For decades, Pakistan has not only been a safe shelter for the heads of terrorist groups – the choice of Osama bin Laden and Hafiz Saeed – but even some ‘Lone Wolf’ terrorists. However, at every point of history, gradual Pakistani governments have refused to harass any such character on their soil.
The current Defense Minister, Khwaja Asif, inadvertently, has clung to the same script in media interviews after a terrorist attack in Pahgam on 22 April. In fact, he has also said that terrorist mastermind Masood Azhar is not in Pakistan, despite many records. There are many incidents that confirm the presence of such wicked elements in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region, run independently across the border, enhancing mercenaries, and sends dangers around the world.
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1993 CIA murders
About 14 years ago, Osama bin Laden was abolished by the American Marine at his Abbottabad hideout in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan in 2011, a killer who shot at least two CIAs (Central Intelligence Agency) operators in 1993, caught by American agents in Quata. On June 15, 1997, the fugitive was raised in the capital of Balochistan province, before the border of Afghanistan. It was barely 200 km from Kandahar. According to reports, the killer was flown directly at the Washington Dullas International Airport at the Chakla Airbase – a huge C -141 starllifter aircraft for about twelve hours. Obviously, no formal arrest or exile procedures were followed in this case.
An FBI poster of Mir Amal Kansi
Incidentally, airbase at Chakla – near Garison city of Rawalpindi, which is Pakistan’s military headquarters – was one of the targets bombing by India in its recent attacks against Pakistan. Aadhaar is now known as Noor Khan Airbase and is used to operate the Pakistan Air Force.
Karachi to barrister
In the eighties, the airbase used to be quite busy as it was one of the launchpads for secret programs, serving as an important site for operations against the former Soviet army, then capturing Afghanistan. It was the same airbase that was used by the CIA and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) during his manhint for Mir Amal Kansi for four years. An elderly gentleman came from this Garison city who claimed to be a barrister from Karachi.
I met this man, when Kansi closed two CIA operatives and injured three others on 25 January 1993. The meeting was correct at the entrance of the agency’s Langli headquarters at Virginia, US. When I told Sajjan that I was a journalist and intended to meet the main players in Afghanistan in those days, he said that he would see what he can do. The next morning, I found a copy of a report on Manhent for Kansi in Afghanistan, which slipped under the door of my hotel room. I believe it was a barrister that I got that clipping.
Kansi was on the FBI list of the top 10 fugitives. An AK-47 was found in his Virginia apartment, and ballistic experts confirmed that it was the same weapon that was used to set fire to the shoots found in the shooting scene at the CIA headquarters.
That horrific morning, Kansi parked her pickup truck near the CIA headquarters in Virginia. As soon as the traffic light turned red at the front, he killed his gun and started shooting on the cars. He jumped back into his vehicle and ran away as the stoplight changed. By then, CIA operator Frank Darling, 28, and Lanceing Bennett, 66, had died, while Nicolas Star, Calvin Morgan and Stephen Williams were injured. Despite the strict efforts of security agencies to catch him, Kansi boarded an aircraft from Duals International Airport the next day to Islamabad.
Kansi discovery
My research took some time (Google was not even a concept, and ‘Internet’ was just a word that I had heard). The more I read, the more I was contradictory. Some reports suggested that he was seen on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.
Meanwhile, on a visit to Jalalabad, about 150 km east of Kabul and Khyber is located close to Peshawar in Pakistan, I found a burnt handbill almost burnt. It showed a picture with Kansi’s name – I understood that with a local contact help – and an amount, in US dollars, as a reward. The last part was completely burnt and inseparable. This amount, which I learned later, was to be honored for information about Kansi and a shocking one had gone up to $ 2 million.
I felt that Kansi was unlikely to be controlled by the ruling alliance in Kabul or any other city or province. The then Defense Minister and North Strongman, Ahmed Shah Masood, stopped Pakistan and his army. His colleague, Abdul Rashid Dostam, with a lot of foot, then in the northern border areas, there were somewhat similar emotions.
Meeting Hekmatyar
In the midst of all this, I managed to reach Hijab-e-Islami founder Gulbuddin Hekmatyar for an interview about the conflict with the Kabul government. I met him briefly and first received my satellite phone number. Although deep, I felt that if Kansi had taken shelter, it was probably with the Hekmatyar.
A little I knew what was in the front shop.
Yellow
It was some time in 1994. Hizbis was stopping Kabul by stopping. It was a bad dream that was traveling in the morning at a distance of some 10-kilometer at its headquarters in four Asabs. Once, we were designed to wait at the prickly wire-fence gate, while our equipment was checked.
Then I saw him. Or this is what I thought. The man was going away from me, more than 100–150 meters away. I shouted her name at the top of my voice. He stopped, but did not turn; Meanwhile, the muzzle of at least half a dozen AK-47 was pointed to me. My subject had gone into a barrack.
I asked then, and later, whenever I met the Hekmatyar, if I really saw Kansi that day. The hemp will either deny a straight face or laugh at my question. Subsequently, I also tried to visit Peshawar and Quetta, but seeing my Indian passport, I did not get a visa in Pakistan.
The days passed, and finally, Kansi was taken to the US, where he faced a test and was executed on 14 November 2002 for his crimes.
Was it really him?
Kansi’s family and some human rights agencies questioned their participation in the CIA headquarters attack. The gun can be found in his apartment, but does not prove that he is guilty, he argued. A lonely person can plan, prepare and execute such an act, he asked. ET CEETERA, et CEETERA.
If he committed murders, did he work alone? He came from a well -to -do family, inheriting himself money from a deceased relative, yet left everything to work for a courier company in Virginia. He told his inquiries that he was upset with the “excesses” of the Western world against Muslims and “wanted to do something”. He claimed that he was not associated with any terrorist group, but was also said that he had once met Osama bin Laden. He was, he insisted.
Above all, I would be with this unanswered question forever: I really saw that American agencies were combing for the region? Or was it someone who remembered him? If this is former, I lost a lifetime opportunity due to prickly wire and some AK-47.
(Jayant Bhattacharya is a senior journalist who writes on elections and politics, struggle, farmers and human interest issues)
Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author
