ISI is Pak’s first line of defence: Musharraf, War on Terror, NewAgeIslam.com

War on Terror

ISI is Pak’s first line of defence: Musharraf

Indo-Asian News Service

Karachi, August 04, 2008

He was speaking at a dinner in Karachi on Sunday night hosted by traders and industrialists.

According to Musharraf, "conspiracies against the ISI were aimed at defaming Pakistan. ISI is a patriotic institution, which is working for the stability of the country", The News quoted the president as saying.

The ISI, which has been at the centre of numerous controversies, finds itself facing one of its toughest tests yet with the CIA releasing transcripts of what it claims are messages between one of its operatives and the attackers of the Indian embassy in Kabul last month.

Fifty people, including two Indian diplomats, had died in that attack.

US President George Bush, during his meeting with Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani in Washington last month, is reported to have pointedly asked who the ISI's real boss was.

Confusion also prevails over the ISI's reporting line, with the order transferring it from the prime minister's secretariat to the interior ministry not having been formally withdrawn.

http://newageislam.com/isi-is-pak%E2%80%99s-first-line-of-defence--musharraf/war-on-terror/d/425

It is high time we shed our illusions about Pak,

War on Terror

It is high time we shed our illusions about Pak

Islamabad has raised the ante against India in Afghanistan

and we must take corrective steps

By Kanwal Sibal

Not India, although it is arguably the biggest victim of externally promoted terrorist activity. Our seats of power, religious sites, commercial and scientific institutions, our trains, the streets and bazaars of our cities, have all been targeted by terrorists. Numerous innocent lives have been lost over the years. Each bloody incident is strongly condemned by government, with declarations of resolve to eradicate all extremist violence and determination not to be cowed down by it. But no decisive action to strengthen our legal apparatus is taken as a demonstration of zero tolerance of terrorism by the state.

Ultimately, state policy reflects the value society attaches to individual human life. If society at large is moved to its core by the loss of even a single innocent life to malignant acts of terrorism, the state will set up the mechanisms of self- protection. But if society becomes inured to periodic human loss, and there is declining expectation that the state is ready to assume its responsibilities, then public indignation passes and terrorist incidents remain a private tragedy. In India little effort to mobilise society at large to confront the terrorist affliction is visible.

http://newageislam.com/it-is-high-time-we-shed-our-illusions-about-pak/war-on-terror/d/331