Strained relations between the United States and Pakistan probably won’t get any better in light of the latest WikiLeaks revelation that the Bush administration considered the Pakistani intelligence agency as dangerous as al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations.

 

Documents from 2007 relating the American Guantánamo prison operation contained references to the Directorate of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) of Pakistan, in which anyone working for or connected to it should be considered a potential terrorist or insurgent, according to U.S. government analysts.

 

To be sure, the ISI played a central role in supporting the Taliban before and after it took over the government of Afghanistan in 1996. Known as “a kingdom within a state,” the ISI is said to have a network of at least 10,000 soldiers, spies and intelligence officers, not including informers.

 

Ties between Islamabad and Washington have been topsy-turvy since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks with some calling Pakistan a “frenemy” (friend/enemy) of the U.S. Recently, relations became tenser after a CIA contractor killed two Pakistanis, who may have been working for the ISI, in January.

 

Suspicions about the loyalty of the ISI were publicized last year when five families of those killed or injured in the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks sued in American court, claiming Pakistani intelligence operatives helped carry out the assaults that left 166 people dead and more than 300 wounded.

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

Guantánamo Bay Files: Pakistan's ISI Spy Service Listed as Terrorist Group (by Jason Burke, The Guardian)

U.S. Officials Equate Pakistani Spy Agency With Terror Groups in Leaked Documents (by Kim Barker, ProPublica)

U.S. Government Admits American Arrested for Murder in Pakistan Worked for CIA (by Noel Brinkerhoff and David Wallechinsky, AllGov)

Mumbai Terror Victims’ Families Sue Pakistani Intelligence Agency (by Noel Brinkerhoff and David Wallechinsky, AllGov)