Afghan parliamentarians on Saturday demanded a review of an agreement signed by Pakistan and Afghanistan for cooperation between their spy agencies, the Hindustan Times has reported.
According to a report on the newspaper’s website, Afghan lawmakers raised the issue in the House of Representatives and said the memorandum of understanding (Mo) between Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency and the Afghan National Directorate of Security (NDS) should be made public.
The report quoted parliamentarians as saying that the MoU’s contents need to be reviewed. They further said the House of Representatives has the right to demand an explanation regarding the pact, it quoted Khaama Press Agency.
The inking of the agreement was confirmed by Pakistan’s chief military spokesman, Major General Asim Bajwa on Twitter on May 18. Bajwa said the MoU covers intelligence sharing, complimentary and coordinated intelligence operations on both sides.
The Hindustan Times report claimed that an Afghan government source had told Radio Azadi that President Ashraf Ghani had decided, after a meeting with political leaders, to remove “disputed material” from the MoU. The report claimed that provisions related to training of Afghan personnel by the ISI, joint operations and opening of offices by the ISI and NDS in Kabul and Islamabad, respectively, will be dropped from the MoU.
Qazi Amin Waqad, a member of the Afghan High Peace Council, was quoted by Radio Azadi as saying that several leaders were opposed to the MoU labelling the Taliban as a “separatist movement”.
The Afghan president’s office and the NDS have defended the agreement, saying it was in line with the country’s national interests. The President’s spokesman Ajmal Abedi said similar agreements had been signed with Pakistan in the past, said the report.
The Hindustan Times report further claimed that the MoU has also led to differences between President Ghani and Chief Executive Officer Abdullah Abdullah, who reached a power-sharing arrangement to form a national unity government.
According to the report, Radio Liberty quoted an Afghan government official as saying that Abdullah considered the MoU “unacceptable” and had made his opposition known to Ghani and senior security officials. It said that Ghani and Abdullah camps held discussions on how to change the MoU during a meeting of the National Security Council on May 21.
Abdullah was angered at the “lack of transparency” in the MoU. He was also not aware that such an agreement had been signed, the government official said, according to the report.
Abdullah’s first vice president, Mohammad Khan, has said that Abdullah was “consulted only on the draft agreement, but he remained completely unaware of some articles which were included in the agreement later on”.
