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Headley: ISI trained me
Blast rocks Islamabad, 1 dead
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UK plans to stop aid to India
Special to the tribune
Somali pirates release 22 hostages, including 6 Indians
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Headley: ISI trained me
The training, imparted in a two-storey ISI safe house in Lahore, was not like the James Bond style but focused on ways to camouflage his identity and earn the confidence of Indians he was going to use. Headley, a Pakistani-American, was initially imparted training by terror outfit Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) for conducting reconnaissance for Mumbai attacks but his handler Major Iqbal of the ISI was dissatisfied with it, following which advanced training was given to him by Iqbal and several Non-Commissioned Officers (NCOs) of the spy agency. “I had been consulting with or meeting with Major Iqbal, and he was discussing what Lashkar intended to use me for, which was surveillance. “He said he wanted me to do something which he thought was more important, which was do intelligence work for the ISI at that time,” Headley informed a Chicago court which was conducting the trial of co-accused Tahawwur Rana. “He (Major Iqbal) looked at my notes that I had made from my LeT course, and he expressed a dissatisfaction... it wasn’t very good,” Headley said in his testimony, transcript of which is available with the PTI. The instructions in spying were then given by Major Iqbal and NCOs from the ISI. Headley knew that these officials were NCOs from the ISI as Major Iqbal would refer to them as sergeant or corporal or naik or lance naik. During the training, ISI agents taught Headley aspects like “cover authentications,” “create a fake story for cover authenticator,” “how to back stop it,” “conduct recce and intelligence in an urban area”. He was also taught “how to go videotape or observe something without being suspicious,” “how to manipulate people” and other arts of spying along with terrorist planning. “How long would you spend there each day?” Headley was asked. “Different-different times. I went there hundreds-scores of times,” he replied.
— PTI
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Blast rocks Islamabad, 1 dead
Islamabad, June 13 The bomber detonated his explosive vest when he was stopped by a security guard as he tried to enter the branch of Silk Bank at the market in Sector I-8 in the heart of the capital city. Islamabad police chief confirmed the attack was carried out by a suicide bomber. Muhammad Bashir, the guard who stopped the bomber, was killed and three others were injured, officials said.
— PTI
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UK plans to stop aid to India
London, June 13 Mitchell was quoted as saying by BBC 1 that he did not think that Britain would continue to fund programmes in India “for very much longer”. The David Cameron-led government has come under pressure to explain why British taxpayers are giving millions to countries like India at a time of public sector cuts. The criticism comes as public spending cuts have led to job losses in the UK. India has been singled out because of increasing prosperity and the fact that it has a nuclear programme. Several lawmakers have voiced public criticism to give aid to an India whose economy is growing exponentially, and is now in a position to give aid to many African countries. Mitchell said the aid programmes are massively scaled up by the Indian taxpayer. “British know-how is making a huge contribution. Now is not the time to stop the programme in India but I don’t think we will be there for very much longer,” he said in an interview. “India is a place where there are more poor people than the whole of sub-Saharan Africa,” he said, adding “Britain’s programme shows how we can get more people into school, and women particularly.” According to an earlier report, the Cameron government has decided to continue the present level of aid to India, £280 million per year, until 2015 despite a welter of protests. The government has decided against any cuts to the aid which will amount to over £1 billion until 2015.
— PTI
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Special to the tribune AS US-led members of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) prepare to scale back their presence in Afghanistan, signs are emerging of how psychological warfare is being used to fight their Islamic fundamentalist enemies. Every year Western army commanders talk of the progress they have made in overcoming their Taliban-led Islamic opponents in Afghanistan. But such opposition belies the success of the Taliban who have returned in strength to many of their former strongholds. In some provinces that border Pakistan, such as Nangahar, Kunar and Nuristan, the Taliban have stormed the local administration, taking over the local police and justice systems and replacing them with their own candidates. It is these recent Taliban successes in particular that have prompted respected Western analysts to conclude that the Taliban cannot be defeated and must be tackled by other means. Sir Sherard Cowper Coles, a former British ambassador in Kabul and the author of a recently published book, ‘Cables From Kabul’, commented last week, “No serious student of this or any other Afghan war believes any longer in the possibility of defeating the Taliban militarily. In calling at long last for a new political settlement, President Obama said as much on the eve of his state visit to Britain.” Sir Sherard’s comments come in the wake of new US public opinion polls that show significant backing to reduce troop numbers in Afghanistan. One CNN survey shows a 9 per cent jump in the number of people who say the US should withdraw all its troops. A CBS news poll shows a 16 per cent increase in the number of those who think force numbers should be cut back. The same CBS poll shows that 73 per cent of Americans should withdraw a “substantial” number of troops from Afghanistan this summer. Leaders of the pro-withdrawal movement say the killing of Obama bin Laden earlier this year removes the justification for the Afghan war and American forces should now be withdrawn as quickly as possible. It is against this backdrop that some experts on both sides of the Atlantic have started to look at new and cheaper ways to confront the Taliban. In London, the Foreign Office has invested £33,000 on an animated film that aims to discourage young British Muslims from teaming up with Islamic extremists. ‘Wish You Waziristan’ is about two British Muslim brothers who decide to join Islamic fighters on the Afghan-Pakistan border. The cartoon film, which includes computer style graphics, starts with a botched attempt by the brothers to launch a grenade from a location in Pakistan’s Waziristan province. The story, which is told from the perspective of the younger brother, Abu, then returns to how the two boys reached the extremist training back from their home in the UK. Both brothers are shown watching a number of training videos depicting Osama bin Laden before they join up with the fighters on the Afghan border. Abu says, “When we got there, I was thinking, ‘Bro, are we in the right place? The first thing they did was lock us up and start interrogating us. They told me they were just precautions and not to take it personally. But to be honest when a fat guy has his hand up your **** its pretty personal.” The film ends with the brothers returning to the UK where they are arrested. In the US, psycho warfare tactics are just as prevalent, but they take different and more distasteful forms and are not formally endorsed by the authorities, either in the State Department or the Pentagon. If a popular website is to be believed, US military success in Afghanistan can be facilitated by the use of bullets soaked in pig fat. The makers of Silver Bullet Gun Oil even claim Osama bin Laden was shot with bullets soaked in pig fat, thus denying him a place in paradise. It is this pig fat supposedly that makes the bullets a “highly effective counter-Islamic force multiplier”. The owner of the gun oil site, who describes himself as ‘The Midnight Rider’, say the pig fat transfers onto anything the bullet strikes, explaining how this “effectively denies entry to Allah’s paradise to an Islamo-fascist terrorist.’ The Midnight Rider is apparently no student of history and does not realise that it was similar rumours of bullets rubbed with pork and beef fat that led to soldiers of the British Indian army revolting against their colonial masters in 1857.
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Washington, June 13