NIA gathers evidence of Pakistan’s involvement in Kashmir unrest
Live MintNew Delhi: The National Investigation Agency has gathered damning evidence of Pakistan’s involvement in the unrest in Kashmir with Masarat Alam, general secretary of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, confessing during custodial interrogation that “Pakistan-based agents route the funds through hawala operators” and this is then “transferred to separatist leaders, including Syed Ali Shah Geelani, chairman of the Hurriyat Conference”. On 30 May, the NIA had registered a case against terrorists of the Jammat-ud-Dawah, Duktaran-e-Millat, Lashkar-e-Toiba, and Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, as well as other separatist leaders in the Valley “for raising, receiving and collecting funds for funding separatist and terrorist activities in Jammu and Kashmir and entering into a larger conspiracy for causing disruption in Kashmir valley and for waging war against India”. “During interrogation, Yasin Malik revealed that he was instrumental in bringing together the disparate factions of the Hurriyat Conference and formed the joint resistance leadership, which spearheaded the violent agitations in 2016 in Kashmir valley by issuing protest calendars, which led to an economic shutdown for more than four months and also caused death and injuries to civilians and security forces during the violent protests,” the NIA said on Sunday, referring to the time following the elimination of separatist leader Burhan Wani in 2016. “Zahoor Ahmad Shah Watali, who was denied bail by an NIA court, is one of the main hawala conduits who used to generate and receive funds from Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence and had floated various shell companies to disguise foreign remittances for further transfer to separatist leaders and stone pelters in the Valley,” the NIA said.