Indians arrest alleged Pakistani military intelligence agent

The Uttar Pradesh police force announced earlier today that its Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) has arrested an alleged Pakistani Military Intelligence operative in Lucknow. The ATS has released the alias (Sikandar) of the alleged operative, whose name is Abdul Jabbar, which prompts observers to speculate that Jabbar’s arrest was part of an elaborate counterintelligence sting, possibly involving Indian moles inside Pakistani Military Intelligence. Jabbar, a resident of the Pakistani city of Karachi, was apparently arrested two years ago by Pakistani police on charges of drugs trading. He was then offered amnesty on condition of undertaking sensitive tasks on behalf of Pakistani intelligence services. He was trained for several months by the country’s Military Intelligence, with emphasis on Indian military installations. As is the case with numerous Pakistani covert agents operating in India, Jabbar flew last November from an unknown location (probably not Pakistan) to Nepal with false papers, and then made his way into India. He was allegedly communicating with his handlers in Pakistan through secure telephone and Internet communications. The ATS claims that Jabbar was caught with “secret information regarding Central command” in his possession. [IA]