Pakistani spy chief visited Arab states to discuss coup

IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency

Islamabad, Dec 15, IRNA -- A Pakistani-American businessman Mansoor Ijaz, who kicked up the memo scandal, has claimed chief of Pakistan's top spy agency had visited Arab countries for discussions on a possible coup.

Daily ‘Dawn’ on Thursday quoted Ijaz as saying: 'that their (US intelligence) information was that DG ISI Lt Gen Shuja Pasha had travelled to a few Arab countries to talk about what would be necessary to do in the event they had to remove Zardari from power and so forth.'

The secret memorandum, allegedly routed through Ijaz to Mike Mullen, the former US military chief, sought US support to avert a military takeover following the killing of Osama bin Laden in May.

The claim about Gen Pasha talking to Arab leaders about the coup is not new. There is a reference to this effect in the so-called transcript of Blackberry messenger conversations between Husain Haqqani and Mansoor Ijaz.

The latter had supposedly sent a message to Mr Haqqani: 'I was just informed by senior US intel that GD-SII (read DG-ISI) Mr P asked for, and received permission, from senior Arab leaders a few days ago to sack Z.'

Ijaz claimed that this information was shared with him by a senior US intelligence official when he sought to confirm through CIA if Mr Zardari was really facing threat from the military.

Gen Pasha, the ISI chief, had proceeded on a secret overseas trip on May 6.

There was no word from ISI or Army about Mr Ijaz’s fresh allegations.

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Islamic Republic News Agency/IRNA NewsCode: 30714463