ISLAMABAD: The state-sponsored terrorism of the Indian government in Pakistan has been exposed by the United States-based publication, Washington Post.
In a report, the newspaper alleged that the Indian intelligence agency RAW (Research and Analysis Wing) carried out the targeted assassination of about half a dozen in Pakistan.
The killing was carried out through hired assassins using Afghan weapons similar to the method used to assassinate Khalistan separatists in the United States and Canada, the US newspaper disclosed on Tuesday.
The report quoted an identified official as saying the killings in Pakistan were carried out not by Indian citizens but by Pakistani petty criminals or hired shooters from Afghanistan.
According to the Washington Post, in 2024, Indian National Security Advisor Ajit Doval said, “It is unrealistic to attack Pakistan, but we can use covert means to achieve our objectives.”
In April 2024, Amir Sarfraz, also known as Tamba, was shot and injured in Lahore, the report said, adding that the incident was part of a broader Indian covert assassination campaign, similar to operations in other countries.
The Indian agency avenged the “beating of an Indian intelligence agent to death inside a Lahore prison in 2011” by Amir Sarfraz, who was released, and cleared of charges, said the report.
RAW believed that Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency “had hired Tamba to carry out the jailhouse murder.”
In another assassination in 2022, Zahoor Mistry was killed, who was said to have murdered an Indian passenger during the hijacking of an Indian Airlines flight in 1999, The Washington Post report said.
The publication, quoting unidentified Pakistani officials, said that a woman who called herself Tanaz Ansari was involved in the operation to kill Mistry. To track the victim, the woman allegedly hired two Pakistanis and two Afghan citizens to shoot him.
Furthermore, three others from South East Asia, Africa, and West Asia were also hired to send at least $5,500 to those involved in the killing.
The report also brought to light the killing of Pakistani citizens Muhammad Riaz and Maulana Shahid Latif. The alleged mastermind of the 2016 Pathankot attack Shahid Latif was shot in the Pakistani district of Sialkot in October 2023.
The Washington Post report claimed that a group of men led by a labourer named Muhammad Umair had shot Latif.
Later, it added, Umair was arrested. After previous such attempts failed, he was said to have admitted that he had been sent from Dubai to kill Latif. Umair also allegedly disclosed the location of a safe house in Dubai, as per the newspaper.
India’s foreign ministry declined to give a response to the allegations made in The Washington Post report. Indian authorities have neither confirmed nor denied their role in specific assassinations in the past, however, stated that such killings were not part of official policy.
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