Pakistan mission supporting separatists for Kashmir unrest: NIA
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) on Friday alleged that the "Pakistan High Commission is supporting separatists to create unrest in (the Kashmir) valley".
"Role of Pakistan High Commission in supporting the separatist and other networks through transfer of funds via financial conduits and in providing directions to continue the unrest in the Kashmir Valley has also been clearly established," a statement from the agency said.
The agency earlier in the day filed a charge sheet against five accused in the terror funding case involving 26/11 mastermind Hafiz Saaed.
The charge sheet named Yasin Malik as well as the founder and President of the Jammu and Kashmir Democratic Freedom Party Shabir Shah, Dukhtaran-e-Millat chief Asiya Andrabi, All Party Hurriyat Conference General Secretary Masarat Alam and former MLA Rashid Engineer.
The agency has also claimed that it has recovered some videos wherein the said accused persons were seen, exhorting general public for illegal acts, sympathising with the militants and seeking direct support from Pakistan.
"Various incriminating chats and emails have been recovered from the email accounts of Yasin Malik and Shabir Shah wherein description of receipt of funds from Pakistan and various other countries have been revealed. It has also been found that Yasin Malik has been getting funds from foreign countries through hawala channels for causing unrest and insurgency in Kashmir," the NIA said.
The agency further states that it has recovered suffiencent evidence against suspected terrorist Masarat Alam.
"Investigations have also established the nexus of Aasiya Andrabi, leader of proscribed organization Dukhtaran-e-Millat with different militant and terrorist organizations and with hawala financial conduit Zahoor Watali," the statement said.
The agency also claimed that the role of Engineer Rashid in the alleged conspiracy to destabilize Kashmir and cause unrest has also been revealed.
Submitting the charge sheet, the agency said fresh material have surfaced in the form of social media evidence, call records, oral and documentary evidence.
"New material shows the relationship of the persons chargesheeted with the cross border accused Hafiz Saeed (co-founder of Lashkar-e-Taiba and the chief of Jama'at-ud-Da'wah) and Syed Salahudeen (the head of Hizb-ul-Mujahideen)," said the NIA.
The court will take cognizance of the matter on October 23.
The NIA in 2017 arrested several separatists belonging to the two factions of Hurriyat Conference led by Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Syed Ali Shah Geelani, respectively, for terror funding.
In its first charge sheet filed last year, the agency named Geelani's son-in-law Altaf Fantosh, Kashmiri businessman Zahoor Ahmed Shah Watali, Naeem Khan, Raja Mehrajudin Kalwal, Bashir Ahmed Bhat, alias Peer Saifullah, Aftab Hilali Shah, alias Shahid ul Islam, Farooq Ahmed Dar, alias Bitta Karate, Mohammad Akbar Khandey, alias Ayaz Akbar and Javed Ahmed Bhat, among others.
The NIA had registered the case in May 2017 against various separatist leaders who were acting in connivance with terrorist organisations like Hizb-ul-Mujahideen (HM), Dukhtarane Millat, and Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) for collecting funds through illegal means for funding terrorist activities and stone pelting in Jammu and Kashmir.
