US nails8217; Pak on hijack charge

Harkat-ul Ansar, as the outfit was known before, is also responsible for the abduction of six western hostages, one of who was beheaded. One escaped, the other four as still missing, and there seems littlechance that there are still alive. The State Department has since designated Harkat a terrorist group.

Karl Inderfurth, the Assistant Secretary of State for South Asian Affairs, who was one of the three officials who met with General Musharraf, told the general that the United States was concerned about the links between Harkat ul-Mujahedeen and his military and intelligence services, officials said. Inderfurth was accompanied by Michael Sheehan, the US head of counterterrorism. Indian officials acknowledge that ever since Sheehan came into the picture, the administration has been more focused on terrorism and has listened to New Delhi8217;s woes with far more attention than before.

Sheehan participated in the tenth round of Indo-US talks that took place in London last week during which India presented credible evidence of Pakistani involvement in the hijacking. He and Inderfurth went to Islamabad from there. The far-reaching US conclusion about Islamabad8217;s official complicity, and its disclosure in the USmedia, is a devastating blow to Pakistan8217;s denial of its involvement in the hijacking and a clear vindication of New Delhi8217;s charges reported in the Indian media.

Further, the revelations, made by the administration itself, would compel the State Department it to name Pakistan as a state sponsorer of terrorism. The stunning conclusions and its disclosure also effectively shuts the door on Pakistan during a Clinton visit to the region in March which is to be announced this week. Unless there is a dramatic change in posture and Islamabad rescinds its support to terrorist groups and turns its back on the Taliban and Osama bin Laden, it now seems certain that the President will travel only to India and Bangladesh.

The disclosures appear to stem from the Clinton administration8217;s disappointment over the Pakistani military regime rebuffing them on both the Harkat and Osama bin Laden issues. The Times said US officials asked Gen Musharraf to ban Harkat-ul Mujaheddin 8212; a State Department -designatedterrorist group 8211; but the request was rejected. The team also made no progress on their request to Musharraf to put pressure on the Taliban government to expel Osama bin Laden.

Administration officials declined to give NYT details of precisely what they knew about Harkat8217;s role in the hijacking, but they said that they received information that Harkat ul-Mujahedeen was responsible for the episde quot;after it became clearer who made arrangements for the escape of the hijackers.quot;

quot;Indications came through intelligence channels, and I don8217;t know anybody around here, including the skeptics, who don8217;t find that credible,quot; the paper quoted an official as saying of Harkat ul-Mujahedeen8217;s involvement in the hijacking. Even as the disclosure nails Pakistan, the first congressional pressure to designate it a terrorist state erupted from lawmaker Frank Pallone, a vocal and enthusiastic votary of closer Indo-US ties. In a letter to Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, Pallone said the quot;pattern of terrorismhas reached a point of seriousness where I believe that the United States must now take the step of designating Pakistan as a state sponsor of terrorism.quot;

quot;This is hardly the first time that the issue of designating Pakistan as a state sponsor of terrorism has been raised. For much of the past decade, a series of reliable reports from Western media sources have cited Pakistan as a base and training ground for terrorist groups, and the Pakistani Government8217;s demonstrated reluctance to halt the use of its soil for terrorist organizations,quot; Pallone said. He disclosed the he would be introducing a resolution in Congress calling for designating Pakistan a terrorist state.

But that is still some distance away although there is bound to be moves and countermoves in that direction in the Congress session that has just begun. The Times itself amplified the dymamics that governs Washington8217;s view of South Asia, a background that has been frequently reported in the Indian media. The paper quoted officials assaying quot;even though Pakistan is believed by the Clinton administration to be harboring and supporting terrorist groups, there was substantial resistance from the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency to putting Pakistan on the list, in part because of past help that Pakistan gave the United States during the Soviet Union8217;s occupation of Afghanistan.quot; However, US officials for the first time elaborated on the nexus between the terrorists and the military in Pakistan, with a version that contradicted Islamabad8217;s claim that its support was restricted to moral and diplomatic spheres.

The infiltration method described by US officials also squared up to what India has been saying for years.

The officials said that Harkat ul-Mujahedeen and another group, Lashkar-e-Toiba, were used by the Pakistani military during conflicts at the Line of Control in Kashmir. Members of the groups would cross over the line, while the Pakistani army would create a disturbance at another point along the line, officialssaid, thus diverting the attention of the Indian army from the infiltrators.