Two former ISI officers, journalist missing from Kohat

[Mujahid]

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ISLAMABAD: Two former officials of the premier intelligence agency, Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), and a free lance journalist have gone missing in suspicious circumstances from Kohat.

Family sources of the missing ISI officials Col (retired) Imam and Sq Leader (retired) Khalid Khawaja revealed that these officers were assisting the free lance journalist Asad Qureshi who was making a documentary on Taliban and Al-Qaeda.

They were on way back to their homes after having a meeting with the Taliban leadership in tribal areas when they were allegedly picked up by unknown people. It is yet not clear who kidnapped them.

However, it is pertinent to mention that both the former ISI officers were having close relations with Taliban and Al-Qaeda leadership.—DawnNews

DAWN.COM | Provinces | Two former ISI officers, journalist missing from Kohat

[Abu Zolfiqar]

Very odd. No security escort? No witnesses?

[Slides]

Col Imam and Sq Leader Khalid Khawaja are both taliban sympathizers, especially Khawaja. Just few weeks back Khalid Khwaja had mentioned that has men had met Hakeemullah Mehsud who was alive and well.

If these two are missing, ISI might have been tracking them and their meeting with taliban.

[macnurv]

It is all speculations, chances are they might have been picked up by ISI. One question this is not the Col. Imam who trained Mullah Umer and offered to broker a deal between US and Afghan Taliban?

[Metallic]

Two former ISI officers, journalist missing from Kohat
PAKISTAN - 5 APRIL 2010

ISLAMABAD: Two former officials of the premier intelligence agency, Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), and a free lance journalist have gone missing in suspicious circumstances from Kohat.

Family sources of the missing ISI officials Col (retired) Imam and Sq Leader (retired) Khalid Khawaja revealed that these officers were assisting the free lance journalist Asad Qureshi who was making a documentary on Taliban and Al-Qaeda.

They were on way back to their homes after having a meeting with the Taliban leadership in tribal areas when they were allegedly picked up by unknown people. It is yet not clear who kidnapped them.

However, it is pertinent to mention that both the former ISI officers were having close relations with Taliban and Al-Qaeda leadership.


Source: DAWN Media Group

[sparklingway]

Col Imam recently spoke to Dawn about negotiating with the Taliban. Khalid Khwaja, needless to say is an infamous man.

ISI handy work or Taliban in action? I'd say the former although the prospects of kidnapping for ransom cannot be neglected as well.

[Slides]

already posted

[sparklingway]

Report says missing ex-intelligence officials, journalists with Taliban
Friday, April 09, 2010
By Mushtaq Yusufzai

PESHAWAR: There was a likely breakthrough on Thursday in mysterious disappearance of the five persons, including two former intelligence officers and two British passport-holder journalists as Taliban sources said they were safe and sound and staying with Commander Waliur Rahman in South Waziristan.

“They are still working on their project,” claimed a senior Taliban commander, who belongs to the Mehsud militants operating in South Waziristan. Pleading anonymity, the Taliban commander said that former intelligence officials Col (retd) Imam and Khalid Khwaja, presently chairman of Defence for Human Rights, along with some other colleagues had arrived in Mir Ali, the second biggest town of North Waziristan, a few days ago to meet TTP commander Waliur Rahman.

They and two British passport-holder journalists, one of them identified as Asad Qureshi, mysteriously went missing on way to North Waziristan Agency on March 26. Besides their family members, the state-machinery, as well as friends and well-wishers of the two former intelligence officials, are making efforts to locate their whereabouts.

The Taliban commander, who called The News from an undisclosed location, said Col Imam and his colleagues had spent a night with them in Mir Ali and interviewed senior Taliban commander Waliur Rahman.

The next day, the commander said, the team left for the nearby South Waziristan under Taliban escort where they were still busy in their work. He dispelled rumours that Col Imam and his colleagues could have been kidnapped and were still missing.

“They trusted us and our people took them to our strongholds in South Waziristan where they are staying with us as guests,” the Taliban commander explained. He said their visit to Waziristan was planned and Taliban commanders were waiting for their arrival in Mir Ali. He said they knew Col Imam and his men were making a documentary for a foreign news channel and they happily consented to help them in their job as the Pakistani media had stopped covering their activities.

“We are not happy with the Pakistani media as it has stopped following objectivity and was pursuing only the government agenda,” he complained. Though he refused to mention the place where Col Imam and his associates were staying, the commander said they were staying somewhere in Shaktoi, an area still in Taliban control in South Waziristan.

The US spy planes last January carried out a number of missile attacks in Shaktoi in which a number of foreign and tribal militants lost their lives. It was in Shaktoi where the US drone had struck a suspected militant hideout on January 14-15 in which US and Pakistani security agencies believe Hakimullah Mehsud was killed.

Taliban still deny Hakimullah Mehsud’s death and are claiming he is alive but has gone underground under a strategy. The Taliban commander said Col Imam and his colleagues might return within two or three days. He said the area where they were staying lacked the telephone facility.

Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s former MNA from Kohat, Javed Ibrahim Paracha, when reached by telephone, also confirmed that they had spent a night in Mir Ali. “We know they spent a night in Mir Ali but we are trying to locate that house where they stayed,” Paracha told this scribe from his Kohat residence.

Paracha said he was in touch with the Taliban leaders as well as with government functionaries in North and South Waziristan. Col Imam, Khalid Khwaja and the two journalists spent a night with Paracha in Kohat and then left for Waziristan on March 26.

There were also reports that Khalid Khwaja and a few other people recently negotiated between the government and Mehsud Taliban led by Hakimullah Mahsud. Official sources said Khwaja had made some visits of North and South Waziristan and successfully brought the two warring sides to the negotiating table that subsequently brought an end to the fighting between security forces and militants in South Waziristan.

“Even now he may have tried killing two birds with one stone,” a government official based in North Waziristan said, seeking anonymity. However, this piece of information couldn’t be confirmed from independent sources.

[Abu Zolfiqar]

my God Col. Imam was among the kidnapped??

kind of ironic; though i guess technically you can't really call it being kidnapped. I'm sure Colonel (retd.) saab willingly accompanied them without resistance.


and i'm sure after a week or two they will all be released

[Justin Joseph]

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Col Imam and Sq Leader Khalid Khawaja are both taliban sympathizers, especially Khawaja. Just few weeks back Khalid Khwaja had mentioned that has men had met Hakeemullah Mehsud who was alive and well.

If these two are missing, ISI might have been tracking them and their meeting with taliban.

so where are u pointing the fingers ?????????