more from the Himalayan powder-keg

27Jul2001 PAKISTAN: Pakistan came close to being labelled as 'terrorist
state'. 
T V Parasuram
Washington, July 27 (PTI) Pakistan came within an inch of being labelled by
the US as a state sponsor of terrorism but escaped by giving assurances
which it promptly broke, a former senior US diplomat has said.
Instead of closing down the cross-border terrorist apparatus, Pakistan
merely moved many of the Kashmir-bound terrorists to Afghanistan, changed
the ISI chief and "privatised" the cross-border terrorism with continued ISI
help, ex-US Ambassador Dennis Kux has revealed in his new book on
US-Pakistani relations.
Kux, who earlier wrote a highly accalimed book on Indo-US relations under
the title "Estranged Democracies", gives these details of Pakistan's
continued support for counter-terrorism even after promising the Americans
they would stop it.
In the waning days of the Administration of President Bush, father of the
present President George W Bush, renewed reports of involvement of ISI with
groups involved in Kashmir insurgency had landed Pakistan on the terrorism
"watch list".

The then Director of Central Intelligence, James Woolsey,
warned publicly that Pakistan stood "on the brink."
Washington was disturbed by the realisation that Pakistan
was harbouring hundreds of young Islamic extremists, graduates of guerrilla
training camps set up during the Afghan war and located near Peshawar or
just over the border in Afghanistan.
The camps had become breeding grounds for a generation of militant
fundamentalists who not only fought the communists in Afghanistan and the
Indians in Kashmir but maintained close links with terrorists throughout the
Islamic world, Kux says. In April 1993, the then Prime Minister Nawaz
Sharif, worried by the possibility that Pakistan might end up on the
terrorist list, sent the Secretary General of the Foreign Ministry, Akram
Zaki, to assure the Americans that he would put the lid on the extremists,
Kux writes.

Secretary of State Warren Christopher warned Zaki that
the US expected "action" to curb groups engaging in terrorism.
To back up his assurance, Sharif cracked down on Arab
extremists within Pakistan, although many of them simply
shifted across the border into Afghanistan, he says.
Sharif also replaced ISI Director General Lt Gen Javed
Nasir, "a maverick identified with religious extremists" and a
strong supporter of ISI involvement in Kashmir.
Direct ISI support for the insurgents tapered off, but
retired military intelligence personnel and Afghan mujahideen working
through the Jamaat-I-Islami and other extremist groups with close ties to
the ISI provided "privatized" help to the Kashmiri dissidents.
"Even though the change was to some extent cosmetic, says Kux, "it proved
sufficient for the State Department not to take the extreme step of pinning
the 'terrorist state' label on Pakistan."
(c) 2001 Asia Pulse Pte Limited.
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Source: PRESS TRUST OF INDIA 27/07/2001