Pakistan’s former Ambassador to the United States Husain Haqqani has initiated legal proceedings against The Nation newspaper of Pakistan, for calling him an American agent and saying he is a fugitive under Pakistan law.
According to a statement from Mr. Haqqani, his lawyer Yasser Latif Hamdani has sent a legal notice to The Nation asking for an apology and retraction of an offending article.
Failing this, Mr. Hamdani “would start legal proceedings not only in Pakistan but also in the U.K. and other jurisdictions where the newspaper’s online edition is read, seeking damages to the tune of Pakistan Rupees 15 billion [$ 95 million]”, Mr. Haqqani’s statement read.
Mr. Haqqani, who currently heads the South and Central Asia programme at the Hudson Institute, a Washington-based think-tank, was Pakistan’s Ambassador to the U.S. between 2008 and 2011.
He had resigned following his alleged involvement in a memo that was passed to then U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff Michael Mullen seeking American intervention to prevent the military from overthrowing the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) government. The incident came to be known as ‘memogate’.
Mr. Hamdani’s notice said that Mr. Haqqani “has always endeavoured lawfully and constitutionally to uphold democracy and civilian supremacy in Pakistan and that contrary to propaganda he had not been found guilty of any crime in any court of law”, as per the statement.
The article prompting Mr. Haqqani’s legal notice is attributed to Andrew Korybko, whose (non-verified) Twitter profile says he is a “Moscow-based political analyst”.
Mr. Korybko’s piece said Mr. Haqqani is likely a CIA agent. By Thursday morning (Washington DC time), the article was taken down from The Nation website.
