Pakistan : Hamid Gul terms arrest reports as non-sense

Rawalpindi—Former Inter-Services-Inetlligence chief Hamid Gul on Sunday dismissed as “nonsense” reports that Pakistan has agreed to arrest and hand him over to India in connection with the probe into the Mumbai terror attacks.

“It is nonsense, it is disinformation because (Secretary of State) Condoleezza Rice and America want my name to be included,” Gul told a private Indian channel from Rawalpindi.

He was reacting to a Washington Post report that said Pakistan has agreed to a 48-hour timetable set by India and US to take action against Lashkar-e-Taiba and arrest at least three Pakistanis believed to be linked to the Mumbai attacks.

Citing a top unnamed Pakistani official, the Post said among the people India asked Islamabad to arrest and handover is the former ISI Director Gul.

“The US doesn’t like this loud voice in which I condemn them, their aggression, their oppression, their invasion over Afghanistan and lies in Iraq.

I expose them, their 9/11 was a fraud, it was an inside job,” he told NDTV.

“I want to say to the Indian public and the Indian leadership please don’t fall into their trap, look at what they have done to us, they are deceitful and they will use you for their own purpose,” he said.

On his links with the Pakistani spy agency, Gul said: “I left the ISI 20 years ago ... I have no contact with ISI.”

The former ISI head claimed that the US now wanted Indian troops to be “committed” to Afghanistan “because they have run short of their own troops and NATO is pulling out.”

Asked whether he will cooperate with India in probe into the deadly attacks, Gul said he is ready to help if his government tells him to do so.

However, he said New Delhi should show “more sagacity” in dealing with Islamabad.—Online