AgNoStiC MuSliM
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The sudden and suspicious death of the army chief, General Asif Nawaz
General Asif died of a heart attack, and it was declared a natural death. However, in his book "Crossed Swords," his brother Shuja Nawaz makes an effort to counter that claim... (continued)
Thread
...that both the army and the political establishment found it hard to believe that the chief may have been murdered and hindered the investigation at various stages.
This is the story of a series of seemingly unrelated events that later took on greater importance.
1/n
After the General's death, Shuja was approached by a person who had come to offer condolences and, before leaving, whispered to him that the General had been murdered and that the matter should be pursued. Shuja didn't pay any attentions to this and left for the US after.
2/n
After, Gen Nawaz's widow, began receiving letters written by ppl who said they worked in the PM's house & reported that they'd been asked to ‘polish’ the General's plates with a special material that'd been brought from overseas each time he came to dine at the PM’s house
3/n
Letter # 1
The first letter alleged that because of differences between the prime minister and General Nawaz, the prime minister said he did not wish to see the general’s face.
4/n
Letter # 2
Begum Nuzhat Asif passed these on to Gen Waheed with a request that they be investigated. She did not hear back frm him. She also recalled that on Nov 24, 1992, Gen Nawaz had taken ill during a meeting at the JCS HQs after taking some tea & snacks & had come home
5/n
A distraught Begum Nawaz wanted the army and the PM to investigate the matter after his death, bcz she suspected that the general had been subjected to foul play, given reports that the prime minister’s inner circle had discussed removing him from the scene.
6/n
After no positive feedback came from both the army and the PM, Begum Nawaz took the matter to the president. However, no one cooperated much. The JCSC chairman even pleaded with the president not to conduct an investigation.
7/n
"The army did not wish to allow anything to happen that might impugn it."
Months pass, and no investigation happens. The Army did not share any of his medical files with the family either; their release could have resolved some issues.
8/n
After huge pressure, NS established a judicial commission, headed by Justice Shafiur Rahman.
The judicial inquiry was a strange affair. The staff of Army House reportedly had to meet with Brigadier Shami before they appeared before the commission to testify
9/n
The commission concluded that General Asif Nawaz died a natural death on account of a massive heart attack. The allegations of poisoning are not correct. It expressed an inability to order an exhumation and left that matter up to the administration.
10/n
During the investigation by the commission, Shuja Nawaz was in contact with foreign doctors who suggested that one way of ascertaining whether the General had indeed been poisoned was to gather his hair samples and test them.
11/n
Shuja Nawaz collected the hairs of the deceased General Asif and dispatched them to the foreign doctors to be examined, and through segmentation analysis, it could be determined not only what had been ingested but also over what period.
12/n
Reports from the doctors were faxed to Shuja.
He writes, "These results stunned me. My blood froze at what appeared to be incontrovertible evidence that General Asif Nawaz had indeed been poisoned."
13/n
An FIR was filed by Begum Asif Nawaz. By this point Pakistan had a caretaker Prime Minister, Moeenuddin Ahmad Qureshi.
14/n
A three-person team of foreign experts came to Pakistan for the exhumation of the General's body and to take samples for examination.
Samples were taken back to Islamabad by the forensic team, now under the care of a deputy inspector general of police, Dr Shoaib Suddle.
15/n
This is an interesting development.
Shuja Nawaz writes, "Dr Wecht told me on his return that, on coming back from our village, he was taken by Dr Suddle to the hill station of Murree for a sightseeing trip." (continued)
16/n
"He assured me that the samples were safe during that period. Dr Wecht said that the 3 experts had agreed to talk before completing their reports & expected this to be done in about 2 weeks. A long silence followed. He was concerned about it & tried to raise his colleagues"
17/n
Finally, the doctors stated in their report that the General Asif had advanced heart disease and that none of the tissue, hair, or nail samples that he had tested showed any sign of arsenic.
18/n
This was the same doctor who had previously faxed Shuja Nawaz reports confirming the presence of arsenic in the samples of General Asif's hair.
It is impossible to fake arsenic poisoning in hair since the poison has to be ingested naturally to grow into the hair over time
19/n
The mystery remains. Nothing emerged to explain the apparent discrepancy b/w the results obtained from the samples that I received from the family and the "final" test results that came out of the government-supervised tests later in the year.
20/n
More insight from Shuja Nawaz on why the Army was not at all forthcoming for a murder investigation of its COAS
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