Did The ISI Out A CIA Operative?

Dec 19th, 2010

The growing tensions between Pakistan's ISI intelligence service and our own CIA appear to have reached a new and dangerous level. Our top undercover man in the region has been revealed and forced to flee. The seriousness of the release and it's implications heading into our 10th year of war in Afghanistan are far reaching. The personal motive in the outing is a testament to how deeply our campaign of violence has infuriated their elites.

From the NYTimes:

"An official of the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, Pakistan’s top spy organization, angrily denied Saturday that it was responsible for revealing the name of the Central Intelligence Agency’s top clandestine officer in Pakistan."

“We absolutely deny this accusation, which is totally unsubstantiated and based on nothing but conjecture,” a senior ISI official said in a background briefing at the headquarters of the spy organization in Islamabad."

From The AP:

"The CIA yanked its top spy out of Pakistan after his cover was blown and his life threatened, and 54 suspected militants were killed in a U.S. drone missile attack Friday in stark new signs of the troubled relationship between mistrustful allies locked in a war on terror groups. The CIA’s decision to remove its Islamabad station chief comes at a pivotal moment. The Obama administration is pressing Pakistan to rid its lawless northwest frontier of militants, even as public outcry in the country has intensified against the U.S. spy agency’s unacknowledged drone war."

From Alex Rodriguez of The L.A. Times:

"The CIA agent's name was first made public by Pakistani lawyer Shahzad Akbar and his client, Karim Khan, at a Nov. 29 news conference to announce their intent to sue the United States over the deaths of Khan's son and brother, and another man in an American drone missile strike Dec. 31, 2009, in the tribal region of North Waziristan.

Subsequently, the agent's name was widely disseminated in Pakistani newspapers and television newscasts. Akbar said he obtained the agent's name from two Pakistani journalists, whose identities he would not disclose. He did not know how the journalists learned of the agent's identity. However, the ISI maintains strong bonds with certain Pakistani journalists and commentators, and often uses them to influence coverage or spin their version of events."

And the permawar goes on...