While a section of Pakistani media has termed the visit of Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, to Pakistan as an effort to revive the complex relations between the two countries, the US official further put Pakistan into trouble when he blamed the latter's intelligence agency Inter Services Intelligence for contacts with the Haqqani Network.
Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari has accused the army, which covertly supports the 2008 Mumbai attacks perpetrator Lashkar-e-Tayiba, of playing a double game in the ongoing war on terror, and an "abundance of evidence backs him up," Bruce Riedel, a former Central Intelligence Agency officer, has said.
'While Kasab was helpful in the investigation of the 26/11 terrorist attack, he was of no use in detecting and neutralising Lashkar's sleeper cells and the Indian Mujahideen.'
Pakistani intelligence officials have arrested Indonesian Al-Qaeda operative Umar Patek, suspected to be involved in the deadly 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people. Patek, a member of the Jemaah Islamiyah terror network, was captured by the Inter-Services Intelligence recently, an unnamed officer of the spy agency told The News.
The frequent use of these assault rifles by terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir, according to experts, is a consequence of the US Army leaving behind arms and ammunition while pulling out from Afghanistan in 2021 and is a cause of concern due to the more lethal nature of the steel bullets used.
Suspended diplomat Madhuri Gupta, arrested for allegedly passing information to Pakistan's intelligence agency Inter Services Intelligence, was on Tuesday granted bail by a Delhi court on the ground that her alleged offences entail a maximum of 3 year jail term while she has already been in jail for over 20 months.
Pakistan's security forces and its intelligence agency have facilitated the rise of the Taliban, with whom they have an "ambiguous" relationship, a former top American army official, now headed to become the country's representative to Afghanistan has said.
Terror groups in Pakistan are under tremendous pressure to recruit more people, especially Indians, to carry out subversive activities. Intelligence Bureau officials say that the latest directive from the Inter Services Intelligence to terror groups is to recruit more Indian nationals into the outfits. However, terror group have a problem of transporting these men into Pakistan.
The ISI has 500 terrorists waiting to cross over to India.
A powerful car bomb went off close to an office of the Inter Services Intelligence in the central Pakistani city of Faisalabad on Tuesday, killing at least 13 people and injuring nearly 50 others.The blast destroyed a CNG station, at least three buildings and dozens of cars near the intelligence agency's heavily-guarded office in Civil Lines area of Faisalabad.Thirteen bodies were found at the site of the blast, Faisalabad Commissioner Tahir Hussain told the media.
ISI sources have confirmed that Davis, who is currently under detention in Lahore, had links to the CIA, and said that the conduct of the US intelligence agency around the incident has 'virtually thrown the partnership into question'.
Pakistan-based terrorist outfit Lashkar-e-Tayiba had the backing of the Islamic nation's spy agency Inter Services Intelligence, which shared intelligence with Lashkar and provided protection to it in the Mumbai terror attacks, a media report said on Monday.American intelligence and counterterrorism officials were quoted by the New York Times as saying that LeT has quietly gained strength in recent years with the assistance of Pakistan's ISI.
Notwithstanding the recent arrest of high-value Taliban leaders in Pakistan in which the Inter Services Intelligence played a key role, top US Senators and officials have indicated that they continue to remain suspicious about the real intentions of the Pakistani intelligence agency in view of its links to the Lashkar-e-Tayiba and other terror outfits.
The arrest of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the second-in-command of the Taliban forces operating in Afghanistan, is being seen as a dramatic shift in the policies of Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence agency, which had hitherto covertly supported some of the organisation's top leaders.But experts warn that by helping the Central Intelligence Agency nab Baradar, the Pakistan government and the ISI will lose the sympathies of Mullah Omer-led Afghan Taliban.
In a major success, a top militant commander considered to be a close aide of elusive Afghan Taliban chief Mullah Mohhamad Omar was captured from Pakistan's port city of Karachi.Mullah Baradar was captured from Karachi in a joint raid by personnel of the Inter-Services intelligence and the Central Intelligence Agency. But Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid rejected the news, saying, "Baradar has not been arrested; it is a rumour."
State-run PTV quoted the Inter-Services Public Relations as saying that Kiyani will take up his new assignment once the President, who is seeking re-election in the October 6 ballot, gives up his uniform.
Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence was behind the 26/11 attacks as well as the July 2008 bombing of the Indian embassy in Kabul, the BBC said in a damning report on the military-run spy agency that does not function "without the authority" of the Pakistan army chief.
He, along with another soldier, was detained on Tuesday over suspicion of espionage, they said.
Former Central Intelligence Agency South Asia analyst, Lisa Curtis, now a Senior Fellow at the Heritage Foundation, recalled how in 1995, when she served in Islamabad as a diplomat, the Pakistan-based terror groups that were funded, armed and supported by the Inter-Services Intelligence specifically to launch attacks in Kashmir against Indian security forces, also had strong links to the Taliban.
Confusion persists over which wing of the Pakistan government is currently controlling the powerful ISI agency, which is at the centre of a controversy after being linked by US intelligence agencies to the suicide bombings on the Indian embassy in Kabul.
Even as the Pakistan Army is all prepared and waits for a nod from the government to launch an all out offensive in South Waziristan, the Taliban's stronghold, many inside the Canadian government who deal with Pakistan and Afghanistan issues are suspicious of Islamabad's efforts.
Inter-Services Intelligence chief Lt Gen Ahmed Shuja Pasha has embarked on a secret visit to China that is being seen as part of Pakistan's efforts to reduce its dependence on the United States in the wake of strained military and intelligence ties.
A report based on the assessment of the US led 'war on terror' by General Stanley McChrystal, the top military commander in Afghanistan, also highlights the increasing clout of the Taliban even after eight years of continuous struggle.
Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on Friday appointed Lt Gen Zahirul Islam as the new chief of spy agency Inter Services Intelligence, reports stated on Friday.
The Central Intelligence Agency has confronted Pakistan with new evidence about ties between the country's spy service with some militant groups responsible for rising violence in Afghanistan, possibly including suicide bombing at the Indian Embassy in Kabul earlier this month.
Some of the money used to finance the terror attacks in Mumbai last November and the Indian Institute of Science in Bengaluru in December 2005 came via a fake currency racket, sources from the Intelligence Bureau and Central Bureau of Investigation have revealed.
Former Inter Services Intelligence chief Lieutenant General. Hamid Gul responds to charges that he supports terrorism, discusses 9/11 and ulterior motives for the war on Afghanistan, claims that the US, Israel, and India are behind efforts to destabilise Pakistan.
Amid reports of leak of United States intelligence information about bomb-making factories in Pakistan's tribal areas, a top American senator has claimed that elements in Inter-Services Intelligence were tipping off terrorist outfits.
The menace of fake currency which majorly funds terrorism to be carried out on the Indian soil continues to haunt Indian security agencies with the Inter-Services Intelligence devising new plans to continue with this operation.
Weeks after the news that Ilyas Kashmiri, was killed in a drone strike there has been no confirmation on the same. India's intelligence agencies believe that rumour's of the Al Qaeda commander's death were spread by the Inter-Services Intelligence. Vicky Nanjappa analyses why.
In revelations that clearly show Inter Services Intelligence's role in the Mumbai terror attacks, Pakistani-American terrorist David Headley has told his interrogators that the Pakistani intelligence agency had paid Rs 25 lakh to Lashkar-e-Tayiba to purchase a boat, which terrorists used to travel from Karachi.
British domestic intelligence agency M15 is facing allegations of outsourcing the torture of Pak-origin Britons to Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence, after the accused were detained during counter-terror operations in that country. Human rights groups and British Parliamenterians called for an investigation into allegations made by four such British citizens of Pakistani-origin. They also asked the British government to explain steps taken against torture.
Gretchen Peters, of the United States Military Academy at West Point's Combating Terrorism Center, who has since 2005, spent considerable time studying the link between organised crime and insurgencies in Afghanistan and Pakistan, has told US Congress of the nexus between the criminal enterprise Dawood Ibrahim company, the Haqqani Network and the Inter-Services Intelligence.
The arrest of Madhuri Gupta, the Indian mole in the Pakistani establishment has highlighted the fact that the Pakistan government had increased the budget for such operations from Rs 10 crore to Rs 25 crore just six months ago.
A Pakistani journalist has petitioned the Supreme Court to bar the civilian government and the military from making any contacts or conducting negotiations with the Taliban, saying such an act is forbidden by the Constitution.
The Bengaluru police investigating the terror plot in Karnataka may turn to the Interpol to probe conversations between the arrested youths and their handlers overseas. Vicky Nanjappa reports
For three years now, Lashkar cadres have been pressurising their higher ups in Pakistani intelligence agency Inter Services Intelligence to battle American troops, but they have always been pulled back. The reason? The ISI does not want the only outfit that it has complete control over to go out of hand.
Former Central Investigative Agency deputy director John McLaughlin, a 32-year veteran of the agency who has studied the Lashkar-e-Tayiba extensively, believes that while the "Pakistani intelligence was instrumental in helping to create the LeT in the outset, these days it's not at all clear that the Pakistani intelligence has any direct control over this group."He said he was skeptical that even rogue elements in the Inter Services Intelligence today held any sway.
