Author: Aamir Latif
Publication: The Washington Times
Date: November 27, 2002
URL: http://www.washtimes.com/world/20021127-24240168.htm
The FBI has organized some former
Pakistani army officers and others into a band known as the "Spider Group"
to locate Taliban and al Qaeda fugitives hiding in tribal areas along the
Afghanistan border.
A federal law-enforcement official
in Washington said yesterday that the move marked an attempt by the FBI
to develop a "free flow of information" to U.S. agents who previously had
worked under some restrictions with Pakistan's official Inter-Services
Intelligence agency.
The ISI had deep and long-standing
ties to the Taliban and is believed by many to remain beyond the control
of the central government in Islamabad.
The Spider Group consists largely
of retired officers of Pakistan's army, some of whom had reached the rank
of brigadier and colonel, say law- enforcement authorities in Washington
and sources in Pakistan familiar with the operation.
Most of those involved have had
a long experience dealing with Afghanistan, going back to the U.S.-backed
war against the Soviets in the 1980s and as recently as the period of Taliban
rule, from the mid-1990s until last year.
The new group is based in the Pakistani
border city of Peshawar, a gateway to Afghanistan.
It is charged with tracking the
activities and movement of Taliban and al Qaeda outfits that operate in
a largely autonomous belt of tribal areas nearby.
Sympathy for the Taliban and its
brand of Islam is widespread in Pakistan's Northwest Frontier province,
of which Peshawar is the capital.
Candidates of the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal
(MMA), a coalition of six militant anti-Western Islamic parties, won a
majority in the province's legislature in recent elections.
Some of those elected to the provincial
assembly taught Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar and other top Taliban
officials. The provincial assembly's new leaders have vowed to block the
FBI from carrying out its mission, saying they want to hunt for the Taliban
and al Qaeda themselves.
Initially, the Spider Group was
assigned to keep an eye on public gatherings and seminars involving the
MMA, especially the leaders of the Jamiat-e-Ulema Islam (JUI) party, which
is especially close to Taliban leaders.
The FBI fears that the provincial
MMA-led government will give the Taliban and al Qaeda the freedom to meet,
recruit members and plan attacks against pro-Western targets.
The FBI also believes that fugitive
Islamists from Afghanistan are hiding in a network of madrassas, or religious
schools, that are operated by the JUI.
Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf
denies that the schools harbor terrorists or that the ISI is beyond his
control. He has said his government will not allow anyone to challenge
its participation in the U.S.-led war against terrorism.
The Spider Group has also been asked
to recruit locals in Pakistan's tribal areas, where hundreds of wanted
terrorists are holed up under the patronage of tribal chiefs.
Despite a sizable Pakistani army
presence in those areas, they are considered havens for Taliban and al
Qaeda fugitives.
Members of the Spider Group, a mix
of Muslim and Christian retired army and intelligence officers, have been
trained and equipped by the FBI, and, sources in Pakistan say, all have
command of the Pashto language spoken in the region. They have also hired
Arabic translators.
Active Pakistani intelligence officials
have begun monitoring Spider Group members, and their presence in army
receptions and ceremonies has been banned. Pakistani intelligence operatives
have also been directed not to have meetings with the group members.
The FBI decided to set up the Spider
Group after it concluded that "lack of cooperation" from the ISI made it
impossible to hunt down Taliban and al Qaeda fugitives in the tribal areas,
the sources said.
The FBI found that the ISI helped
several Taliban and al Qaeda fugitives escape to Iran after the military
campaign in Afghanistan last year.
The FBI believes the ISI might still
be helping fugitives by providing authorities with a steady flow of incomplete
information.
An ISI spokesman would neither confirm
nor deny the existence of the Spider Group.
"I have heard about it; however,
I cannot comment on that without any concrete information," said the spokesman,
who spoke on the condition of anonymity. He also denied that the FBI had
ever expressed no confidence in information or hints provided by Pakistan's
intelligence agency.
"Pakistani secret agencies are completely
following the government policy vis-a-vis the war against terrorism and
the recent arrests of al Qaeda leaders from Pakistan," the spokesman said.
Two top al Qaeda operatives have
been arrested in Pakistan, both outside the tribal areas. In September,
U.S. and Pakistani authorities captured Ramzi Binalshibh, believed to be
a planner of the September 11 attacks, in Karachi. In March, al Qaeda financier
Abu Zubaydah was arrested in the Pakistani city of Faisalabad.
(Jerry Seper contributed to this
report in Washington.)
