Washington: After recent terrorist attacks in the West, the United States has increased pressure on Pakistan to prevent certain outfits from collecting donations inside the country.
The sources also said that three organisations — Falah Insanyet, Ganj Madressah and Lashkar-e-Taiba/Jamaatud Dawa — topped the US list. All three have been declared terrorist outfits by the US State Department as well as the United Nations.
“The pressure to prevent these three groups from collecting donations has always been there but has increased after the recent attacks,” said a diplomatic source.
At a recent congressional hearing, Special US Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard G. Olson told lawmakers that terrorism had always been at the centre of dialogue between the United States and Pakistan.
“There was no conversation that I had with the security establishment in Pakistan that did not include a very direct, very frank discussion about, specifically the Haqqani network, but also the Taliban in general,” he said.
When Chief of Army Staff Gen Raheel Sharif visited Washington last month, US officials raised this issue with him.
After the COAS’s meeting with the acting US national security adviser and his senior staff, army spokesman Lt Gen Asim Saleem Bajwa told reporters that the two sides had also discussed “measures to choke terrorists financing”.
But the Americans raised this issue more forcefully when Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif came to Washington for a meeting with US President Barack Obama in October this year.
Four days before the PM’s visit, US Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Adam J. Szubin invited the Pakistani ambassador, Jalil Abbas Jilani, to his office to discuss the issue.
Mr Szubin informed the ambassador that US Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew would raise this issue with the prime minister as well.
In another meeting with Pakistani officials, US Deputy Assistant Secretary for Terrorist Financing Jennifer Fowler even talked about animal hides that some of these groups collected during Eidul Azha.
The Americans also complain that whenever they raise this issue at the UN, China uses its influence as a permanent member of the UN Security Council to prevent the world body from taking any action. “The Americans believe that the Chinese do so to please Pakistan,” a diplomatic source said.
Pakistani officials, however, point out that they have already taken a number of steps, which includes making new laws to stop terrorist financing.
“But they also remind Americans that most of the groups on their list are based in Afghanistan, not Pakistan,” another source said. “There are less than 50 money changing companies in Pakistan while Afghanistan has more than 500. Unless they too are targeted, this problem will not disappear.”
