New Delhi
5 September 2009
Need for a "serious catharsis" between ISI and RAW: Ex-Pak official; says political leadership should drive dialogue, not bureaucrats; suggests joint probe into 26/11 Mumbai attacks
Pakistan shared India's perception that war was not an option, former Pakistani
national security adviser Mahmud Ali Durrani said delivering the inaugural RK Mishra
Memorial Lecture organised by the Observer Research Foundation here Saturday.
That being the case, he said "good relations between India, Pakistan and Afghanistan
are an economic and security compulsion," not only for the three countries but also for
the growth of the region extending from West Asia to South East Asia.
Durrani, also a retired major general of Pakistani Amy and former ambassador to the
United States, said the political leadership needed to be the driving force behind the
formal dialogue process.
"The most important element for forward movement is strong political will [that] can
override the negative static produced by the establishment," he said, citing bureaucratic
inertia, especially amongst the security agencies, as a major obstacle to rapprochement.
He thought there was an urgent need to expand the Joint Anti-Terrorism Mechanism to
include representatives of security and intelligence agencies. "Instead of using the
media and accusing each other ... there is a need for a serious catharsis between our
intelligence agencies," he said.
He recommended opening up of the visa regime, allowing broadcast of TV channels, and
expanding the composite dialogue process to include agriculture and energy.
Specifically, he said India and Pakistan needed to move forward on the stalled joint gas
pipeline project, besides considering a common electricity grid that will allow Pakistan to
buy electricity from India. Also, he mooted the idea of setting up a a joint arid agriculture
research centre.
He said media, academia and business community can help build bridges. He
suggested enhanced interaction among media persons and scholarships to students for
studying in India and Pakistan.
"There is an urgent need to humanise the relationship," he concluded.
CAN GO AS A BOX / INSET:
'Hafiz Saeed is not involved in 26/11 attacks'
Mahmud Ali Durrani insisted that Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed had no hand in the
26/11 attacks in Mumbai.
"To my best knowledge there is zero proof" of Saeed's involvement, he told reporters
after delivering his lecture.
He said Home Minister P Chidambaram's remarks were not "fair" as Pakistan was doing
its "very best" and it had arrested a lot of people.
"Our country is doing its very best to move forward. They have moved forward. They
have arrested a lot of people. They want to go in a fashion that they prove this in a court
of law," he said.
"Just capturing people left and right may not be correct. I am not in government, but for
what I know (Pakistani) people are committed (to bring Mumbai attack perpetrators to
book). It is in our interest, not your interest," he added.
No comments:
Post a Comment