Senator Farhatullah Babar on Saturday submitted a call-to-attention notice in Senate regarding a recent report that intelligence agencies were "shielding" terrorists.
Babar's notice — based on a petition submitted in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) by an Intelligence Bureau (IB) employee — called Minister of Interior Ahsan Iqbal's attention “towards a matter of sufficient and urgent public importance, namely the reports that terrorists are being shielded and protected by an intelligence agency itself.”
Babar said that circumstantial evidence to support the claim exists, adding that there are “reports that some militants are being protected by some invisible forces.”
While highlighting such instances, Babar said that Maulana Masood Azhar, the head of the banned Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), “has repeatedly been protected from UN sanctions for unexplained reasons.”
In his notice, Babar also said that the discovery of a “Pakistani national identity card and passport from the person of Mullah Mansoor Akhtar — who was killed in a drone strike in May last year — should have [led to] investigations into [who is] protecting [the] Taliban.”
“However, there has been no progress in the case … as is evident from the replies to questions recently asked in the Senate raising suspicions of a cover up [in the matter],” he added.
Babar also recalled that in the recent NA-120 by-elections, the photographs of a “banned militant leaders appearing on the election posters of a candidate” had raised concern but the “Interior ministry failed to take notice [of this].”
In the notice, Babar further said that the complaint of the IB employee against his own department has lent a sense of urgency to the matter.
According to The News, the IB, in response to the above mentioned petition in the IHC, has demanded that the petition be dismissed as it is “frivolous.”
"The petition should be dismissed on the grounds of being frivolous, as it demands the disclosure of details pertaining to secret operations and task objectives," The News quoted the IB as stating in its reply.
"If disclosed, these details will compromise national security as they will expose the administrative units of the department," the reply further said.
According to The News, the IB’s response said that if the required information was to be submitted to court, “the secret details will become a public document, which can potentially deteriorate the country's foreign relations."
The News also mentioned that IB’s response claims that the employee in question has "frequently caused trouble" for the department, having submitted 14 petitions against the agency in the past.