters sailing to Gaza or the wealthy American Jews who fund extremist settlers' housing purchases in Arab East Jerusalem ' often fuel the worst trends on either side and divert our energies from the only thing that is important: forging a two-state solution.

So is there anything good happening in that regard? Yes. The effort by the Palestinian President, Mahmoud Abbas, and the Prime Minister Salam Fayyad to build the institutional foundations of a Palestinian state from the ground up ' replacing the corrupt structure that Yasser Arafat created and Israel destroyed ' is actually making progress. This matters ' and must be nurtured. You see, there are two models of Arab governance. The old Nasserite model, which Hamas still practices, where leaders say: 'Judge me by how I resist Israel or America.' And: 'First we get a state, then we build the institutions.' The new model, pioneered in the West Bank by Abbas and Fayyad is: 'Judge me by how I perform ' how I generate investment and employment, deliver services and pick up the garbage. First we build transparent and effective political and security institutions. Then we declare a state. That is what the Zionists did, and it sure worked for them.' The most important thing going on this conflict today is that since 2007 the Palestinian Authority, Jordan and the US have partnered to train a whole new West Bank Palestinian security force in policing, administration and even human rights. The programme is advised by US Lt Gen Keith Dayton ' one of the unsung good guys. The Israeli army has become impressed enough by the performance of the new Palestinian National Security Force, or NSF, under Abbas and Fayyad that those forces are now largely responsible for law and order in all the major West Bank towns, triggering an explosion of Palestinian building, investment and commerce in those areas.

Here are highlights: The Jordanians have trained and the Palestinian Authority deployed and equipped five NSF battalions and one Presidential Guard unit, some 3,100 men. Plus, 65 Palestinian first-responders have been trained and are being equipped with emergency gear. A Palestinian National Training Centre, with classrooms and dorms, is nearing completion in Jericho so they themselves can takeover the training. The Palestinian Authority is building a 750-man NSF camp to garrison the new NSF troops, including barracks and parade ground near Jenin. At the same time, the Palestinian security headquarters are all being rebuilt in every major town, starting in Hebron. An eight-week senior leadership training course in Jericho ' bringing together the Palestinian police, the NSF and Presidential Guards ' has graduated 280 people, including 20 women.

A course for captains and below in how to handle everything from crowd control to elections has also begun. The reinvigorated Palestinian Ministry of Interior is leading its security sector transformation, and the Canadians are helping set-up Joint Operations Centres across the West Bank so all Palestinian security services can coordinate via video conferencing. Even Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu has reduced Israel's manned checkpoints in the West Bank from 42 to 12. This won't be politically sustainable for Abbas and Fayyad, unless Israel begins to turn full authority over to the Palestinians for their major cities in the West Bank. Palestinians have to see their new security services as building their state, not cushioning Israel's occupation. There could be a moment of truth here for Israel soon but it will be based on something real. Palestinians building real institutions from the ground up and getting Israel to cede to them real authority ' is the ball game. Make it work across the West Bank and find a way to transfer it to Gaza (how about reopening the Israel-Gaza border and letting the new Palestinian NSF control the passages to Israel?) and a two-state solution is possible. Let it fail, and we'll have endless conflict. Everything else is just a sideshow.

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