Reacting to Husain Haqqani’s decision to resign as Pakistan’s ambassador to Washington, Pakistani-American businessman Mansoor Ijaz, the central character in the ‘memogate’ scandal, said on Tuesday that he respected Haqqani’s decision and welcomed the announcement that the controversy would be investigated at the highest level, Geo News reported. Ijaz said Pakistani agencies had asked him to cooperate in uncovering the truth and he was certain that the agencies’ information had played an important role in the events that had taken place.
He said he would be willing to help in the investigation if the Pakistan government contacted him. He said he had been told in October to help the agencies with the evidence he had at hand. Born in 1961, Ijaz is an American businessman of Pakistani ancestry. He is an investment banker and media commentator, mostly in relation to Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan. He is the founder and chairman of Crescent Investment Management (LLC), a New York investment partnership since 1990 that includes retired General James Alan Abrahamson, former director of President Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative. Ijaz has had ties to former CIA Director James Woolsey. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Mansoor Ijaz was born in Tallahassee, Florida and grew up on a farm in rural Virginia. He received his bachelor’s degree in nuclear physics from the University of Virginia in 1983 and master’s degree in mechanical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1985. His father, Dr Mujaddid Ahmad Ijaz, was a theoretical physicist who played a major role in nuclear deterrence development throughout 1970s and 1980s. Ijaz developed CARAT, a currency, interest rate and equity risk management system. Away from Crescent’s daily business affairs, Ijaz serves on the College Foundation Board of Trustees at the University of Virginia and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
He used to appear regularly on a variety of financial and political news programs for CNN, Fox News, BBC, Germany’s ARD TV, Japan’s NHK, ABC [disambiguation needed] and NBC. He has commented for PBS’ News-hour with Jim Lehrer and ABC News Nightline with Ted Koppel. He has also contributed to the editorial pages of London’s Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, The International Herald Tribune, Newsweek International, The Christian Science Monitor, The Weekly Standard, National Review, USA Today, and the Times of India. He endorsed views in the period prior to the Iraq War, later proven to be false, that included the presence of WMDs in Iraq and ties between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda. Among other topics, he commented on the Osama bin Laden and Nuclear Proliferation
Iran Nuke Exclusive: In 2006, in an interview with Gulf News, he made the world exclusive claim that Iran already had a nuclear bomb and that US think-tanks were already formulating strategies to overthrow the Iranian Government
International negotiator: Mansoor Ijaz has been involved in unofficial negotiations between US and Sudanese governments with regard to extradition of Osama bin Laden. In 1996 the United States Congress had imposed sanctions against the Sudanese government over the terrorist operations on its soil.
Haqqani’s nemesis welcomes resignation
