Trump campaign under fire for ISI links
Donald Trump's presidential campaign has come under fire after it emerged that his campaign aide Paul Manafort had links to Pakistan's intelligence service ISI. The reports deal a severe blow to Trump's campaign after recent revelations showed that ISI may have sponsored the 2009 Camp Chapman bombings that killed 7 CIA officers in Afghanistan. Neither Trump nor his campaign managers commented on the matter.
The Inter Services Intelligence is Pakistan's external intelligence agency. It was established in 1948 and from its inception, the agency has been headed by a 3 star officer in the Pakistan Army, being the biggest segment of Pakistan armed forces. The cadre are recruited from Pakistan's Air Force, Navy and Army and also include civilian agents and local police officers.
In 2009, the CIA recruited Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, a Jordanian doctor to help them infiltrate Al-Qaeda networks in Pakistan. He was turned by the Haqqani network, funded by Pakistan's ISI, who convinced him to blow himself up at Camp Chapman in 2009, killing 7 CIA officers. Declassified NSA documents revealed Haqqani and Salar were provided $200,000 by ISI to enable the attack on Chapman.
The Haqqani network, which has the backing of elements within the Pakistani security establishment is a guerilla insurgent group using asymmetric warfare to fight against US-led NATO forces and the government of Afghanistan. Camp Chapman is a US base in Afghanistan.
The US funds Pakistan's intelligence and military because Pakistan serves as a frontline and supply chain for US interests in Afghanistan and Iran. In 2010, ISI was accused of funding the Afghan Taliban, even sponsoring attacks on US and Indian interests in Afghanistan. Wikileaks cables revealed that US authorities described the ISI as a "terrorist" organization on a par with al-Qaeda and the Taliban.
Manafort was an adviser to the presidential campaigns of Republicans Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole, George W. Bush, John Mcain, and is currently employed by the presidential campaign of Donald Trump.
Manafort was a registered lobbyist for the Kashmiri American Council (KAC), which the US justice department charged with operating covertly for the ISI. In 2011, the FBI arrested the council's director Syed Ghulam Nabi Fai, on charges that he ran the group on behalf of the ISI. Manafort's lobbying firm was allegedly paid over $4 million by the ISI through the KAC between 1990-95.
Gordon Kromberg, the assistant US attorney who prosecuted the case, said "The KAC was actually bankrolled by the ISI in order to deflect public attention away from the involvement of Pakistan in sponsoring terrorism in Kashmir and elsewhere."
