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Afghanistan/South Asia
British attache removal - the honey in the honeypot
2005-08-23
The ISI agent involved in the honeypot trap has been outed.
She is Maria Kiani of the Institute of Strategic Studies Islamabad

This is her Photo

"Following nerve wrecking investigations of five days by this correspondent, a senior source at the Institute of Strategic Studies Islamabad has finally confirmed that one of their junior research fellows was the “julliet” behind the clumsy affair causing the British Military Attache to Islamabad lose his job and the grace of the prestigious service of Royal British Army.

Brigadier Andrew was removed from Islamabad in Jan this year as a result of internal investigations which concluded that the Brig had lost the confidence of the High Commission. The British Defence Ministry had announced that, “the decision was taken after Brigadier Andrew Durcan formed an “inappropriate relationship” with a suspected female Pakistani spy”. Durcan, 56, was living in Pakistan as single and according to reports was tricked into a close friendship by the arractive woman described as defence academic who is also believed to be undercover agent.

Pakistan’s capital has been in the grip of wild speculations about the identity of the “defence academic” and fingers were pointed towards some of respected and senior defence academics. "

Posted by:john

#4  thanks John for background.

What's your take...Was “julliet”[Maria Kiani] was an ISSI agent from the getgo, missioned to honey up Brigadier Andrew, or did the ISSI discover that the Brigadier had fallen into the pot with a Paki female academic and then recruit her to work for the Institute.
Posted by: Red Dog   2005-08-23 21:53  

#3  Row over the outing
Link to story

A section of the press had already vaguely reported about identity of the lady involved in the alleged platonic relationship with the British Brigadier. In fact, Dr Mazari should be thankful to the reporter, who, by pinpointing a particular lady, who may not necessarily be the person concerned, has put an end to wild guesses being made in the city about some of the known media-related female academics, including Dr Mazari herself, for being the lady in question.

While the DG ISS has every right to condemn or criticize the report, she has no right to cast aspersion on the integrity of a newspaper, whose commitment to Pakistan’s national interest has remained the only constant during its entire history of publication. Let us humbly state that, in our career as a publisher and editor, we have always upheld the national interest of Pakistan in highest esteem. We dare to claim that, barring any inadvertent lapse, we know better than Dr Mazari as to what the national interest of Pakistan means, and we do not need any sermon from Dr Sahiba in this regard.
Posted by: john   2005-08-23 20:23  

#2  Link to the original Sun story
Posted by: john   2005-08-23 20:16  

#1  Damage control from the Madam in charge of ISSI

ISS DG debunks British defence attaché scandal

She accused the British government of “defaming” the ISS because of articles she wrote criticising London for the recent laws it announced to curb extremism. “In the story the correspondent named the ISS and maligned an innocent young researcher here, with no grounding in reality,” Dr Mazari said.

Posted by: john   2005-08-23 18:34  

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