The testimony of Mansoor Ijaz, US national and lead witness in the memogate affair, submitted by Ijaz’s counsel Akram Sheikh to the Memo Commission, is almost identical to the affidavit submitted to the Supreme Court (SC).
Sources said the witness statement comprises Ijaz’s claims and does not contain ‘incontrovertible’ evidence of Husain Haqqani’s link to the memo Mansoor Ijaz sent to US Admiral Mike Mullen through former National Security Adviser James Jones. Sources said Mansoor Ijaz, in the testimony, made clear that the only alleged link between Haqqani and the memo are handwritten notes made by Ijaz of a telephone conversation with the ambassador. Sources said none of the text messages and BBMs included in the affidavit directly referred to the memo. They said most BBMs are timed and dated after the email delivery time of the memo to James Jones, with an overwhelming majority of BBMs sent from Ijaz to Haqqani suggesting Ijaz might have been creating a trail of BBMs to be use at a later date as circumstantial evidence. However, sources said there is no BBM or email from Haqqani to Ijaz written before the writing and sending the memo on 9th May 2011 that asks Ijaz to write and send the memo and prove that the memo was Haqqani’s idea.
According to the Communications log provided in the witness statement, Haqqani only made two short phone calls of less than 2 minutes each to Mansoor Ijaz, which support Haqqani’s version that he kept in touch with Mansoor Ijaz as a courtesy. The flow of communications suggests Mansoor Ijaz is the one who was eager to communicate with Haqqani. The alleged transcripts of text messages and BBM conversations establish communication between Haqqani and Ijaz but do not shed any light on the memo. Ijaz accepts in his statement that he drafted the memo albeit with ‘content originating from phone conversation with Haqqani.’ But Haqqani has denied having anything to do with the memo.
Mansoor Ijaz included the text of his email to Gen. James Jones. In it he says, “I am attaching herewith a document that has been prepared by senior active and former Pakistani government officials, some of whom served at the highest levels of the military-intelligence directorates in recent years and as senior political officers of the civilian government.” Unlike in his October 10 Financial Times oped, Ijaz does not say the document comes from “a senior diplomat.” Legal experts believe that this gives weight to Gen Jones’ version of events given in his affidavit, where he says Mansoor Ijaz never mentioned Haqqani as the source of the memo.
Although Mansoor Ijaz’s statement speaks of Ijaz’s relations with Haqqani, it supports Haqqani’s version of the relationship. There are sporadic email contacts and references to no more than 4 in-person meetings, including a charity event in New York in 2009. There is, however, acknowledgment of closer ties with the military-intelligence establishment. All of Ijaz’s trips to Pakistan in the last few years were to meet Pakistani establishment officials.
No ‘smoking gun’ in Mansoor Ijaz testimony
