ISLAMABAD: (Parliament Times): Inter Services-Intelligence (ISI) and Intelligence Bureau (IB) officers on Monday joined the team investigating the hate campaign on social media against the martyrs in Balochistan’s Lasbela helicopter crash. A notification issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs, a copy of which is available with the Express Tribune, announced that a six-member team is to be constituted by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA). The FIA had opened an investigation into the spread of negative propaganda on social media, hours after Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif had warned against a “self-righteous political narrative” that weaponised hate speech. Deputy Director Waqar Nisar from IB and Lieutenant Colonel Saad from ISI are now part of the joint inquiry team of the FIA. Intelligence agencies will probe the matter under the supervision of Additional Director Cybercrime FIA Muhammad Jafar.
The team includes the FIA director, FIA Cyber Crime Wing Waqaruddin Syed, Additional Director Cybercrime Ayyaz Khan and Assistant Director Imran Haider. The purpose of the team will be to investigate where the negative trend initiated from and the individuals involved in running the hate campaign against the Pakistan Army martyrs. Following the probe, the team will take legal action against the culprits. This comes amid an ongoing online smear campaign stoking the speculations that the helicopter crash was “orchestrated” through conspiracy by the country’s security establishment. The conspiracy theory fell on the fertile ground after similar allegations echoed from certain political activists who fumed against the military. Earlier, the ISPR also condemned negative propaganda, saying that it had hurt the sentiments of the families of the martyrs.
