India is no longer big threat to us, says EX-ISI chief

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s former spy master Lt Gen (retd) Asad Durrani has said that India is no longer a big threat to Pakistan, as it has got itself entangled in a mess created by the illegal annexation of the disputed Himalayan region of Jammu and Kashmir.

“Ater what India did to the occupied Kashmir, there is no threat to us on the eastern border. We should not lower our guard against a Balakotlike misadventure though, but they [Indian] are so caught up in their own mess that they have litle time to care about Pakistan,” Durrani told BBC Urdu in an interview.

Indian warplanes carried out a ‘botched airstrike’ in the Balokot area of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) in the dead of night in February 2019. The Pakistan Air Force (PAF) retaliated in broad daylight by carrying out precision strikes deep inside occupied Kashmir and then shot down two Indian jets that chased them into Azad Kashmir.

“India has not always been the biggest threat to us,” added Durrani, who had ruffled some feathers in 2018 by co-authoring a book, Spy Chronicles: RAW, ISI and the Illusion of Peace with Indian RAW’S former chief AS Dulat which stirred up a controversy that haunts him till this day.

Of late, his second book, Honour among Spies, brought him back into the spotlight by resurrecting the controversy set off by his first book.

Elaborating on the internal challenges facing the country, Durrani said Pakistan is facing three types of challenges: economy, political instability, and social cohesion. There are some areas like Balochistan where there is unrest among people who feel politically alienated and deprived. The economy is in bad shape. The government’s credibility is bad because people believe it has been brought into power by the military.”

He believes Pakistan is facing inherent internal problems, including the most dangerous one. “If you ask me challenges from outside, I would say Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey pose new challenges,” he added.

Durrani also said that military’s interference in the country’s political affairs was a reality but detrimental to the country.