ZARDARI SAHAB THE NATIONAL HERO
Pakistan People’s Party Co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari has claimed that the decision to place the ISI under the Interior Ministry is a step towards the civilian rule and also to save the Army from controversies and a bad name.
Talking to The News from Dubai, Asif Ali Zardari said that a strong Army with non-political command was the need of the time and “we hope that positive results will come out from this historic decision”.
He said that in future, the enemies of Pakistan would not be able to defame the ISI. “Nobody will say that this agency is not under the control of an elected government as the Interior Ministry will be responsible for responding to the allegations against the ISI.”
On the other hand, top officials of the Interior Ministry claimed that the decision to place the ISI and the IB under the Interior Division was taken with the consent of the Army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani but Director General ISPR Major General Athar Abbas said he had no information in this regard.
The decision to place the ISI and the IB under the Interior Division has raised many questions in political and diplomatic circles of Islamabad.
The most important question asked by diplomats was that why the prime minister gave his powers to the Adviser for Interior Rehman Malik.
A senior official of the Interior Ministry said that this decision was taken for better understanding between the two intelligence agencies and also to overcome some administrative difficulties. He said that maintaining law and order was their responsibility as the Interior Ministry was always answerable to the judiciary and parliament but “sometimes we feel that we have no information about certain national security issues and we cannot answer them properly in courts and parliament.”
He said that Adviser on Interior Rehman Malik will report to the prime minister and there was no question of cutting down the powers of the PM.
A top Interior Ministry official said that they were summoned by the Supreme Court in the Lal Masjid case but both interior minister and secretary interior were not in Pakistan when the operation was started in Lal Masjid last year but “we faced the music”. He said the court asked for information about the missing persons but they had no information because most of the operations against al-Qaeda and the Taliban were conducted by the ISI. The Interior Ministry official claimed that better coordination between the intelligence agencies will improve the law and order situation.
The decision to place the ISI under the Interior Division was taken when the prime minister, the information minister and the adviser on interior were not in Pakistan.
Defence experts are of the view that ISI is not responsible for internal security, this agency looks after external security and the Interior Division has nothing to do with external operations.
According to some sources, the ISI was taken into confidence before this “historic decision”.
Many analysts think that the prime minister is a symbol of an elected house and instead of empowering an elected leader, the real decision makers empowered a person who was not even elected and this decision could create more controversies and more problems for the new government.