M A I N   N E W S

Indian currency factory in Pak

NEW DELHI, Jan 9 (PTI) — Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) has set up a facility in Peshawar to print counterfeit Indian currency, which is brought in by carriers code-named “Savaris”.

Various points in Nepal, where the ISI has established bases are being used as distribution points.

Home Ministry officials here said the arrest of a Pakistani Embassy official on charges of circulating counterfeit Indian currency in Kathmandu was only the “tip of an iceberg”.

The racket has been going on for sometime now and conduits are not only active in Nepal but also within the country, official sources said.

The ISI conduits target those planning to visit to Pakistan through the “Samjhauta Express” and a trap is laid at its New Delhi-based High Commission itself.

Quoting an interrogation report of a woman, who acted as “Savari” and was arrested in the last week of December 1999, the sources said she was a resident of a JJ cluster in Yamuna Pushta and had gone to get a visa from the High Commission, where she was approached by one of these conduits.

The woman said she accepted a bag from a stranger at Lahore railway station for delivery here on being paid a certain amount.

After her arrival and subsequent arrest, it was found that the bag contained more than Rs three lakh in counterfeit Indian currency.

The “Savari” was on her way to deliver the bag to an ISI conduit in Kabootar market in old Delhi, who was also picked up later.

However, the investigating agencies are yet to ascertain the exact number of such “Savaris”, who have handed over money to these conduits.

Meanwhile, the opening of another front from Nepal has become a source of worry as India’s border with the Himalayan kingdom is very porous with police and customs manning it at only 23 points, leaving several other sectors in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal unguarded.

Interrogation of several militants has shown that Pakistani Embassy officials in Kathmandu are acting as conduits for the ISI and pass “vital instructions” to Kashmiri militants.

Some of the militants arrested last year have said that explosives like RDX were handed over to them by Pakistani Embassy officials.

The immigration authorities in Nepal are also termed as “manageable” by sources, who says “that for a meagre amount one can have a passport from that country”.

Stating that Naim-ul-Haq, acting chief of Al-Umar Mujahideen, had been provided with a Nepalese passport by the ISI, the sources said that Haq was constantly flying on the Nepal-Islamabad sector.

He is wanted by the Delhi and Jammu and Kashmir police in several cases including the infamous Lajpat Nagar blast.

Azhar not to be arrested: Pak

ISLAMABAD, Jan 9 (ANI) — Pakistan Chief Executive Gen Pervez Musharraf’s Adviser Javed Jabbarhas said that the government has no intention of arresting the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen leader, Maulana Masood Azhar, claiming that he had been victimised by the Indian authorities over the past six years.

In an interview with The New York Times, he said New Delhi “had violated all norms of law and justice” without finding Azhar guilty of a crime in a court of law. He also said that Azhar had not committed any crime on the Pakistani territory.

The adviser also debunked Indian allegations that Pakistan had played a key role in organising the hijacking of the Indian plane as sheer propaganda.

“What kind of absurd objective would Pakistan achieve by supporting such an incident?” he asked. “Are we bereft of reason? Why would we give something to India that they could use to distort Pakistan’s image misinform the world about what we are as a people and demonise us?, he stated.

The adviser was also skeptical that India had managed to obtain photographs of the hijackers from their reported accomplices. “It is curious,” he said, “that the hijackers, who were not seen throughout the hijacking drama, would have left their photographs with the accomplices to be handed over to the Indians on demand”.

Meanwhile, speaking in Bahawalpur, Maulana Masood Azhar denied that he had threatened the USA and India with attacks on their nationals in Pakistan.

In an interview to Radio Pakistan on Saturday, Azhar said during his address at a Karachi mosque and later at a press conference he had not mentioned the names of the USA and India. He said he was himself surprised over levelling of this allegation by the USA, who has asked the Pakistan Government to investigate against him (Masood).

He said Pakistan was never involved in the hijacking of the Indian Airlines plane.

In another interview to BBC, when asked about the Indian claim that it has arrested four persons allegedly associated with the hijacking of the Indian plane and that India also mentioned the name of Ibrahim Azhar as among those four persons, Maulana Azhar said: “Ibrahim is at present in Saudi Arabia. He has gone there to perform Umra. I have been in India for six years. I have had the experience”.

“Whenever some incident takes place, India claims to have arrested several persons after the incident, he said.

“Indian troops burnt Chirar-e-Sharif and later claimed that they have arrested such and such persons. The BJP government is doing so to avert the pressure of the Opposition. This issuance of photos is a drama,” Maulana Azhar said and added “this was done in the wake of my statement that all the five hijackers were Indian citizens and that they belonged to occupied Kashmir”.