ISI Runs Own Foreign Policy, Has Links With Terrorists: Dunford

AVA- Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff told members of the Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee during a Congressional hearing that Pakistan’s ISI has connections with terrorist groups.

"I think it's clear to me that the ISI has connections with terrorist groups," Dunford said.

He was responding to a question from Senator Joe Donnelly.

Donnelly had asked Dunford if he thought the ISI was still helping the Taliban.

Over the past several years, Dunford said, the US has had a bilateral approach to trying to effect a change in Pakistan's behaviour.

In the meantime, US Secretary of Defence James Mattis also said that: "We have seen havens left to the terrorists' own devices. We have seen the government of Pakistan come down on terrorism, while ISI appears to run its own foreign policy.”

Mattis said acknowledging for the first time in a public domain that ISI runs its own policy and does not seem to be controlled by the federal government.

The strong statements on ISI and Pakistan from top officials of the Trump Administration came hours before the Pakistani Foreign Minister Khawaja Asif landed in Washington on a three-day visit.

Asif is scheduled to meet the Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and the National Security Adviser H R McMaster and address the think-tank community at the US Institute of Peace.

Mattis said US would try “one more time” to work with Pakistan in Afghanistan before President Donald Trump would turn to options to address Islamabad’s alleged support for militant groups.

 “We need to try one more time to make this strategy work with them, by, with and through the Pakistanis, and if our best efforts fail, the president is prepared to take whatever steps are necessary,” he said.

Mattis added that he would be traveling to Islamabad soon, but did not give more details.

When asked by a lawmaker whether revoking Pakistan’s major non-NATO ally status was amongst the options being considered to deal with Islamabad, Mattis said: “I am sure it will be.”

The US in 2012 designated the Pakistan-based Haqqani network as a terrorist organization.

The US will send about 3,500 additional troops to Afghanistan.

Dunford said that the current cost for the US in Afghanistan was about $12.5 billion a year, and the new strategy would cost an additional $1.1 billion.

This comes after US Defense Secretary James Mattis said Tuesday that the United States will soon decide whether to keep open a Taliban office in Qatar as his country steps up its Afghan war effort.

He added that he was looking at who represents the increasingly fractious insurgency.

“Secretary (of State Rex) Tillerson and I have been in contact on this issue three times in the past 10 days,” Mattis told a Senate hearing. “He is looking to make certain we have the right (Taliban representatives), so it’s just not an office in existence.”