Author: Ranvir Nayar/ Paris
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: May 8, 2003
A renowned French thinker and writer
has challenged Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf's claim of being in
total control of his country's nuclear arsenal and says there is a real
risk that such weapons may find their way to terrorist organisations like
Al-Qaeda.
Bernard Henri Levy, also known by
his initials BHL, says the terrorists could lay their hands on the nuclear
weapons in Pakistan since Pakistan's secret service, the Inter-Services
Intelligence (ISI), is continuing its collaboration with the Al-Qaeda and
other Islamic terrorist groups.
In his latest book, Levy - who has
also served as a special envoy to President Jacques Chirac - has stirred
a hornet's nest with a string of serious accusations against not just ISI,
but the entire administration of General Musharraf.
Entitled Qui a tue Daniel Pearl
(Who killed Daniel Pearl), the book has been right at the top of best selling
books in France, since it was released three weeks ago. Levy says he spent
over a year researching the latest book, with long sojourns in Karachi,
Kandahar, Islamabad, New Delhi, London and Washington. In the book, Levy
says that Pearl was kidnapped and killed, because he was on the verge of
establishing the existence of an extensive network linking ISI and Al-Qaeda.
He said Pearl had been working on a report that showed that ISI was actually
sharing the nuclear capability of Pakistan with Al-Qaeda and other rogue
groups.
"They knew that he was close to
finishing the report and that he was on to something so big that threatened
to unravel the whole structure of terrorism in Pakistan. That is why Pearl
was kidnapped and later killed in such a barbarous manner," says Levy.
He says that in his investigation,
during which he met hundreds of people in various cities, he found that
several top nuclear scientists of Pakistan had been in close contact with
the terror groups. He says that though the general keeps on claiming to
be in total control of the situation in Pakistan, it is far from true.
"The Western intelligence agencies
are getting so desperate that they are actually willing to believe that
Musharraf has much more influence on events in Pakistan than he actually
wields," says BHL, adding that even Musharraf's claim of being in total
control of the nuclear weapons of his country was highly dubious since
ISI has consistently misinformed the general.
"For instance, the day Pearl was
murdered, Musharraf was boasting at a press conference in New York that
he had been told that Pearl would be found and released in a matter of
hours," Levy said. "This was an extremely embarrassing moment for Musharraf,
but it shows the extent to which ISI can mislead the government in Pakistan,"
he says.
Levy said that his primary object
in writing the book was to find out why Pearl had been killed. "I wanted
to reconstruct the entire series of events that led to his death. Who did
he meet, what had he learnt, why did he board the car with a group of strangers
who were waiting for him? From here, I wanted to find out everything else
about the possessed men who can do such horrible things," says Levy.
Ever since the book hit the stands,
it has generated a lot of interest in France and other European countries,
where Levy has been invited on various television shows to discuss his
book and the implications of the allegations that he makes about the real
situation in Pakistan.
BHL is not a stranger to South Asia,
in fact, he has long been following the developments in the South Asian
region, where he first got involved during the Bangladesh's war of liberation,
for which he had signed up as a volunteer. After the independence of the
country, he wrote his first book on Bangladesh.
Ever since, Levy has returned several
times to the region, with his latest trip being in 2001 when he was sent
by President Chirac to Kabul as a special envoy to oversee restoration
of cultural heritage in the war-ravaged country.
(IANS)
