Pakistan hiring Lankan Muslims as spies spooks intelligence agencies - report
September 15, 2014 08:18 am
The
arrest of a third Sri Lankan spying on India on behalf of Pakistan in less than
10 months has got intelligence agencies to train their focus back on growing
radicalization among Tamil-speaking Muslims in eastern Sri Lanka where Pakistan
has been fishing for a long time, Indian Media reports.
Although
the latest Pakistani spy in the Indian net, Arun Selvarajan, is a Colombo-based
Tamil Hindu, two others arrested since April are Tamil-speaking Muslims
belonging to eastern Sri Lanka.
In
April, Intelligence Bureau arrested Sri Lankan national Sakir Hussain in
Chennai who revealed a Pakistani conspiracy to attack US and Israeli consulates
in Chennai with help from two Maldivian nationals. A month later, his associate
Mohammed Sulaiman, another Sri Lankan, was arrested in Malaysia on similar
charges. Both, like Selvarajan and Chennai-born Pakistani spy Thameem Ansari
(arrested in 2012), were recruited by Pakistani diplomat Amir Zubair Siddiqui
in Colombo.
Intelligence
sources say, there is information that not only is ISI regularly recruiting
youth from this troubled region of Sri Lanka for espionage and covert
operations against India but even LeT has set up a base and now wields some
sort of influence in the region.
“The region has been in some ethnic turmoil of late and
Pakistan has been fishing in troubled waters. For its intelligence-collection
and covert action operations directed against India, ISI uses four external
bases - Kathmandu, Dubai, Bangkok and Colombo. The last one has traditionally
been used as a base to collect intelligence about developments in sensitive
Indian nuclear and missile establishments, many of which are located in south
India, particularly in Tamil Nadu and Kerala. But the last few arrests show
that these elements could now be used to mount an attack. This is worrying,”
said a security establishment officer.
Notably, while Sakir Hussain was trying to help attack US
and Israeli consulates, Selvarajan had conducted reconnaissance of Kalapakkam
nuclear plant site, according to NIA.
Radicalization
in eastern Sri Lanka began way back in the 1980s when clashes with LTTE and
Tamils led to a section of Muslims gravitating towards fundamentalist forces.
Post Lanka-LTTE war, this radicalization is now being fuelled by increasing
attacks of triumphant Buddhist Sinhala groups on the religious minority, who
make 9.7% of Sri Lanka’s population.
There
have been a series of clashes between Buddhists and Muslims in the past couple
of years. A Muslim minister in Mahinda Rajapaksa’s government recently
criticized the regime for the clashes and warned it would lead to
radicalization. “A community pushed against the wall like this will suddenly
become a fertile ground for outside forces,” Sri Lanka’s justice minister Rauf
Hakeem was quoted by agencies as saying.
Ajai
Sahni of Institute for Conflict Management, however, says the situation is as
yet not as alarming for India vis-a-vis Sri Lanka as it is in context of
Maldives. “It is in Maldives where Pakistan has been most successful and that’s
where the real threat lies. In Sri Lanka, though there has been radicalization
since the 1980s, men from the region are being used for small spying activity
and help in reconnaissance. It is definitely one extra tool in Pakistan’s
terror box, but of limited value,” said Sahni.
Courtesy
– Times of India