The chief of Pakistan-based terrorist outfit Jaish-e-Mohammed, Maulana Masood Azhar, reportedly visited Kandahar in the third week of August after the Taliban wrested control of Afghanistan. The objective was to seek their support in raising terror temperature in Jammu and Kashmir, sources said.
Masood Azhar met Taliban leaders led by Abdul Ghani Baradar, the head of the political commission. The Jaish chief sought their help for escalating terror in the Kashmir Valley.
The Taliban and Jaish have deep relations, as they follow the Deobandi school of Sunni Islam. Interestingly, Masood Azhar was released from an Indian jail in exchange for the safety of passengers in the Indian Airlines flight IC 814, which had been hijacked by Pakistani terrorists and taken to Kandahar in 2002. The Taliban were in power back then.
Earlier, the Jaish chief had expressed happiness over the Taliban›s “victory” after they recaptured Kabul on 15 August. In his article, ‘Manzil Ki Taraf’ (Towards the destination) on 16 August, Masood Azhar applauded the “success of mujahideen” in Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, India is closely monitoring the situation in Afghanistan and is in touch with other countries as well, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson said on Friday as over 100 people were killed in Kabul blasts on Thursday.
“We are monitoring the situation in Afghanistan and are in touch with other countries, especially the US, as they are operating the Kabul airport,” MEA spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said during a weekly briefing on Friday. He added, “We have been seeking a peaceful, prosperous and democratic Afghanistan. We are currently monitoring it closely. The current focus is on the security situation of Afghanistan evacuations and seeing how it unfolds. Other countries are in the frame of wait and watch.”
He also said the Kabul attacks are a matter of concern and expressed condolences over the casualties.
Asked about the evacuations from Afghanistan, Bagchi said that so far India has evacuated over 550 people in six separate flights, either from Kabul or Tajikistan›s capital Dushanbe, of these, over 260 were Indians. New Delhi also facilitated the evacuation of Indian nationals through other agencies and is in touch with various countries, like the US, Tajikistan, Iran and others.
On Afghan nationals arriving in the country, he said that they will get a six-month visa and the government will “take it from there” as making long term plans have not been the «best of ideas» under the current circumstance.
This comes as the Union Home Ministry announced that all Afghan nationals must travel to India only using e-Visa given the current security situation in Afghanistan. “So they (Afghans) are currently coming here under the six-month visa regime. We will take it from there. That›s the current plan for six months. This is an evolving situation. Making long term plans have not been the best of ideas,” Bagchi said.
“We were moving to the e-Emergency visa system. It appears that all this could have led to some confusion, which led to the unfortunate incident of denial of entry to a particular Afghan national,” Bagchi said.
WITH AGENCY INPUTS