By Asmat Zubair

ISLAMABAD: Although the focus so far in the media and the Supreme Court has been on the authenticity or otherwise of the text and BlackBerry messages allegedly exchanged between Mansoor Ijaz and Husain Haqqani, the real task of the memo commission might be to address the non-forensic questions about the origins of the memo.

According to legal experts who have read Mansoor Ijaz’s 81-page affidavit and additional submissions before the Supreme Court, his essential claim is that Husain Haqqani told him to write the memo in a telephone call from a London hotel. The rest of the material is included only to create the impression of close contacts between Ijaz and Haqqani and has no direct relevance to the memo.

As the Supreme Court heard arguments only about maintainability of the petitions about the memo, Haqqani’s lawyer Asma Jahangir was not allowed to make arguments about the substance of Mansoor Ijaz’s claim and point out the flaws in his story.

Careful reading of all the 89 texts and BBM messages submitted by Mansoor Ijaz shows that not once has Haqqani mentioned the memo in any of the alleged messages. Even if forensic evaluation determines that these messages were exchanged, Haqqani’s alleged connection to the memo still depends on Mansoor Ijaz’s claim of what was discussed in their phone call.

Although the DG ISI Lt General Ahmed Shuja Pasha found Mansoor Ijaz’s claim sufficiently reliable to demand a forensic inquiry, the judicial commission will have to address the political question of why Pasha and Mansoor Ijaz met on October 22 and why Mansoor Ijaz wrote the article in the Financial Times on October 10 that attracted the Pakistani military’s concerns leading to the Pasha-Ijaz meeting.

It is interesting to note that Ijaz says in his affidavit to the Supreme Court (Page 4), “At no time did I meet Haqqani in person” even though the very first Blackberry message sent by him to Haqqani on May 9, according to him, (Page 6 of affidavit) said, “I’m in Monaco but it’s no problem for me to fly up. Takes 90 minutes.” ….

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