month-old civilian government has disbanded the political wing of the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) to concentrate its focus on counter-terrorism, the foreign minister said on Sunday. The move, which Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi described as a “positive development,” may have far reaching effects on the country's politics and democratic set-up, Dawn newspaper said. “ISI is a precious national institution and it wants to focus fully on counter-terrorism activities,” the Associated Press of Pakistan quoted Qureshi as saying. It had become common knowledge that the so-called “political wing”, whose existences was otherwise never officially acknowledged, was manned by a brigadier, two colonels and a number of other junior military and civil officials, who would now be absorbed in other departments of the agency, Dawn said. Although the “wing” was associated with several controversial activities in the past, including the creation of an anti-Benazir Bhutto alliance in 1988, more recently it played a vital role in the 2002 general elections and helped the then president Pervez Musharraf in fulfilling his political objectives and formation of a coalition government with new factions of PML, the paper said. Dawn said the decision to disband the political wing was taken by the ISI and it was conveyed to the political leadership of the country with an advisory that that the agency should not be approached for any political motive. The report did not say when the decision was taken.
