News
Friday, March 18, 2011
$2m deal heals US-Pakistan spy row but scars ties* Freeing of Davis sparks demonstrations by public that thinks authorities have bowed down to US demands
ISLAMABAD: A blood money deal to secure the release of a CIA contractor accused of murder in Pakistan has ended a damaging spy row but eroded a thin veneer of trust between the suspicious allies, analysts say.
The sudden freeing of US citizen Raymond Davis on Wednesday, seven weeks after he shot dead two men in Lahore, has sparked small angry demonstrations in protest at the authorities’ decision to bow to the demands of the superpower ally.
The US persistently argued that Davis enjoyed full diplomatic immunity as a member of its embassy staff but secured his release only after a compensation of $2 million was paid to the families of the dead men. Pakistani media was quick to denounce the deal with a local newspaper decrying it as a “sell out”.
“Davis has been let loose through a state-managed drama aimed at hoodwinking the entire nation. Every self respecting Pakistani is ashamed today,” said the newspaper’s front-page story on Thursday.
Islamabad has stayed largely quiet in the wake of the blood money deal, and a weekly press conference at the Foreign Ministry was also cancelled on Thursday.
US Senator John Kerry, who flew to Pakistan in the wake of the shooting in a bid to resolve the row, lauded the decision as a boon for bilateral ties. “Neither country can afford for this tragedy to derail our vital relationship,” Kerry said in a statement.
The US holds Pakistan as a critical ally in winning the war next door in Afghanistan, and believes the Taliban’s top leadership lives in safe havens in the tribal regions on the remote border between the two countries.
But behind the public row over Davis’ right to diplomatic immunity lay a secret battle between the CIA and Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency over the anti-terrorist fight, say analysts. The ISI wanted to put a stop to the CIA’s covert surveillance of terrorist networks operating in the country, while the CIA wanted greater involvement in the ISI’s work to stamp out home grown terrorists, they say.
And although the politicians leading Pakistan’s embattled government have again been made to look weak by agreeing to release Davis, defence analyst Talat Masood says resolution of the row has helped fix CIA-ISI ties.
“I think CIA-ISI relations will have definitely improved. This would not have happened without their approval and an improvement in their relationship,” said Masood.
“I think they tried to redefine their relationship... I think this will improve the level of confidence if they adhere to their deal,” he said.
But as for the government, the deal will confirm to Pakistanis that their government “has no spine and is prepared to sell everything,” Masood added.
The US has been waging a diplomatic campaign for months to convince Pakistanis that its interests in the country lie beyond security ties, signing off huge sums of non-military aid and rushing to the rescue in the wake of devastating floods last summer.
But a sceptical Pakistani public point to a covert drone campaign that pummels the northwest border area as proof that the US is only interested in maintaining relations to win the Afghan war, and the Davis saga has only reinforced that view, said analyst Imtiaz Gul.
“They have created a facade of a strategic partnership between the US and Pakistan but it will largely remain a transactional relationship, and this will continue,” said Gul.
Masood agreed. “One single incident showed the fragility of the relationship. As of now everyone thinks it is primarily based on Afghanistan,” he said. “It would require a sustained relationship for quite some time for people to think otherwise. But American and Western interests in this region will not go away”. afp
Courtesy www.dailytimes.com.pk