Pakistan’s defence minister admitted to doing “dirty work” for the US and the West when asked whether Islamabad has a history of funding and backing terror groups.
Khwaja M Asif was speaking to British news network Sky News. During the interview, the minister was asked, “Do you admit, sir, that Pakistan has had a long history of backing and supporting and training and funding these terrorist organizations?” To which the Pakistani minister said, “We have been doing this dirty work for the US for the past three decades, including the West and the United Kingdom.”
However, he was quick to call it a “mistake” and said Pakistan “suffered because of that.” He added that Pakistan’s track record would have been “unimpeachable” had Islamabad not joined the West during the Soviet-Afghan war and the US-led war against the Taliban after 9/11.
The Pakistan minister’s admission of doing “dirty work” by backing terrorists for the US and West comes in the wake of the Pahalgam terror attack in which 26 innocent civilians were shot dead at a picnic spot in Baisaran valley.
Pakistan supported the United States in the Soviet-Afghan war by training and harbouring armed militants to fight the Soviets. The proxy war between the US and the Soviets gave Pakistan an important role because of its porous border with Afghanistan. The war ended with the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan and a civil war, which saw the Taliban at the helm for almost a decade until the 2001 World Trade Centre attacks shook the world.
Osama Bin Laden’s al-Qaeda was given shelter by the Taliban in Afghanistan. On September 11, 2001, the terror group carried out the biggest attack on American soil, killing 2,996 people. The United States launched a full-scale invasion of Afghanistan, and again, Pakistan was at the centre of operations to back the US-led forces in uprooting the Taliban.
Pakistan, which has backed, funded and trained terrorists on its soil against India, is again accused of supporting the attackers who killed the civilians in Pahalgam. ‘The Resistance Front’ (TRF), an offshoot of one of India’s most-wanted terrorists, Hafiz Saeed-led Lashkar-e-Taiba, has claimed responsibility for the attack.
Sources told NDTV that the attack was carried out by a hardened group affiliated with the proscribed Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terror organisation, comprising mostly foreign terrorists, with support from local militants, overground workers from the Valley and under the control of 26/11 attacks mastermind and Lashkar chief Hafiz Saeed.
According to sources, the group has been active in Kashmir for a long time. Security agencies believe it has been behind several high-profile attacks across the region, including in Sonamarg, Boota Pathri, and Ganderbal.
In October 2024, four individuals, including two Indian Army personnel, were killed in a terror attack at Boota Pathri. In the same month, Sonamarg witnessed a deadly assault on tunnel construction workers in which six labourers and a doctor were gunned down. Hashim Musa, one of the main accused in the Pahalgam massacre, is believed to be a suspect in this attack.
