SNEHESH ALEX PHILIP
The two Pakistan Army officers are a Lieutenant General, who was DGMO in 2011, and a Brigadier who served as the Pakistani Defence attache in Germany.
The Pakistan Army has sentenced a former Director General of Military Operations (DGMO) to life imprisonment for spying and ordered the death penalty for a brigadier and a civilian officer convicted in the same case.
The life term handed out to Lieutenant General Javed Iqbal (Retd), who was the DGMO during the infamous Raymond Davis episode in 2011, will keep him in prison for 14 years.
Brigadier Raja Rizwan (Retired) was sentenced to death alongside Wasim Akram, a civilian doctor employed by an army organisation.
While the Pakistan Army remained tightlipped on who they were spying for, sources told ThePrint that they were suspected to have been on the rolls of the United States’ foreign intelligence service, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
Pakistan Army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa has endorsed the death sentence to a “retired army officer and civilian and rigorous imprisonment” for one army officer on charges of “espionage/leakage of sensitive information to foreign agencies prejudice to the national security”, a statement issued by the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the Pakistan military’s PR wing, said.
“The officers were tried under Pakistan Army Act (PAA) and Official Secrets Act by separate Field General Court Marshal (FGCM) for separate cases,” added the statement.
The ISPR statement did not contain any further details of the offences committed by the three convicts. However, ISPR director general Major General Asif Ghafoor had confirmed the arrests of the senior officers in a press conference on 22 February.
He had, at the time, said that the two cases were not linked to each other, and there was no network of spies as such, a claim that sources in the Indian establishment said was completely untrue.
Who are the officers
Sources said that both officers were nabbed after their retirement from the army.
Lt Gen. Iqbal served as the DGMO, a crucial post tasked with overseeing the entire operations of the army, in 2011.
He played a key role in the deal worked out between the US and Pakistan in 2011, when CIA contractor Davis was arrested by Pakistani authorities after he shot dead two Pakistani civilians.
According to the sources, he was also the Corps Commander of the Bahawalpur-based 31 Corps and Adjutant General of the Pakistan Army.
Nothing much is known about Brigadier Rizwan, except that he has served as the Pakistani Defence attache in Germany.
The Pakistan Army has its own laws and courts, and military officers accused of wrongdoing are always tried behind closed doors.
Rulings can only be challenged or reviewed in accordance with military procedures.
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