ZABIUDDIN ANSARI’S ARREST: POSSIBLE DIPLOMATIC IMPACT

INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR: PAPER NO. 750

B.RAMAN

( I have been in receipt of some questions from foreign journalists on the likely impact of the arrest of Zabiuddin Ansari aka Abu Jindal aka Abu Jundal aka Abu Hamza, a co-conspirator of the 26/11 terrorist strikes in Mumbai, on the Indo-Pakistan peace process. The questions asked are if he makes any sensational disclosures regarding the involvement of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) during his interrogation  by the Indian authorities, what impact will that have on the peace process and can it lead to fresh pressure on New Delhi to retaliate against Pakistan as there was in 2008. I have tried to cover the likely sequel to his arrest in this article)

Ansari is presently under interrogation by the Indian authorities. It is likely that the interrogation is being carried out by a joint team headed by the Multi-Agency Centre (MAC) of the Intelligence Bureau and consisting of officers of the Federal Investigation Agency, and the Mumbai and Delhi Police.

2.The interrogation will focus on two dimensions. The first and the most important dimension will be whether his going to Saudi Arabia from Pakistan presaged any fresh plans of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) to mount a new mass casualty terrorist attack in Indian territory. In this connection, they will ask him questions such as: Was he really arrested by the Pakistani authorities and put in jail to face prosecution as claimed by Senator Rehman Malik, Pakistan’s Interior Minister, on February 12,2009, or was it a charade to hoodwink India? If he was arrested and jailed, how did he manage to get out and go to Saudi Arabia? Did he manage to escape to Saudi Arabia with the complicity of the Pakistani authorities and, if so, who were in the picture regarding this complicity? What was the purpose? Was it to organise a fresh terrorist strike in India ? If so, what were the instructions to him by the ISI and the LET in this regard? When did he arrive in Saudi Arabia? How?  Under what travel document? Issued before 26/11 or after? When was he arrested by the Saudi authorities? Under what circumstances? What did he tell the Saudi authorities during the interrogation by them? Was the Pakistani Embassy in Saudi Arabia aware of his arrest and of the plans of the Saudi authorities to hand him over to India? If so, did the Pakistani authorities try to stop it? What happened in the LET and ISI headquarters after 26/11 to organise the cover-up? What are the details of the cover-up plans? What are the present intentions and plans of the ISI and the LET? Were they talking in terms of resuming terrorist strikes in India? If so, what kind of infrastructure like sleeper cells they have in India? Who are the members of these cells? What are likely to be their targets?

3.The second dimension will be  to complete the gaps in the reconstruction of the  26/11 terrorist strikes. The gaps  are: Were there any more Indian Muslims involved in assisting the LET and the ISI  in planning and carrying out the strikes? Who are the others? Where are they? Why the targets attacked in Mumbai were chosen? Who did the target selection? Why foreigners, particularly the Americans and other Westerners, were attacked? Who took the decision to attack them? When was the decision to mount the attack  taken? By whom? Was it an idea initially suggested by the LET and subsequently backed by the ISI or was it an original idea of the ISI given to the LET for execution? What was the role of Headley of the Chicago cell of the LET in the entire operation? Who were his contacts and accomplices in India?

4. Ansari is a much more important catch than Ajmal Kasab. Kasab was uneducated. Ansari is educated having reportedly studied in a technology institute of Maharashtra. Kasab was a foot jihadi who carried out orders. Ansari was part of the team of six main conspirators who helped Hafiz Mohammad Sayeed, the head of the LET, in the planning and execution of the attacks. Ansari was in Pakistan before, during and after the strikes liaising with the LET leadership and was thus having knowledge of what happened during that period. His evidence will, therefore, have greater credibility and importance than that of Kasab in the eyes of the courts  and the international community.

5.If his disclosures indicate that his escape to Saudi Arabia was part of a diabolical plan of the ISI and the LET to organise a fresh strike in India, it could have a negative impact on Indo-Pakistan relations and affect the peace process. Otherwise, not. There is unlikely to be any pressure on the Government of India for a retaliatory strike on Pakistan.

6. The US will be closely monitoring the interrogation to find out what he says about the attack on US nationals. If he says that the US nationals  were attacked and killed with the prior knowledge and on the instructions of the ISI it could cause a further set-back to Pakistan’s relations with the US and make India hesitate to go forward on the peace process. ( 26-6-12)

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate, Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-Mail: seventyone2@gmail.com . Twitter: @SORBONNE75 )

ARREST OF ABU JINDAL: WHAT NEXT?

INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR: PAPER NO. 749

B.RAMAN

Shri P.Chidambaram, the Home Minister of the Government of India, has been quoted as saying on June 25,2012, as follows: “"Abu Jindal has been apprehended and remanded to custody of law enforcement agencies."

2. Some media reports disseminated earlier had said: “On June 21, 2012, the Intelligence Branch took custody of Abu Hamza allies Sayed Zabiuddin, on his deportation from Saudi Arabia at the Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi and later on June 25, 2012, formally handed him over to Delhi Police, that announced the arrest, for him to be produced at the New Delhi Court for trial.”

3.Some other media reports had said: “The name of Sayed Zabiuddin Ansari alias Abu Hamza alias Abu Jindal first surfaced in connection with an arms haul in Aurangabad in 2006. He is also believed to have had a hand in the 2006 Mumbai train blasts, was allegedly one of six Lashkar-e-Taiba handlers of the terrorists who attacked Mumbai on November 26, 2008 and has played a role in many other terror attacks all over the country, including an alleged plot to assassinate Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.”

4.The Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET) has been emulating the example of the Palestinian terrorist organisations in allotting kuniyats ( assumed names) to its field operatives in order to conceal their real identity. These kuniyats are chosen from the names of the Companions of the Holy Prophet.

5.The Palestinian terrorist organisations generally follow the principle of allotting one kuniyat to one operative. Till that operative dies, the same kuniyat is not allotted to any other operative. The LET does not follow any such practice. Sometimes, the same kuniyat is allotted to more than one operative and sometimes the same operative is allotted more than one kuniyat. This makes identification difficult.

6. Since the LET started operating in Indian territory in 1993, it has been frequently using the kuniyat Abu Hamza. In the late 1990s, the man in charge of publicity and propaganda in the LET headquarters in Muridke in Pakistani Punjab used to be called Abu Hamza.

7. In 2002, the Tamil Nadu Police had arrested some Tamil Muslims who had formed an organisation called Muslim Defence Force (MDF). They reportedly stated during their interrogation that they were motivated to form the MDF by one Abu Hamsa, alias Abdul Bari, an Indian Muslim living in Saudi Arabia and associated with the LET, and one Abu Omar, a Pakistani Muslim working there, after the Gujarat riots.

8. The kuniyats Abu Hamza and Abu Jindal had figured in the investigation  reports regarding the involvement of Sayed Zabiuddin Ansari , reportedly of  Georai area of Beed district in Maharashtra, in the terrorist attack on some suburban trains of Mumbai in July,2006, and in the 26/11 terrorist strikes in Mumbai.

9.Ajmal Kasab, the lone survivor of the 10-member Pakistani terrorist team of the LET which attacked Mumbai on 26/11, had reportedly stated during his interrogation by the Mumbai Police that one of the Karachi-based conspirators who had trained the 10 members of the LET team, and taught them Hindi was known as Abu Jindal. From the description of his, he appeared to be an Indian Muslim.

10. On February 12,2009, Senator Rehman Malik, the Interior Minister of Pakistan, had claimed that the Pakistani police had made a breakthrough in the investigation of the 26/11 terrorist strikes and arrested seven persons for involvement in the conspiracy. One of the persons named by him was Abu Hamza. However, he did not give his real name. According to claims made by Pakistani authorities, after the completion of the investigation, these persons, including Abu Hamza, have been charge-sheeted before an Anti-Terrorism Court, but the trial has not made any progress due to frequent transfers of the judges and the judges frequently going on leave.

11.The interrogation of the arrested person by the Delhi and Mumbai Police should help to establish whether the person named as Abu Jindal  by Kasab and whether the person named as Abu Hamza by the Pakistani Interior Minister are one and the same and whether Abu Jindal and Abu Hamza are the kuniyats of Syed Zabiuddin Ansari, an Indian Muslim, as believed by our Police.

12. If all the three are established to be one and the same, the question will arise as to  how Abu Hamza arrested by the Pakistani authorities on February 12,2009,managed to go to Saudi Arabia? Did he escape due to negligence or complicity or was he quietly released by the Pakistani authorities or is his landing in the hands of the Delhi police the result of back channel co-operation between the intelligence agencies of India, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia consequent upon the  recent visit of the Director of our Intelligence Bureau to Islamabad as a member of the Indian officials’ team headed by our Home Secretary for talks with their Pakistani counterparts. It would be difficult to find answers to these questions unless the Government of India is forthcoming. If back-channel intelligence co-operation has played a role, the Government of India will not be forthcoming in order not to embarrass the other two Governments.

13. However, if back channel co-operation had played no role and if the complicity of the Pakistani agencies with the LET had played a role in this matter, the implications could be more serious, indicating that the Pakistani agencies want to resume mass casualty terrorist strikes in Indian territory using the LET once again. This would call for the utmost alertness by our agencies. ( 25-6-12)

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate, Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-Mail: seventyone2@gmail.com . Twitter: @SORBONNE75 )

DEALING WITH PAKISTAN: MY TAKE ON CHRISTINE FAIR’S ARTICLE

B.RAMAN

In the latest issue of the  “Foreign Policy” magazine of the US, Ms.Christine Fair, the well-known US academic,  has given an excellent analysis of the state of affairs in Pakistan  and of the State of the  US relations with Pakistan.

2. The article, which reflects well the desperation and confusion in Washington DC over the lack credible and workable options to make Pakistan behave as a responsible member of the international community, comes out with a list of options that could be tried out in future. Some of these options are quite drastic like letting the state of Pakistan collapse without being inhibited by fears over what could happen subsequently.

3.Her analysis, brilliant and thought-provoking, has failed to look into how Pakistan has been able to maintain a policy of defiance against the US for over a year. It  does not bring out the fact that this Pakistani defiance has been largely due to its confidence that China and Saudi Arabia would never let it suffer or collapse, whatever be the punitive measures that might be taken by the US against it.

4. China matters to Pakistani political and military leaders much more than the US. They are more sensitive and responsive to Chinese views, concerns and advice than they are to those of the US.

5.We saw striking evidence of this during the Kargil military conflict of 1999 between India and Pakistan. The Bill Clinton Administration, then in office in Washington, repeatedly advised Islamabad to withdraw its troops and re-establish the sanctity of the Line of Control (LOC).

6. The Pakistani leaders were confident that China would support their stand of non-withdrawal. But to their shock and surprise, Gen.Pervez Musharraf, the then Chief of the Army Staff (COAS), and Mr.Nawaz Sharif, the then Prime Minister, who visited Beijing one after the other, found that Beijing was in agreement with the US advice to withdraw.

7. On his return to Islamabad from Beijing, a surprised Nawaz Sharif flew to Washington DC to seek US help for working out a face-saving formula to enable the Pakistani troops to withdraw. What worked on Islamabad was not US unhappiness and pressure, but the Chinese support for the US stand on the sanctity of the LOC.

8.A point covered in Ms. Christine Fair’s analysis is how to tame Pakistan’s nuclear ambitions and defang its nuclear arsenal to prevent its falling into the hands of the jihadi terrorists. She has correctly referred to Pakistan’s continuing to add to its nuclear arsenal.

9. She has failed to highlight the fact that China’s continuing support for Pakistan’s nuclear ambitions has been behind its defiant stand on the nuclear issue. China and possibly North Korea continue to supply nuclear-related equipment and missiles of different kinds to Pakistan.

10. Pakistan’s economy is in a shambles. Despite this it has been able to procure from China and possibly North Korea an unending supply of nuclear material and missiles. It does not hesitate to flaunt its missile capability by testing one missile after another at regular intervals without a single failure. Pakistan has had a unique success  record in the world in respect of missile firings.

11. This has been possible because of the steadfast Chinese and North Korean support to Pakistan’s programme. Unless and until the US is able to break this nefarious  nuclear-cum-missile nexus  of Pakistan  with China and North Korea no amount of direct US pressure on Islamabad will produce satisfactory results.

12. When Mr.George Bush Sr was the US President and Mr.James Baker his Secretary of State, the US closely monitored China’s nuclear-missile relationship with Pakistan and repeatedly made it clear to both countries that this clandestine relationship could cost them heavily.

13. After 9/11, because of the US dependence on Pakistan for dealing with  Al Qaeda and the Taliban, the US monitoring of the nuclear-missile supply relationship between Pakistan and China and the US pressure on China to stop adding to Pakistan’s nuclear capability has eased and Pakistan has taken full advantage of this.

14. In the on-going discussions in the US on the available options against Pakistan, the China angle has not received the attention it deserves. This deficiency is evident in the analysis of Ms.Christine Fair too. It is important to pay greater attention to the Chinese angle and study how to wean China away from its blind support of Pakistan.

15. The Saudi angle is another factor that has not received due attention in her analysis. The Saudi angle is important for two reasons. Firstly, the Pakistani leadership has the confidence that if the US drastically cuts down its economic assistance, it could count on Saudi Arabia. Secondly, the Wahabi-oriented jihadi organisations operating from the Pakistani territory are kept sustained by the intelligence agencies of Pakistan as well as Saudi Arabia.

16. The Pakistani military-intelligence establishment uses these Wahabi jihadis for  trying to achieve its strategic objectives against India and in Afghanistan. The Saudi intelligence uses them for spreading the Wahabi ideology in the Islamic world---particularly in the Af-Pak region and in the Central Asian Republics.

17. The important question, therefore, is not only how to make Pakistan behave, but also how to get the co-operation of China and Saudi Arabia in this endeavour. Making Pakistan behave as a responsible member of the international community is a much more difficult and complex task than it has been projected by Ms.Chrisine Fair in her timely analysis. ( 23-6-12)

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate, Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-Mail: seventyone2@gmail.com . Twitter: @SORBONNE75 )

THE NATION HAS A RIGHT TO KNOW

B.RAMAN

1962:India suffered a humiliating set-back in the Sino-Indian war. Many believed that the set-back was attributable to the then political, military and intelligence leadership. An enquiry was held into some of the aspects of the set-back. This enquiry report has not so far been released to the Indian public

1965-66:India suffered two set-backs. During the Indo-Pakistan war of 1965, the Indian Army unit, which was ordered to open the Lahore front, got bogged down. The Army blamed the Intelligence Bureau for poor intelligence regarding the Ichogil Canal. In 1966, the Mizo National Front under Laldenga took the Indian Security Forces by surprise and practically over-ran the entire Mizoram. The Army retrieved the ground subsequently and beat back the MNF.A senior officer of the Ministry of Home Affairs of the Government of India was asked to enquire into allegations of failure by the IB in both the cases. His reports reportedly absolved the IB of any blame for these set-backs, but led to the decision of Indira Gandhi to bifurcate the IB and create the R&AW on September 21,1968, to deal with external intelligence. The Indian public and research scholars have been denied access to these enquiry reports.

1971: The R&AW, hardly three years old, played  a highly-commended role in the events of 1971 preceding the Indo-Pakistan War of December 1971 that contributed to the success of the Bangladesh freedom-fighters. As it happens in the case of secret agencies, many of the decisions, operations and other actions of the R&AW were based on oral instructions from Mrs.Gandhi and others who played a role in the decision-making at the higher levels. There was no written documentation in the Archives of the R&AW giving a total picture of the role of the R&AW. In 1982, Indira Gandhi recalled R.N.Kao from  retirement and appointed him as Senior Adviser in the Cabinet Secretariat. He felt that in the absence of an authentic written documentation of the role of the R&AW, future generations of R&AW officers would remain in the dark about the operations of the R&AW during 1971----particularly after all the officers who had played a role in 1971 pass away. At his suggestion, the R&AW recalled from retirement an officer of the Army information wing who had served in the R&AW in 1971 and asked him to interview all officers, senior and junior, who had played a role in 1971 and write an authentic narrative of the role of the R&AW in 1971.He did part of the work. Kao resigned after the assassination of Indira Gandhi on October 31,1984. The R&AW terminated the services of this officer and discontinued the project. Many of the officers, who had played a role in 1971, including Kao himself, have since passed away. About half a dozen are still alive--- either in their late 70s or early 80s. A legendary officer from Kerala, of whom any intelligence agency in the world will be proud and who acted as the right hand man of Kao in 1971, is in his early 90s. When these officers also pass away in the next few years, no authentic record of the role of the R&AW in the events of 1971 will be available. Their knowledge, however feeble now, will die and be cremated with them. The Government should revive this project urgently, complete it quickly and make it available to the public and scholars.

1975-77: The Intelligence agencies and the Central Bureau of Investigation played a role in enabling Indira Gandhi to proclaim and sustain the State of Emergency for three years. There were allegations of serious misuse of the agencies by her and her advisers in the Government and the Congress to browbeat her critics and those opposed to the Emergency. The Morarji Desai Government, which came to office in 1977, ordered two enquiries into these allegations and other connected matters relating to the Emergency. The first was a quasi-judicial enquiry by the Shah Commission. The second was an administrative enquiry into the alleged misuse of the agencies conducted by a committee headed by L.P.Singh, who was Home Secretary under Indira Gandhi in the years before the Emergency. The Shah Commission’s report was released to the public, but the L.P.Singh committee report was not released to the public by any of the Governments that had held office since 1980. Hopes and expectations that the A.B.Vajpayee Government would release the L.P.Singh Committee report and other documents relating to the Emergency were belied. It is high time now to release all these accounts to the public so that we have a comprehensive and authentic record of the State of Emergency in public domain.

1984:Mrs.Gandhi made frantic efforts to avoid having to send the Army into the Golden Temple at Amritsar for what came to be known as Operation Bluestar. She initiated back channel talks/contacts with important Sikh leaders in the Punjab as well as in the diaspora to find a peaceful outcome. The back channel contacts with important Sikh leaders of the Punjab were handled by Rajiv Gandhi and his young associates. One back channel contact with a Sikh leader of the diaspora was handled by Kao. These back channel contacts spoke very positively of Indira Gandhi and her sincere search for a peaceful outcome to the crisis in the Golden Temple. The Government should ensure that the documents relating to these back channel contacts are properly preserved for evaluation after some years whether they could be released to the public.

2002: Kao passed away in January 2002. Before his death, he had reportedly recorded a narrative of some of his experiences and had it deposited for safe custody in the Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Library in New Delhi for release to the public some years after his death. One doesn’t know what time-bar he had put on its release to the public. It is now more than 10 years after his death. The Government owes it to the memory of Kao, who had served the country so brilliantly, to ensure that his narrative becomes available to the public once the time-bar is over. Any attempt to keep it permanently in darkness in the Library would be an insult to the  memory of this distinguished and proud  son of  India.

The Government should appoint a high-powered group to go into all these reports and documents, excise portions that could have an adverse impact on State-to-State relations with other countries and release the rest to the public.  Possible domestic embarrassments should not be a ground for excising any portion(23-6-12)

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai, and Associate, Chennai Centre For China Studies. E-Mail: seventyone2@gmail.com . Twitter: @SORBONNE75 )