By Arun Kumar, IANS,
Washington : Former chairman of US Joint Chiefs of Staff Mike Mullen has confirmed the existence of a secret memo alleged to have been sent by Pakistan President Zardari to him about a feared military takeover.
A Pakistani businessman Mansoor Ijaz alleged in a column in the Financial Times last month that a senior Pakistani diplomat asked for assistance in getting a message from Zardari to Mullen.
Ijaz alleged that Zardari feared a military takeover following the US raid that killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan in May and brought unprecedented public scrutiny on Pakistani leaders.
The Cable feature of Foreign Policy magazine Thursday reported that Captain John Kirby, who was Mullen’s spokesman until the admiral stepped down earlier this year, told it that Mullen now acknowledges that the Ijaz memo does exist – that he did receive it – but that he never paid any attention to it and took no follow up action.
“Adm. Mullen had no recollection of the memo and no relationship with Mr. Ijaz. After the original article appeared on Foreign Policy’s website, he felt it incumbent upon himself to check his memory. He reached out to others who he believed might have had knowledge of such a memo, and one of them was able to produce a copy of it,” Kirby was quoted as saying.
“That said, neither the contents of the memo nor the proof of its existence altered or affected in any way the manner in which Adm. Mullen conducted himself in his relationship with (Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ashfaq Parvez) Gen. Kayani and the Pakistani government. He did not find it at all credible and took no note of it then or later. Therefore, he addressed it with no one.”
(Arun Kumar can be contacted at [email protected])