India rejects appointment of George Griffin as political counsellor in US embassy in New Delhi

With Indo-US relations edging towards an all-time low, last month's visit by Jeanne Kirkpatrick, permanent US representative to the UN, was optimistically viewed as an effort on the part of the Reagan Administration to smooth ruffled feathers in New Delhi.But even if Kirkpatrick's visit was a success - which it certainly wasn't - it would have helped little, for no sooner had Kirkpatrick left when a major diplomatic row erupted between New Delhi and Washington over the appointment of George B. Griffin as political counsellor in the US Embassy in New Delhi. Though the Indian Government gave no reasons for rejecting! Griffin (under the terms of the Vienna Convention, a host government may exclude a diplomatic officer from its territory without giving any reasons), unofficially, Foreign Ministry officials made no bones about the fact that they believe Griffin to be a CIA operative. "We had information that the person (Griffin) was connected with the intelligence services of the US," declared Mrs Gandhi at an impromptu press conference at Bhubaneshwar airport when asked about Griffin's rejection.In Washington, State Department officials termed the Indian Government's decision as "unwarranted" and, in an act of seemingly childish pique, announced that they were barring the entry of Griffin's opposite number in the Indian Embassy in Washington, Prabhakar Menon. Again, no reasons were given, but to observers it was clear that the Americans were making a desperate effort to save face and were using Menon as a convenient scapegoat.Allegations: As a continuation of that effort, the US State Department then declared that Griffin was a target of Soviet misinformation which the Indian Government had taken at face value. To back their claim, they produced a fact sheet detailing reports put out by Toss and Pravda which were picked up by the leftist press in India accusing Griffin of being a "highly placed CIA employee sent from Pakistan to India to coordinate the activities of Afghan counter-revolutionaries and US espionage agents", but the State Department's implication that India's leftist press had succeeded in branding Griffin a CIA agent and the Indian Government had been taken in by the allegations was nothing more than counter-misinformation, India Today's Washington correspondent had first described Griffin's dubious role in the events that led to Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's assassination in Bangladesh. Griffin was then posted as political officer in the US Consulate in Calcutta, India Today's report on Lawrence Lischultz's prodigious research, which took him three years to complete, is a product of Lifschultz's interviews with Bangladesh and State Department sources; a significant portion of it was based on what is known as the Carnegie Papers. The Carnegie Endowment for Peace (an influential think-tank having close links with the American foreign policy establishment) launched its own probe of America's Bangladesh policies. Carnegie researchers conducted some 200 high-level interviews, but the ultimate study was suppressed.American Involvement: Lifschultz's findings that resulted in a book, Bangladesh: The Unfinished Revolution, made clear that information on planning the coup was regularly forwarded to Kissinger and his aides, George Griffin and Harold Saunders. The Bangladeshis who approached the Americans for their assent to the coup were Mahmud Alam Chashi, chairman of the Rural Development Academy, TaheruddinThakur, Mujib's information minister, and A. B. S. Safder, Chashi and Thakur were by Khondakar Mushtaque Ahmed's side when he announced Mujib's overthrow over Dacca radio, and Safder was later to become director of Bangladesh's intelligence services (MIS). The Kissinger-Ahmed-Chashi-Thakur-Safder link goes back to 1971. The Carnegie Papers establish beyond any doubt that as many as eight secret contacts took place during that year between American intelligence sources and a faction of the Awami League government-in-exile in an effort to split the Bangladesh independence movement and arrive at a settlement, short of independence, acceptable to Pakistan's Yahya Khan, whom Kissinger was wooing in pursuit of his China initiative.Reagan: spurned overtureMujib was then in jail in Pakistan and the head of the provisional government in Calcutta was Tajuddin Ahmed who was viewed by Kissinger as pro-India and pro-Soviet and a democratic socialist. The Americans made contact with Mushtaque who represented the right wing of the Awami League, through Chashi and Thakur. Chashi, a foreign service officer, had served in the US in the 1950s and was known to be committed ideologically to the American lobby. According to Lifschultz, Kissinger - either in Europe, Washington or in New Delhi en route to Peking in July 1971 - talked directly to a representative of the Mushtaque faction.The moment for the 1971 coup against the Mujibists, the study suggested, was to be October 1971, when Mushtaque, as the provisional government's foreign minister, was to arrive in New York to present the Bangladesh case before the UN. According to the plan he would unilaterally, and without warning, announce a compromise solution short of independence and thereby pull off a coup against the Awami League leadership in Calcutta.Macabre Happenings:The plot was foiled after Tajuddin discovered Mushtaque's secret meetings and put him under house arrest. After Mujib's return, Mushtaque was unceremoniously demoted to a lower ranking ministry. According to the Carnegie Papers, the Mushtaque-Chashi-Thakur clique dealt with Griffin. Griffin reported to Saunders and through him to Kissinger-it was the same trio that four years later was kept informed of the impending coup against Mujib by the same cast of Pengali characters.The role of the Bangladesh intelligence services in 1971 and 1975 is a sordid tale of betrayal and intrigue. What is generally not known is that between 1961 and 1971, 40 Bengali police officers were trained in CIA-sponsored counter-intelligence-oriented police academies such as the International Police Academy in Washington under the USAID's Office of Public Safety (OPS) programme.According to intelligence sources in New Delhi, Griffin was put under Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) surveillance in 1971 when he was found having frequent clandestine meetings with Awami League exiles. Said an intelligence source: "Griffin was of the view that Mujib should be killed before Bangladesh's liberation."In fact, US Embassy officals including Archer Blood, the current charge d'affaires in New Delhi who was then in Dacca, had sent a signed letter of protest to Kissinger on the covert US activities in the region, which were widening the gulf in Indo-American relationships. Said intelligence sources, "Griffin's close proximity to the region involving major upheavals in Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Pakistan had created doubts about Griffin's diplomatic assignment. Even the murder of the US ambassador in Kabul, Harold Dubs, was believed to be a result of an act of revenge against an operation that Griffin had orchestrated in Afghanistan.Constant Surveillance: A correspondent with a national news agency told India Today that Griffin tried to recruit him for the CIA in Calcutta in 1971. Aware of Griffin's activities, the Indian Government had given him a free hand to move around even after he left India. He was conveniently granted a multiple entry visa to visit his familv in New Delhi who had been granted permission to stay on while he was posted in Kabul because he was reluctant to keep his family with him in Afghanistan. But each time he visited New Delhi, he involved himself in "high profile diplomacy", delivering CIA-inspired briefings to American and foreign journalists, who would file stories referring to him as a "diplomatic source". Said a Foreign Ministry official: "During the trips he made over the two years he was also meeting Afghan exiles in New Delhi."Said an intelligence source: "We were aware of his activities and could have cancelled his visa, but we felt it was better for us to know exactly who his contacts were and keep them under surveillance." Meanwhile, Griffin's wife, Christine, was also under constant surveillance and intelligence sources allege that she was deeply involved in covert activities for her husband. She entertained lavishly and often, and during her stay in Delhi made numerous high-level contacts in the Indian Government. Christine's parents had settled in Kathmandu and Griffin had also made frequent trips to Nepal. He had met Christine during his stay as political officer in Calcutta, and his marriage gave him a good cover to travel between Calcutta and Kathmandu. The Griffin appointment, announced in Washington, put the Indian Government in a quandary. The Indian Government had advised Washington in July through its ambassador that Griffin's appointment as the political counsellor would not be acceptable. Yet Washington had persisted. In cases where the diplomat is known to be a member of a foreign intelligence agency, many countries, including India, prefer to allow the person in on the premise that it is safer to know exactly who the operator is and keep him under surveillance. But Griffin's case was different. He is suspected to be a highly trained and experienced operative of the CIA and a specialist in political subversion. "He was adept at behind the scenes operations and covert functioning," says an intelligence source. The final conclusion was that in view of the Afghanistan situation, instability in Bangladesh, and deteriorating Indo-American relations, it would be too much of a risk having Griffin in New Delhi.Strained Relations: The State Department still stoutly maintains that Griffin is not a CIA man. Said a State Department official, "We believe the Indian decision on George Griffin was unwarranted. Griffin is an experienced, responsible foreign service officer. He has had an outstanding career which has included many difficult assignments. He has acted at all times in accordance with instructions and norms of proper diplomatic behaviour. This action, taken at a time when Griffin has been a target of a Soviet misinformation campaign, makes it particularly regrettable."The Indian Government is equally sure that the Soviet smear on Griffin has in no way influenced its decision. "To say that the Russians pushed us into turning Griffin down is an absolute canard." said a senior Foreign Ministry source, "and the State Department knows it." Though both governments say that the matter is closed, the US retaliation in barring Menon's posting to Washington -is in itself a covert signal that relations between Washington and New Delhi are touching a new nadir.The diplomatic row had still not subsided when the Indian Government filed an application last fortnight for licence to import from the United States yet another shipment of low-enriched uranium fuel for the Tarapur nuclear power plant. The application for 19.8 tonnes of nuclear fuel that should by contractual obligation, be delivered by March-September 1982, symbolised once again the precarious state of Indo-US ties. There is little hope of the shipment being approved. On the contrary the two countries are moving towards an abrogation of the Tarapur agreement: The United States has told the Government of India over two rounds of negotiations this year that it is not in a position to continue the Tarapur supply relationship. Delhi is now evidently taking a tough stand towards Washington.Published By: AtMigration Published On: Nov 7, 2013 09:29 IST--- ENDS ---

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India rejects appointment of George Griffin as political counsellor in US embassy in New Delhi

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