ISLAMABAD: Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday ordered the Ministry of Interior to remove former spy chief Lt Gen (r) Asad Durrani from the Exit Control List (ECL).
In 2018, Durrani, former chief of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), landed himself in trouble for co-writing a book with Amarjit Singh Dulat, former chief of India’s Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), stirring controversy on a range of issues.
Subsequently, in May 2018, the interior ministry placed him on the no-fly list after receiving a letter from the Military Intelligence (MI) recommending the same. In October, Durrani moved the high court seeking removal of his name from the list.
During the proceedings on Thursday, IHC Chief Justice Athar Minallah asked Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Syed Tayyab Shah if the former spy chief’s name had been put on the list because an inquiry had been underway against him.
The court, Justice Minallah said, had examined all records against Durrani and arrived at the conclusion that there was no formal inquiry underway against the retired general when he was placed on the ECL in 2018.
“Like all citizens, this retired three-star general also has rights,” he observed.
However, the judge offered the DAG to “give the court grounds” to keep Durrani on the list, without which “there is no basis” for such a move.
When Additional Attorney General (AAG) Tariq Khokhar, who was late to the hearing, appeared in front of the court, Justice Minallah again asked whether Durrani was put on the ECL because of an ongoing inquiry against him.
“According to the record, there was no inquiry underway at the time [in 2018],” he pointed out.
“The petitioner is a retired three-star general and has also remained the ISI director. But now he is a common citizen and it is his right to move about with freedom.”
Justice Minallah questioned whether the federal government had “free rein to put anyone’s [name] on the ECL”.
AAG Khokhar asked the court to issue a notice to the Ministry of Defence for an answer, to which Justice Minallah said that there was “no need to call anyone”.
“According to the record, there is no fresh inquiry against Asad Durrani [and therefore] no reason for keeping his name on the ECL,” he said.
OBL ISSUE:
The 2011 US raid that killed Taliban leader Osama bin Laden is the most thorny issue covered in “Spy Chronicles”.
“The ISI probably learnt about OBL [Osama bin Laden] and he was handed over to the United States according to a mutually agreed process,” Durrani wrote.
His version contradicts the government official stance that it only knew of the US raid on May 2, which targeted the compound in Abbottabad where bin Laden was holed up after the US stealth helicopters had left its territory.
“The denial of any [Pakistani] role was because cooperating with the United States to eliminate a person regarded by many in Pakistan as a “hero” could have embarrassed the government,” Durrani has said in the book.
In an exclusive interview with Pakistan Today in 2018, Durrani said that he “has not been misquoted anywhere in the book”, whether it were his remarks on the US operation against Bin Laden or the Kargil operation.
