ISLAMABAD, May 29: President Gen Pervez Musharraf did not say that Iran was very anxious to acquire a nuclear bomb, foreign office spokesman Jalil Abbas Jilani categorically stated here on Sunday. “The president has not been quoted correctly,” the spokesman said when Dawn sought his confirmation on President Musharraf’s reported comment on Tehran’s nuclear ambition in an interview with Germany’s Der Spiegel weekly.
The German weekly had quoted the president as saying: “I do not know. They are very anxious to have the bomb,” when apparently asked how to prevent Iran from developing a military nuclear programme. The interview was published on Saturday.
According to the spokesman, when President Musharraf was asked if Iran was anxious to obtain a nuclear bomb, the president merely repeated the question posed to him and then said: “I don’t know.” The spokesman expressed his disappointment at the wrong attribution of the statement on a sensitive issue to President Musharraf.
In this context he underlined that Pakistan had always supported an EU-Iran dialogue and peaceful resolution of Tehran’s nuclear programme issue. In the interview to the German weekly President Musharraf had reportedly opposed a preventive war against Iran and warned that it could be disastrous.—Q.A.
Agencies add: President Musharraf said a pre-emptive war against Tehran would lead to “a disaster considering the current state of the world”.
“It would provoke a rebellion in the Muslim world. Why open up new fronts?” he was quoted by the magazine as saying. He insisted that Pakistan, which already has nuclear weapons, was against proliferation.
Replying to a question, President Musharraf said the desecration of the Holy Quran and prisoner abuse cases were a matter of great concern for every Muslim individual and states.
When asked whether anti-American feelings were still on the rise in Pakistan, he said: “We have a strategic direction that does not get affected.”
The president said that an organization like Al Qaeda was well-knit around the world and all other terrorist groups had joined them in Iraq with an interest to attack the US forces or Western forces.
When pointed out that Pakistani forces had often been criticized by the West for going after Osama bin Laden half-heartedly, he said: “I’m very annoyed frankly and pose a question as to who has been fighting Al Qaeda other than Pakistan?”
“It is only Pakistan which has eliminated over 700 terrorists from cities and over 300 to 400 from the mountains,” he said, adding that during the war in Afghanistan Al Qaeda shifted to Pakistan and security forces killed something like over 200 or 250 of them in the initial stage.
While sketching the origin of terrorists, he said mainly foreigners, non-Afghan, non-Pakistanis, who came into this part of the world during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan for 10 years were brought inside by the US, by the West and thus a ‘Jihad’ started there.
He noted that all these people shifted their bases into Pakistani cities and into mountains and “we got over 700, which included all the important figures like Khalid Al Sheikh and Abu Obaida”.
About harbouring foreign militants, he said some people had a religious motivation to provide shelter to them. Others simply did it for money. They were charging thousands of dollars from them and the terrorists had access to money, he observed.
About terrorists’ communications system, he said they stopped talking on the phone, they started contact by couriers. The last one that was caught was the third-in-charge, Abu Faraj Al Libbi. He was in the mountains.
“They were running the whole show through a courier system and this was the first time we broke into it. We caught about 14 couriers. And the ISI keeps telling me that they have earned about $30 million bounty money in one week,” he added.
About Osama bin Laden, the president said: “…yes, he is alive. He is probably in the border belt, where it is so easy to shift to either side. Then there are some areas where there are no operations, so maybe he could shift there.” About American troops’ presence in Pakistan, he said this was intelligence work rather than operational.
Dear visitor, the comments section is undergoing an overhaul and will return soon.