The Foreign Office (FO) on Thursday said eight Indian diplomats in Pakistan ─ allegedly members of the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) and Indian Intelligence Bureau (IB) ─ are suspected of involvement in terrorist and subversive activities in Pakistan.
FO Spokesman Nafees Zakaria during a weekly press briefing in Islamabad said, "As you are aware, a number of Indian diplomats and staff belonging to Indian intelligence agencies RAW and IB have been found involved in coordinating terrorist and subversive activities in Pakistan under the garb of diplomatic assignments."
The names and designations of the suspected operatives provided by the FO are as follows:
Suspected RAW operatives
- Rajesh Kumar Agnihotir, commerical counselor and RAW station chief
- Anurag Singh, first commercial secretary
- Amerdeep Singh Bhatti, attache visa
- Dharmendra Sodhi, staff member
- Vijay Kumar Verma, staff
- Madhavan Nanda Kumar, staff
Suspected IB operatives
- Balbir Singh, first secretary press and information, IB station chief
- Jayabalan Senthil, assistant personnel welfare officer
The FO claimed that Indian High Commission official Surjeet Singh who was declared persona non-grata a few days ago was also an IB operative working under Balbir Singh.
"Surjeet was using a fake identity as Abdul Hafeez pretending to be a telecom company Warid’s employee," the FO alleged.
"We are disappointed that India has not only been found involved in promoting terrorist activities and terror financing as was disclosed by Kulbhushan Yadhav, and further confirmed by the statements at the highest political level on Aug 15 and earlier during a visit to Dhaka... India has also been using its diplomatic mission for its nefarious designs," the FO said.
Details of the alleged activities of the suspected RAW and IB operatives provided by the FO are as follows:
- Espionage, subversion, supporting of terrorist activities and fueling instability in Balochistan and Sindh, especially Karachi
- Sabotage of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor
- Creating unrest in Gilgit-Baltistan
- Expanding network of operatives and agents under guise of commercial activities
- Leveraging positions as diplomats for ingress into influential circles for gathering inside information
- Damaging Pak-Afghan relations through a variety of activities
- Infiltrating Indian agents into social, media and political circles for propaganda purposes and activities detrimental to Pakistan’s interests
- Fabrication of evidence to portray Pakistan as a state sponsor of terrorism
- Handling factions of Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan
- Instigation of religious minorities
- Fueling sectarianism
- Maligning Pakistan with propaganda on human rights issues
- Activities in Azad Jammu and Kashmir detrimental to the Kashmir cause
- Misleading the international community about the indigenous movement for self determination in held Kashmir
'Most significant exposé of undercover agents'
The information regarding the 'undercover agents' was leaked to the media yesterday, but no FO official was available to confirm it, Dawn reported.
The posting of undercover officers is a routine practice in inter-state relations.
The leak that took the confrontation between the two countries to a new peak came after Pakistan was forced to pull out six of its officers and staff posted at the high commission in New Delhi because of Indian allegations that four diplomats were working for Pakistani intelligence services.
The withdrawn officers and staffers reached Lahore on Wednesday.
The leak about Indian undercover agents is one of the most significant exposé relating to undercover agents since the US Central Intelligence Agency was forced to pull out its station chief Jonathan Banks in December 2010 after his identity was revealed in a law suit by victims of drone attacks.
In 2010, an Indian undercover set-up was also partially revealed after India arrested one of its own high commission officers for working for the ISI.
Never before has the cover of such a large number of agents been blown in one instance.
Security agencies earlier this year captured a serving RAW officer, Kulbushan Jadhav, in Balochistan, which is seen as the most important intelligence catch so far.
The blowing of cover of Indian agents may serve as a temporary intelligence setback for Delhi.
India last week sparked the latest controversy in its strained ties with Pakistan when it detained one of the Pakistani mission’s staffers, Mehmood Akhtar, and coerced him to name four of the diplomats as spies.
The recorded statement of Akhtar, who was later dismissed from India, was played on Indian media, compromising the security of Pakistani personnel at the Delhi mission.
Akhtar insists that he was forced into identifying the diplomats as intelligence agents.
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