Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: We feel ashamed as a nation over the episode of the release of Raymond Davis, as various personalities fulfilled their commitments with others by putting aside national interest, Foreign Minister Khawaja Asif told the Upper House on Friday.

Speaking during the Senate session, the minister said that he would stand with parliament if it wanted to investigate the Raymond Davis case.

He said that raising the Davis issue only for point scoring would not be constructive for the country. He said both an in-camera session or a public inquiry in the case would be beneficial for the nation.

Parliament should look into the matter of how the nation’s honour was compromised, he said, adding that it (Senate) should also ascertain whether decisions on the Davis case were made by institutions or individuals. “I don’t think any institution was involved in the case. People may have their personal interests attached to it,” he said, adding that to strengthen their position, some people may have played their role to fulfil their international commitments.

Khawaja Asif informed the House that the Pakistani government paid money to free Davis after a deal was struck between his victims’ heirs and the government. “Only God knows from where the money was taken… to free him,” he said.
Davis, a CIA operative who sparked a diplomatic row after gunning down two men in the streets of Lahore in January 2011, recently penned his side of the story for the first time in a memoir titled “The Contractor: How I Landed in a Pakistani Prison and Ignited a Diplomatic Crisis”.

According to Davis, then US secretary of state John Kerry, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz chief Nawaz Sharif, then president Asif Zardari, then ISI chief Lt Gen Ahmed Shuja Pasha and then envoy to US Hussain Haqqani helped in his release from the Kot Lakhpat Jail.

Apart from the ISI chief, several other officials of the intelligence agency were present in the court at the time of his release, he had claimed in his book. Davis became the centre of controversy in Pakistan moments after local police registered a case against him on the charges of killing two Pakistani men at Qurtaba Chowk in downtown Lahore in January 2011. A third Pakistani man was struck and killed by a vehicle that was reportedly racing to Davis’ aid.

Published in Daily Times, August 26^th 2017.