Pakistan’s main spy agency denied it had unmasked the CIA’s station chief in Islamabad and warned such allegations could damage its already fragile counterterrorism alliance with the US.
The CIA pulled its top spy out of Pakistan on Thursday amid death threats after his name emerged publicly a few weeks ago from a Pakistani man threatening to sue the CIA over the alleged deaths of his son and brother in a US missile strike last year. The attorney involved with the complaint said he learned the name from Pakistani journalists.
The station chief’s outing has spurred questions as to whether Pakistan’s spy service might have leaked the information. Lawsuits filed last month in New York City in connection with the 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai, India, also may have raised tensions by naming Pakistan’s intelligence chief as a defendant.
The recall of the top US intelligence official in Pakistan comes at a delicate time. The White House over the past week released the results of a review of progress in the war in Afghanistan. The report included the conclusion that the existence of safe havens for militants on Pakistan’s side of the border remained a major obstacle to defeating the Taliban and al-Qaeda.
Pakistan’s assistance in clearing those militant hideouts — and providing intelligence to help the US pinpoint targets for its covert, drone-fired missile strikes — is considered crucial.
An official with Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISS) agency, its lead spy agency, said on Saturday any suggestions it outed the station chief were “a slur.” In particular, he denied the notion that the US lawsuits had spurred the ISI to retaliate.
Such “unfounded stories can create differences between the two organizations,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he is not cleared to brief the media.
The US lawsuits were filed last month, and the plaintiffs include relatives of victims in the Mumbai attacks, which left 166 people and nine attackers dead. The assault has been blamed on the Pakistani militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba, which is listed as a defendant in the suit. They also list the ISI and its chief, General Ahmed Shuja Pasha.
The lawsuits repeat long-standing allegations that the ISI “has long nurtured and used international terrorist groups,” including Lashkar.
Pakistan has denied any government agency was involved in the attacks in India. Islamabad has detained seven suspects in the case.
It’s unclear how far the US lawsuits will go or how quickly they will move, but being named in such legal documents is an embarrassment to the ISI and Pasha.
The Pakistani intelligence official said the CIA has not directly accused the ISI of any wrongdoing in the revelation of the station chief’s name.
Pakistanis involved in the threatened lawsuit over the missile strikes have held rallies in Islamabad featuring posters bearing the CIA officer’s name and urging him to leave the country.
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