US Urges Pakistan on Militant Group

By Kathy Gannon
Associated Press Writer
Wednesday, Jan. 26, 2000; 5:58 a.m. EST

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan –– The United States wants Pakistan to shut down a militant Islamic group it believes may have been linked to last month's hijacking of an Indian Airlines plane.

The U.S. State Department says it has no evidence that Pakistan was involved in the hijacking that ended in southern Afghanistan on Dec. 31, but one of the groups linked to the hijacking is headquartered in Pakistan. Washington asked Pakistan to close down Harakat-ul-Mujahdeen.

But Pakistan has not agreed to any specific action, rebuffing requests made during a visit to the region by U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Karl Inderfurth.

"We hope that the government of Pakistan will take steps against such extremist groups which carry out acts of violence inside Pakistan, as well as in the region," Inderfurth said, specifically naming Harkat ul-Mujahedeen.

A spokesman for a sister organization, Harkat ul-Jehad, warned of violence if Pakistan tried to close the group's offices in Pakistan.

"We will not hesitate to take any action, and believe me there will be a free-for-all here in Pakistan. It will be anarchy," Abu Mahmood Ashraf said. He added that his group trains in Pakistan and Afghanistan to fight in Kashmir – the flashpoint of two wars between India and Pakistan – and "in other Muslim countries where Muslims are being attacked."

Inderfurth also pressed both Pakistan and Afghanistan's Taliban religious army to hand over suspected terrorist Osama bin laden, charged in the United States with masterminding the deadly bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998.

The Taliban's foreign minister, Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil, rejected the request for a trial of bin Laden either in the United States or a third country.

Ashraf called bin Laden a hero to Muslims worldwide.

"Any injury or his death would be a great shock to us, and we would not stop until we have severely punished the United States," he said.

India accuses Harkat ul-Mujahedeen of staging the Indian Airlines hijacking that ended with 155 hostages freed in exchange for the Indian government's release of three pro-Kashmiri prisoners, including one member of Harkat ul-Mujahedeen, Muslim cleric Maulana Masood Azhar.

President Clinton said Tuesday there was no evidence Pakistan supported the hijacking, which Pakistan strongly condemned again on Tuesday.

"The government of Pakistan regards the highjacking as abhorrent and is committed to prosecute any person or persons found and apprehended on our territory, or in Kashmir, who may be suspected of having committed that crime. If they are convicted, they will be subject to the death penalty," a spokesman for Pakistan's Foreign Ministry said.

U.S. State Department spokesman James P. Rubin cited concerns "that agencies of the Pakistani government have provided general support to a number of groups operating in Kashmir, including Harkat ul-Mujahedeen."

Two days before the Oct. 12 military coup that ended civilian rule in Pakistan, then-Interior Minister Shujaat Hussein told The Associated Press that militant Islamic groups were created by Pakistan, its military and its intelligence agency.

Hussein said his government had asked the Taliban to shut down camps in Afghanistan, where Pakistanis were receiving military training. While publicly denying the existence of these camps, Hussein said the Taliban privately promised Pakistan to close them.