

Admiral Mike Mullen, Richard Holbrooke, Pakistani FM Shah Mahmood Qureshi

Daylife/AP Photo used by permission

ISLAMABAD: The United States has said that Afghan drug trade was not a major source of funding for militancy and extremism in Pakistan. The financing came from extremists’ patrons in Gulf countries — an aspect now being scrutinised, the statement added.

‘Private individuals who support extremists bring money in through illegal means … hawala system and the area focussed is the Gulf Cooperation Council countries,’ US Special Envoy…Richard Holbrooke told a media briefing at the American Embassy.

Mr Holbrooke…said it was ‘a very big issue’ and ‘the most troubling aspect of the entire situation.’

The US, he said, had started looking into the source of financing for the extremists and would be devoting more time to investigate it. He admitted that not much work was done in the past to explore this aspect.

However, he said the much-touted drug trade was not the main financing source for extremism. ‘Even if the drug trade stops it won’t have any significant impact.’

A significant difference in public analysis by the U.S. government. No doubt the Bush administration did little to analyze funding for the Taliban in either Afghanistan or Pakistan. Especially if there was any hint that his buddies in the Persian Gulf were involved.

Holbrooke is being careful, precise enough in his choice of words to confine his statement to “private individuals” being responsible for the flow of gold to the insurgency. Though, I doubt that any significant traffic through the wahala banking system goes unscrutinized by Saudi royals or UAE sheikhs.

Regardless – this extends the range of potentially “official” enemies to reactionary thugs in Gulf oil country.