Faction conflicts continue to shake Pakistan’s government after Prime Minister Khan’s expulsion


Recent upheaval changes in Pakistan’s national politics include former Prime Minister Imran Khan and Vice Admiral Kamal Jabid Bajuwa, a key figure in the country’s powerful military facilities, and Vice Admiral Faiz Hameed, former Intelligence Director (ISI). ..

Widely expected to replace Bajuwa, Hamed was replaced by Lieutenant General Nadim Ahmad Anjum in October, contrary to Khan’s intentions. Last month, Khan became the first prime minister in Pakistan’s history to be expelled from power after losing a distrust resolution in Pakistan’s parliament.

Kahn was charged with blasphemy on April 28 in Medina, Saudi Arabia, after supporters pursued Saudi Arabia’s new Chancellor Shebaz Sharif on the same day. The former Prime Minister may face the death penalty. The Sharif administration also decided to begin investigating Khan’s assets and insisted on foreign funding for his party.

Indian intelligence and world experts told The Epoch Times that a power struggle continues between conflicting factions in the establishment of Pakistan. After Khan was expelled, Vice Admiral Anjum ordered his top subordinates to begin an investigation into Lt. Gen. Hamed’s faction, including ISI’s secret Kashmir desk staff and leaders.

The Kashmir region, a decades-old issue between India and Pakistan, has played a very important role in Pakistan’s domestic politics and foreign policy. Islamabad has a province of Kashmir, but ISI’s Kashmir desk is a secret.

The origin of ISI is related to the country’s British colonial past. Founded in 1948, the first chief belonged to the British Indian Army. Aparna Pande, a researcher and director of the Washington-based Hudson Institute’s Future Initiative, says Britain’s influence on Pakistan’s military and intelligence agencies wants to remain influential in the region after 1947. He said he was strong because of the desires of the former colonial forces. India and South Asia.

“ISI is an important part of Pakistan’s military installations. Since 1947, the Pakistani state has seen India as a threat to its existence, India never accepted the division, and had the view that India had illegally seized Kashmir. Kashmir is Pakistan’s “jugular vein” or “unfinished business” of the partition, “Pande told the time of the era in an email.

India is processed and targeted by two bureaus within ISI. A section within the Joint Information Agency that focuses only on India and the Far East, and a Joint Information North (JIN) designed solely to handle covert operations in the Jammu region. Kashmir is a member of SOAS London’s Pakistan Research Center and Virgin Wagmar, the first Indian Fellow of the Royal United Services Institute in the United Kingdom, said.

“It’s this JIN that’s commonly referred to as the ISI’s Kashmir desk,” Waghmar said.

The existence of ISI’s secret Kashmir desk is often mentioned in the Indian media. According to a recent report earlier this year, India has expressed concern that Pakistan will reopen the “Kashmir Desk” to confuse the celebration of the Republic Day of India in January.

The ISI Kashmir Desk is the center of Pakistan’s activities within Kashmir, and intelligence agencies have a separatist element of Kashmir and a secret Kashmir fund to support Pakistan’s “proxy war” against India in Kashmir. .. region.

The “corruption and misappropriation” of the secret fund was at the heart of the faction dispute within the ISI, said Pandia, a former adviser to India’s Governor of Jammu and Kashmir on the terrorist issue.

Epoch Times Photo
Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shebaz Sharif will wave when he arrives during his visit to Karachi on April 13, 2022, to meet with the leaders of the Muttahida Qatu (MQM-P) and the collation partners of the new administration. – As the new prime minister of the country after Imran Khan, who resigned from parliamentary seats on the weekend when Pakistani lawmakers elected Shebaz Sharif on April 11, resigned with most party members prior to voting. (Asif Hassan / AFP via Getty Images)

Battle between creeks

Lieutenant General Hamed’s faction, which is currently under internal investigation and legal scrutiny, includes senior ISI officials, Kashmir separatist leaders, and members of the United Jehad Council (UJC). .. Headquartered in Kashmir, Pakistan, UJC is a complex of 13 jihadist groups, including Jaishem Hammad (JeM) and Lashkar-e-Tiba (LeT), which have been designated as foreign terrorist organizations by the US State Department. Report obtained by the Epoch Times. The report was provided by an Indian intelligence agency that spoke to the publication on the condition of anonymity.

After taking office, Vice Admiral Anjum evaluated the activities of the Kashmir desk over the past 10 years and decided to suspend all operating funds for Kashmir separatists led by UJC and an organization called the All-Party Hariyat Conference (APHC). Did. , Indian intelligence said.

Authors Adrian Levy and Cathy Scott-Clark, in their best-selling book Spy Story, state that APHC was the brainchild of ISI Captain Nusratname in 1993. From 2018 and 2019.

Naeem was later named in the Pandora Papers and was reportedly charged by Islamabad police for fraud related to a “purchase attempt” at a steel mill, according to a 2021 report. Investigative Journalist International Consortium.. Naim also reportedly owned an Afghan oil and gas company in the British Virgin Islands, which was registered shortly after retirement.

However, Pande does not consider APHC to be the “brain” of ISI, but states that ISI supports its creation and existence.

“They can create more groups at any time. After they have helped the Mujahideen for decades, if they can help the Taliban in Afghanistan, they can always find new groups. These groups Are important, these individuals are important, and even if the world tries to force Pakistan to give them up, the ISI will always support and support its agents and their agents, “Pande said.

The relationship between APHC and ISI was also mentioned in a 2017 report on Jammu and Kashmir (ISJK) media group Alcalar, whose article focuses on Kashmir’s separatist leaders.

According to 2018, ISJK is part of a recent trend of cross-border terrorist organizations seeking to infuse pan-Islamic ideas into the Kashmiri jihad, a conflicting border between India and Pakistan. Reported by Amira Jadoon, an assistant professor at the Anti-Terrorism Center for both Pakistani and Indian troops on either side of the country and the Social Sciences Department of the US Army Academy in West Point.

According to Indian intelligence reports, Lieutenant General Anjum is part of Lieutenant General Hamid’s faction and wants to replace his entire team with the current leader of the Kashmir Desk, an ISI officer.

The Epoch Times contacted a spokesperson for Pakistan’s Foreign Minister regarding these allegations, but did not receive a response by the press time.

Epoch Times Photo
Supporters of the Pakistan Tehreek-Eye Movement (PTI) party, former Prime Minister Imran Khan, who was banished to the opposition by a distrust resolution, shouted a slogan in protest of the “bias” of the election commissioner, April 26, 2022. Demands an immediate general election in the country outside the office of the Pakistan Tehreek-Eyes Commission (ECP) in Islamabad. (Aamir Qureshi / AFP via Getty Images)

Land fraud

Land fraud cases are currently being tracked by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FIA) in Pakistan against Kashmir separatist leaders residing in Pakistan. According to Indian intelligence, this is the only unsolved crackdown on those involved in Deep State’s secret Kashmir desk.

Pakistani officials reportedly arrested Karachi-based APHC member Altaf Ahmad Bhat and 16 of his business associates on February 9 for a $ 18.3 million land fraud in Rawalpindi. Indian era.. Rawalpindi also has the headquarters of the Pakistani Army.

Bert is the younger brother of the surrendered Hizbul Mujahideen terrorist Zafar Akbar Bert. Hizbul Mujahidin is an Islamic extremist group operating in Jammu and Kashmir and was designated as a foreign terrorist organization by the United States in October 2017.

Both brothers were trained in terrorism in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir, but Altaf Ahmad Bhatt fled to Pakistan in 1995 and has lived there ever since. According to Indian media, India wanted a terrorist financing campaign in Kashmir.

In Pakistan, the FIA ​​sought to investigate land fraud against Bhat, the chairman of the Central Revenue Employees Cooperative Housing Association (CBR ECHS), and other board members. Pakistan reported today February 9th.
Pakistani media have confirmed the arrests of only two people except Bart. The Epoch Times asked CBRECHS for comment, but did not receive a response by the press time.

The Epoch Times has a copy of the criminal investigation sheet, called the First Information Report, registered under criminal law against Bert and his associates by Pakistani authorities. This publication also contains a copy of a letter requesting Bhat and 14 other “movements and” information from the FIA ​​to the National Capital Development Authority in Islamabad.

The Epoch Times couldn’t confirm if Bart was arrested, and Express Tribune, the last update on him in the Pakistani media, accuses India-controlled “extrajudicial killings” in Jammu and Kashmir3. It was his statement on the 17th of March.

Bert appears to be active on Twitter’s handle, but the Kashmir Solidarity Movement website, led by Bert and listed on his Twitter profile, seems to be inactive.

According to Indian intelligence reports, Bert is investing funds for his separatist activities in his business activities in Pakistan, and Pakistani intelligence is between Bert and other ISI personnel at the desk in Kashmir. I was investigating the “connection of suspicions”.

India’s intelligence reports also “Pakistan and the Middle East” with another terrorist commander in Islamabad, who allegedly invested money for Kashmir separatism in the luxury taxi business, and ISI’s secret Kashmir fund. The Epoch Times has withheld the identities of these two for security reasons.

Pande said there are two ways to interpret the situation between the ISI and the Kashmir separatists.

“It was a purely regional issue, political and regional, that led to these arrests, or a message from Pakistan’s Deep State to its agents, if you crossed the line. , We’re pulling the plug and letting you down, “she said.

According to Wagmar, Bert’s Pakistani connections are naturally via ISI, and some intelligence personnel are very likely to be the “secret or implicit party” to this housing fraud.

“The reason they want to set an example for Altaf Ahmad Bert to other Kashmiris, militants and sympathizers is whether they are Hürriyet leaders or dissatisfied young people under the Union Territory of India, Islamabad. “They are so-called struggles,” he said, adding that the ISI cannot be spared from the charges of transplantation and embezzlement.

“The fact that such activities are not reported on a daily basis gives new credibility to this still-developing bust-up of Bart.”

Venus Upadayaya

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Venus Upadhayaya reports on various issues. Her area of ​​expertise is geopolitics in India and South Asia. She reports from the highly volatile Indian-Pakistan border and has contributed to India’s mainstream print media for almost a decade. Community media, sustainable development and leadership continue to be her key areas of interest.