Pakistan's envoy to U.S. quits over coup memo
Pakistan's envoy to U.S. quits over coup memo | Reuters
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Tue, Nov 22 19:41 PM EST
By Chris Allbritton
ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistan's ambassador
to the United States resigned on Tuesday, days
after a Pakistani-American businessman said the
envoy was behind a memo that accused the
Pakistani military of plotting a coup in May.
Envoy Husain Haqqani said in a Twitter message
that he had sent his resignation to the prime
minister. State television said his resignation had
been accepted.
"I have resigned to bring closure to this
meaningless controversy threatening our
fledgling democracy," he said in a statement
released after his resignation.
"I have served Pakistan and Pakistani democracy
to the best of my ability and will continue to do
so."
Businessman Mansoor Ijaz, writing in a column
in the Financial Times on October 10, said a
senior Pakistani diplomat had asked that a memo
be delivered to the Pentagon with a plea for U.S.
help to stave off a military coup in the days after
the May 2 U.S. raid that killed al Qaeda leader
Osama bin Laden.
Ijaz later identified the diplomat as Haqqani.
No evidence has emerged that the military was
plotting a coup and the Pentagon at the time
dismissed the memo as not credible. Haqqani
denies involvement in the memo. (http://
r.reuters.com/wes25s)
"I still maintain that I did not conceive, write or
distribute the memo," Haqqani told Reuters
shortly after he resigned. "This is not about the
memo," he continued. "This is about bigger
things."
He declined to comment further.
Haqqani's resignation followed a meeting with
Pakistan President Asif Zardari, the nation's
powerful army chief General Ashfaq Kayani and
its intelligence head, Lieutenant-General Ahmad
Shuja Pasha.
A spokesman for the prime minister's office said
Haqqani was asked to resign and there would be
an investigation into the memo.
Haqqani is a former journalist who covered
Afghanistan's civil war and later wrote a book on
the role of radical Islam and the military in
Pakistan.
With his crisp suits and colorful turns of phrase,
he has developed close ties with Washington's
top power brokers as Pakistan's envoy since
2008.
In the past year, he has sought to ease tempers
in both capitals and find common ground during
an extraordinarily tense period in U.S.-Pakistani
relations that included the bin Laden raid, the
jailing of a CIA contractor, and U.S. accusations
that Pakistan backed a militant attack on the U.S.
Embassy in Kabul.
He is close to Zardari but estranged from
Pakistan's military.
Tensions between Pakistan's civilian government
and military have bedeviled the nuclear-armed
South Asian country for almost its entire
existence, with the military ruling the country for
more than half of its 64-year history after a
series of coups.
Haqqani's resignation was seen by many
analysts as further weakening the civilian
government, which is already beset by
allegations of corruption and incompetence.
"They (the military) may expect much more
from the government, much more beyond the
resignation of Husain Haqqani, because they see
that everybody perceived to be involved in this
affair will be seen as anti-military and by
implication anti-state," said Imtiaz Gul, a security
analyst in Islamabad.
IMPACT ON U.S.-PAKISTAN TIES?
Haqqani's successor might include a diplomat
with a less complicated relationship with the
military, perhaps Pakistani Foreign Secretary
Salman Bashir or Pakistan's envoy to the United
Nations, Hussain Haroon.
"Whether Pakistan's people or its military will be
represented in DC will become evident when
Husain Haqqani's replacement is announced," Ali
Dayan Hasan, representative for Human Rights
Watch in Pakistan, said on Twitter.
Vali Nasr, a former senior State Department
official who worked on Pakistan, said the crux of
the affair was not Haqqani's role but whether
Zardari would come to be seen as having
directed the memo, which would imply the
president had gone outside Pakistan to request
urgent assistance against his own military.
"At what point would the issue escalate to
Haqqani was acting on Zardari's behest? That
would really create massive tension between the
military and Zardari."
Nasr said the issue would be unlikely to have a
major impact on the strained U.S.-Pakistan
relationship unless it seriously weakened or
toppled the civilian government.
As U.S. officials focus on thorny diplomatic and
security issues with Pakistan, Haqqani's
departure did not immediately make many
visible ripples in Washington. The State
Department said it had not been notified of
Haqqani's departure and the Pentagon declined
comment.
Democratic Senator John Kerry, who has been
heavily involved in U.S.-Pakistani relations, said
he was sorry to learn of Haqqani's resignation.
Kerry said he respected the Pakistani
government's decision but that Haqqani would
be missed "as we continue to work through the
ups and downs of our relationship."
Ijaz said initially he believed Haqqani was acting
under the authority of Zardari, but said later he
was not sure how involved Zardari was in the
affair.
Mark Siegel, a lobbyist who represents the
Pakistani government in Washington, said
Zardari called him when the Financial Times
story appeared, asking his law firm to initiate libel
proceedings against the newspaper and Ijaz.
Siegel advised Zardari against filing a case
because he judged it difficult for a public figure to
win a libel case in a U.S. court.
"He was irate and said the memo was a total
fabrication," Siegel said. Siegel, who has known
Zardari for 25 years, said he was absolutely
certain that Zardari had known nothing about the
memo.
