Last Updated on: 24th March 2023, 12:53 pm
Who is Asif Hafeez? Biography, Wiki
The United States is fighting to extradite Pakistani businessman Asif Hafeez from Britain’s most secure Belmarsh prison to a New York jail after kidnapping two Akasha drug trafficking brothers and two others from Kenya, according to court documents.
Among those arrested by the US are royal brothers Baktash Akasha Abdalla and Ibrahim Akasha Abdalla, husband of Bollywood star Mamta Kulkarni, Vicky Goswami and Ghulam Hussein, while one stood as a witness against the Pakistani national.
Hafeez’s case is not ordinary and makes for a Hollywood thriller: full of drama, action, intrigue, criminal syndicates, drug dealing, traps, Bollywood, American secret agents, forced confessions, a mysterious death, Greek tragedy, betrayal at the highest level.
The case has become very interesting as at least four key figures have been linked to the 2004 Greek drug plot that involved smuggling 650 tons of hashish out of Pakistan and the 2014 Kenyan drug operation which was also linked to India, Bollywood and Pakistan Foreground. say that Hafeez was involved in shipping shipments of drugs to Greece and the United States.
In addition, US agents had vowed to attack him for several years using all methods fair and unfair, including inciting him to engage in the manufacture and importation of drugs onto US soil.
The case was also straight out of a script, as in real life, Asif Hafeez once provided intelligence to intelligence agencies in the United States, UAE, United Kingdom, and US-Pakistan. British intelligence even wrote him a letter of congratulations for providing credible information that helped stop a shipment of drugs by the ton to the UK.
Brothers Akasha And Goswami
The US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) said it conducted an investigation into the planned importation of drugs from Kenya into the United States between 2014 and 2017.
American sources posing as Colombian drug traffickers contacted Akasha Baktash organization leaders Ibrahim, Vijaygiri Anandgiri Goswami (known as Vicky Goswami) and Ghulam Hussein, who wanted to procure heroin for import and shipment to the United States.
Baktash, according to the U.S. indictment, arranged for him to source heroin for delivery in the United States, telling sources his supplier was from Pakistan and went by various aliases, one of which was the Sultan, who later declared himself as Asif turned out Hafeez.
In October 2014, 98 kilos of heroin were shipped to US sources, allegedly these four men arranged the shipment in collaboration with the Sultan (Hafeez).
The case of the US government is that the “Sultan” was later identified as Hafeez during investigations, particularly when the devices of the Akasha brothers, Goswami and various other confidential sources were searched which allegedly linked messages to numbers used by Hafeez.
The once-powerful Kenyan Akasha brothers, Vijay Goswami and Ghulam Hussein, were first arrested on November 9, 2014 by the Kenya Counter Narcotics Unit in Mombasa at the request of the US government for conspiring to import drugs into the United States accused but were soon released on bail.
Extraordinary US Operation in Kenya
For more than three years, the four men staunchly defended the US extradition request, and it didn’t look like the local courts would extradite them to the US any time soon.
Around January 23, 2017, Kenyan authorities arrested the four in a sudden operation and within a week, without extradition authorization from a local court and without due process, the four accused were transferred from Kenya and brought to trial in New York. Southern District Court, where the charges against them were read and a new substitute charge added, alleging that the four bribed local officials in Kenya to avoid extradition.
Her lawyers and family members claimed that the United States kidnapped her and, with the help of the Kenyan government, extraordinarily brought her back.
According to court documents and witnesses, the rendition operation on Kenyan soil was carried out by US DEA and CIA agents who kidnapped brothers Akasha, Goswami and Hussein for importing drugs while the local court was hearing his case.
The US government denies wrongdoing in relation to court documents, saying the Kenyan government “decided” to deport the four Kenyan men and that a court order to bring the four men to justice is a matter of course. The authorities.
Looking For Hafeez
After the four Kenyan nationals were evacuated and secured in a US prison, US agents focused on nabbing their prime target: Asif Hafeez, the Lahore-born ex-pilot-turned-businessman who worked with Prince Charles and members of the English royal family related polo events. and has not only donated to royal charities but also to Shaukat Khanum Cancer Hospital.
Hafeez was arrested in London on August 25, 2017 at his home in Regent’s Park by Scotland Yard officers and US agents who were executing an extradition order on behalf of the US government.
Hafeez immediately challenged his extradition case and has now been held in harsh conditions at Belmarsh Prison for nearly six years while the European Court of Justice hears his case against extradition to the United States after efforts to stop extradition in UK courts failed were.
This correspondent visited and met with Hafeez at Belmarsh Maximum Security Prison, where WikiLeaks founder and free speech activist Julian Assange is being held along with hundreds of other inmates serving sentences for the most serious crimes, including terrorism and mass murder became.
So what is the case against Hafeez, and why is the US government so keen to get him onto US soil to stand trial on charges involving life in prison without parole and near certain death in prison pull?
The American Case
The United States wants Hafeez tried on three counts. The first indictment alleges that Hafeez conspired to import heroin, methamphetamine and hash into the United States; knowingly assists and assists in the manufacture or distribution of heroin with intent to bring it into the United States.
In the same indictment, the United States alleges that Hafeez sent a co-conspirator, British citizen Afzaal Khan, to meet with the “Kenyan Four” in connection with a heroin transaction and that approximately 98 kilograms of heroin were eventually delivered to two unidentified buyers.
Count Two alleges that in December 2004, Hafeez and his associates transported a commercial shipping container containing more than six tons of hash to Greece for shipment to the United States; and in the same indictment, the United States further alleges that Hafeez and an accomplice set up a methamphetamine factory in Mozambique in or about 2015, but that the methamphetamine was never manufactured due to the confiscation of ingredients by law enforcement agencies.
Count Three alleges that between approximately March and November 2014, Hafeez supported and abetted the manufacture and distribution of heroin with the knowledge and intent to import it into the United States.
The United States hoped to use the evidence of various witnesses, known and unknown, against Asif Hafeez, and it is believed that the forced extradition of the Akashic brothers from Kenya served precisely that purpose.
However, there is a major plot twist. According to a recent court statement, several people – involved in drug trafficking or working as secret agents for US agencies – have refused to support the US charges against Asif Hafeez and have offered strong testimony against their own former US managers and bosses .
Only Vicky Goswami, according to reliable sources, will testify against Hafeez after the US government offered the Indian citizen a deal to become a US informant and witness in lieu of privileges and exemptions.
The two Akasha brothers, who were convicted and imprisoned in the United States, refused to charge Asif Hafeez, claiming that Asif Hafeez did not use drugs with them and that the allegations against him were false and fabricated.
A former FBI-DEA agent, Kamran Faridi, said in a statement to Hafeez’s attorneys that he was repeatedly asked by his FBI superiors to capture Hafeez while he was working on an arrest mission focused on the cases of Jabir Motiwala and Ibrahim in Karachi.
Milesh Tareja, a veteran spy who has worked for US and Australian authorities, said in a written statement that his contacts in the US told him about Asif Hafeez and Ibrahim.
The Mysterious Death Of A Key Witness
Court documents show Hafeez has been under the US scanner since 2004. Ommer Faruke Kolia, a British citizen of Indian origin from Leicester, has disclosed full details of his personal involvement in importing Greek hashish in 2004, his conviction in Greece and his asking him to go to Greece to count the cases of hashish.
He detailed his story in testimony sent to Hafeez’s solicitors in London on February 19, 2018. Kolia died four months later, on June 21, 2018, under very mysterious circumstances.
He was found dead in a hotel in the Caribbean. A family source told this reporter that he met with spies from a foreign agency there in connection with talks about drug trafficking. He was fine when they found him dead. The family suspect foul play since they never found out how he died.
According to Kolia, who was serving a prison sentence for drug offenses in the UK, he traveled to Lahore in 2004 and met Kamil Bhatt, who asked him to work in Greece for £10,000 and all expenses paid on his behalf.
The mission was to travel to Greece to inspect a shipment of hash imported from Pakistan and stored in a warehouse in Athens.
Kolia was asked to count the cans of hash, determine their weight, write down the serial numbers and report back to Bhatt. On January 10, 2005, Kolia landed in Greece and was taken to the warehouse in the port of Piraeus by a Romanian national named George Baneskou and two other men.
Almost forty minutes after the crates were counted, George and the other men fled, closing the warehouse shutters and turning off the lights.
Within minutes, dozens of armed Greek police officers entered the warehouse, handcuffed Kolia, and took him to the police station, where two US DEA agents interrogated him for several days, while Kolia was given permission to use his four phones for the agents to see could whoever called him with inquiries and updates.
During one of the interrogations, Hafeez called Kolia to inquire about his well-being. When DEA agents asked him who Hafeez was, Kolia said he was a family friend and that they had known each other for several decades.
Kolia wrote in his testimony: “Mr Hafeez had no connection to the shipment of hashish to Greece and was not even aware that I was in Greece at the time of his call. His call was completely random. Hafeez was not named during the questioning and trial and was not involved in the deal.”
Kolia was sentenced to 16 years in prison for 6.5 tons of hashish imported into Greece from Pakistan. He was released after serving 6 years and 5 months in prison in Athens.
Before his mysterious death, Kolia insisted that Hafeez had in fact repeatedly urged him to stop meddling in the drug trade and that he had nothing to do with the plot to ship drugs to Greece.
The DEA confirms it investigated Hafeez in 2004 when he allegedly conspired to hide drugs in containers so they could be shipped to the United States, but Greek authorities seized the shipment.
According to court documents, the DEA instructed the source to inform Hafeez that the container was at a warehouse in Piraeus and that Kolia later arrived at the warehouse to inspect the container. The DEA acknowledges that Kolia could not be positively linked to Hafeez and the show.
DEA Agent Milesh Talreja Speaks
A former DEA agent, Milesh Talreja, from Hong Kong SAR, provided testimony in support of Hafeez, saying the US agents wanted to incriminate both Hafeez and Ibrahim.
Talreja, who is now on the run somewhere in Hong Kong after falling out with US spy agents over fear of being hurt or caught, describes recruiting by US DEA agents in Stockholm, Sweden in April 2019 became.
It states that the US International Narcotics and Terrorism Unit, through its agents, ordered it to illegally search evidence in various foreign jurisdictions without legal authorization because we in the US courts know that the evidence was searched without legal authority.
Talreja says in his statement that in mid-April 2019 he was asked by a foreign intelligence agency to meet with two US DEA special agents in Stockholm, Sweden, and was hired there as a confidential source after a series of special meetings. with Eric Stouch and Stephen Casey, US DEA agents.
Talreja asked the American agents to help him in exchange for his problems in Australia and America, which they accepted. He says he would use a special phone with software that would record audio, video and GPS coordinates and transmit that information directly to DEA headquarters in Chantilly and to a Stouch-controlled laptop.
Talreja says he came into contact with Stouch on a daily basis while working on targets. He says: “Stouch started telling me about the Hafeez investigation, which he called MAH. Stouch began sharing confidential information with me on a regular basis. Stouch told me his team is working on it and trying to “take down the FBI” to get Dawood Ibrahim indicted.
“It was Stouch’s allegation that he was able to arrest two people in an indictment in the Southern Borough of New York. He told me that he planned to use this charge against Hafeez to get him to agree to extradition and enter into a cooperation agreement in that he would be forced to testify against Ibrahim.”
Kamran Faridi, FBI Agent
Kamran Faridi, who worked as a spy for US agencies for more than two decades, also made a statement to Hafeez’s lawyers.
He says in the statement that his FBI and DEA bosses have often asked him to frame Hafeez, but they have focused on Dawood Ibrahim and Karachi businessman Jabir Motiwala, who was arrested by Scotland Yard in August 2018 and arrested three years later was released to return to Pakistan. After Faridi turned on his American bosses and revealed that he had lied in his testimonies to get Motiwala and that Motiwala was not involved in any illegal activities.
Faridi said he fabricated evidence against Motiwala on orders from his superiors, who were desperate to track down Ibrahim. Faridi is now in prison in the US, serving a seven-year sentence for threatening his FBI chief over a payments dispute.
Faridi said in a statement that during his full-time tenure as an FBI/DEA agent in January 2017, he filed a report that Hafeez had nothing to do with D-Company or any dealings with Ibrahim. “I have not found any financial dealings from Asif Hafeez with D Company, nor contact with anyone he has done business with.”
This report was sent to the Southern District of New York and a copy was sent to FBI agents. It was a 7 page report and a copy was sent to the DEA via the FBI but apparently they ignored the report and proceeded with the case based on the information they had from the Indian side.
“The United States wants to charge Hafeez with terrorism (NARCO-terrorism) in order to sentence him to life imprisonment. American agents want to track Pakistan through Hafeez,” Faridi said.
Afzaal Khan is On The Run
Shortly after Hafeez’s arrest, DEA agents, with the help of the British National Crime Agency (NCA), called a meeting with Afzaal Khan, who worked for Hafeez in London for his family, and I helped him in your business.
Khan claimed in court that DEA and NCA agents put intense pressure on him to cooperate with the DEA and become a witness against Hafeez during their numerous meetings in London. He claims that death threats have been made, including threats to wrongly implicate him in the case against Hafeez.
During the interviews, Stouch and other officials questioned Khan about Hafeez’s possible connections to Ibrahim and members of the Pakistani military.
The DEA and NCA asked Khan which generals in the Pakistan Army Hafeez knew about. Although Khan does not know any specific names, he did confirm that some generals had visited Hafeez at his home in Pakistan. Eric Stouch asked Khan to review between 30 and 40 photos of Pakistani military personnel, Khan said in his statement.
According to Khan, US agents were keen to learn more about the sale to the Pakistani army of a video wall to be installed at their headquarters.
Khan told the DEA he was involved in supplying special night vision goggles for military use.
Khan went into hiding in December 2017 because he too feared arrest. He has not been seen publicly in the UK since then and spoke to this reporter over the phone from an undisclosed location in Pakistan.
Khan said he left London for fear of being arrested or killed, although no charges have been filed against him.
The Akasha Brothers Refuse To Blame Hafeez
The US government removed the Akasha brothers from Kenya in hopes that they would testify against Hafeez to secure concessions, but the Akasha brothers refused to support the US charges against Hafeez.
In August 2019, the US State Department announced that Ibrahim Akasha had been sentenced to 23 years in prison after pleading guilty to, among other things, trafficking heroin and methamphetamine in the United States. and Baktash was sentenced to 25 years in prison by the United States District Court in New York for the same offenses involving narcotics, weapons and obstruction of justice.
In a recent recorded conversation with Hafeez’s nephew, Fawad Hafeez, Ibrahim Akasha said from his cell that the DEA wanted Ibrahim and Baktash to falsely implicate Hafeez in the drug conspiracy in order to force him to testify against Ibrahim, the original target. from the DEA.
The U.S. government says it secretly recorded statements from Baktash Akasha, Goswami and Hussain confirming Hafeez’s involvement in the heroin deal, as well as Hafeez’s 2015 text message to Goswami showing that Hafeez was concerned that he was being held over his involvement at which deal was targeted by US law enforcement arrests of Baktash, Ibrahim, Goswami and Hussain in Kenya.
Ibrahim denies the US allegations and claims that Hafeez was not involved in any drug trafficking. Ibrahim says US agents spoke to him several times and offered him and his brother Baktash to become witnesses against Asif Hafeez in exchange for being released and returning home.
Baktash says, “They say we only want Hafeez. We’ll let you and your brother go home if you talk to us. They want Hafeez to come here.”
Ibrahim says he told US investigators Hafeez was not involved in the drug import plot and was not lying.
“Hafeez is not involved. That’s the truth. Why should I lie? They say you’ll have your whole life if you don’t help us. I won’t lie,” Ibrahim said.
Goswami Turns On His Allies
Goswami is the only person and co-defendant who has agreed to testify against Hafeez at any trial if extradition is ordered. He pleaded guilty under a cooperation agreement with US authorities and will be called as a witness against Hafeez when he stands trial.
The United States did not indict him in the substitute indictment, an indication that he has become an asset.
US authorities have declined to discuss Goswami’s current status, saying any information about his current condition could endanger the lives of witnesses. Sources say Goswami is now enjoying a life of luxury and protection from the US government.
The Ahmedabad Smuggler
Goswami grew up on the streets of Ahmedabad and made his living as a smuggler. He came to Mumbai and worked in the underworld. He met his Bollywood girlfriend Mamta Kulkarni in Mumbai when she was at the peak of her career.
He then moved to Dubai full time and hosted Bollywood events and started selling drugs. He was sentenced to ten years in prison in Dubai in 1997 for illegal drug trafficking.
Mamta regularly visited him in prison. They got married while Vicky was in prison. After his release, the couple moved to Kenya, where Goswami again rose to prominence in the drug scene.
Mamta’s Drug Connection
In April 2016, Mamta Kulkarni and Goswami were charged by Indian police in connection with a Rs. 2 billion drug deal uncovered in Thane.
Police seized 18.50 tonnes of ephedrine and 2.50 tonnes of acetic anhydride, two banned party drugs worth more than Rs 2000 crore on the international market, from a pharmaceutical factory in Solapur and other sites in Thane and Mumbai.
These factories supposedly belonged to Goswami. The United States had alleged that Goswami and his co-defendants had agreed to set up a factory in India from which the drugs would be shipped to the United States at high profits.
RAW’s Plan For 3 Murders in Pakistan
In October 2020, Goswami took the stand in New York federal court and for more than two days told the court that he had been personally involved in criminal activities with the Akasha brothers and witnessed some of the crimes they committed. .
He linked Akashas to the murder of a South African drug lord, as well as to large-scale bribery, threats, intimidation and drug trafficking. He also admitted to having ties to the yakuza, the Japanese underworld.
Goswami stunned the courtroom when he revealed that he had been asked by Indian government intelligence agents to arrange for yakuza members to travel to Thailand to assassinate an individual identified as a terrorist.
Goswami also told the court that Indian intelligence, reportedly the Research & Analysis Wing (RAW), ordered him to travel to Pakistan in the yakuza and kill “two or three” people who are believed to have been killed they are terrorists.
He did not name who these “two or three” people were. Following the convictions of brothers Akasha and Hussein, Goswami is now a US asset and the US hopes to use his testimony against Hafeez if he is extradited to the US.
The Case Of Asif Hafeez
Since August 2017 in Belmarsh Prison in south-west London, Hafeez has resisted extradition, alleging, among other things, that extradition would violate his rights under Article 3 of the Human Rights Convention and his fundamental freedoms; that he would be imprisoned in potentially inhumane conditions; and if convicted, you risk being sentenced to life imprisonment, with no possibility of parole and without an adequate mechanism to review your continued imprisonment under that sentence.
He has denied all allegations and believes he is the victim of a grand conspiracy and that Americans want him at all costs to further their interests.
In a discussion with this reporter at Belmarsh Maximum Security Prison, Hafeez said that in his meetings with senior US agents in Dubai for many years, the interest of US agents has focused on the Pakistani military, his past dealings with the military, and Ibrahim’s relationship Activities.
He said US agents have repeatedly asked him to become a source, leading them into Ibrahim’s network.
“I told them that I last met Dawood Ibrahim in Dubai when he was legally living there. He was a good man and I have no idea what allegations India and others have leveled against him. I cannot lie about anyone just to protect myself or please others, US, I have cooperated with US, UK and other authorities on many issues, but I have refused to work against the interests of Pakistan and a To become a spy against Pakistan,” he said.
Hafeez said Goswami turned on him after he was arrested in Dubai for drug trafficking, for which he was sentenced to 26 years but was released after 10 years. Hafeez believes Indian government agencies helped him.
Before his arrest, Hafeez mingled with the Indian and Pakistani elite in Dubai and London, and also attended polo events attended by the royal family. He owned at least two UK properties worth more than £7million, one of which has been seized by mortgage lenders since his arrest.
His wife and two children, who frequently resided in the UK, have not entered the UK since, fearing that the US would also arrest them on any charges. Hafeez changed several lawyers in the UK and paid huge fees to fight the US extradition offer. Since his arrest, he has lost almost all of his assets and businesses in Dubai, London and Pakistan.
Life in Belmarsh Prison
For the past seven years, he has spent 23 hours a day in his small cell, only being allowed out for an hour or less. He told this correspondent that he managed to survive by reading the holy book of Quran and Hadith daily.
“It’s a very lonely place. It’s very dangerous. I survived by connecting with the Creator and finding meaning in life. I’m not afraid of anything anymore. One thing is for sure, I won’t comply with American requests.”
After his arrest in London in August 2017, Hafeez challenged his extradition before a judge at Westminster Magistrates Court. On January 11, 2019, the Westminster Borough Judge referred the case to the Foreign Secretary (then Home Secretary Priti Patel) to decide whether extradition was appropriate.
On March 5, 2019, the Secretary of State ordered Hafeez’s extradition. In December 2019, Hafeez’s lawyers appealed the Westminster District Magistrate’s decision to the UK High Court, citing evidence from a prison counselor on prison conditions.
On 31 January 2020, the UK High Court denied Hafeez’s application to challenge the Home Secretary’s decision on the grounds that Hafeez may apply for a humanitarian discharge or an application for an executive clemency if he is in the United States sentenced to life imprisonment.
Great Britain. On March 19, 2020, Hafeez applied to the ECtHR for an interim measure under Article 39 of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). On March 24, 2020, the ECtHR ruled in favor of Hafeez in relation to the Section 39 injunction.
The court informed the United Kingdom that since the applicant had applied to the court under Article 39 of the ECHR, he should not be extradited while the proceedings were ongoing.
Hafeez submitted an Article 3 ECHR complaint regarding the imposition of a possible sentence that could result in life imprisonment if he is extradited to the United States, and under Article 3 ECHR concerning the conditions of his detention, as well as Article 6 ECHR. In June 2020, new evidence was entered and sent to UK prosecutors for extradition to be withdrawn.
In a series of motions in 2022, Hafeez presented evidence of former US spies and inmates who had testified in support of him clearing him of involvement in drug trafficking, but courts said the proper forum to do so was in the United States and not. Great Britain, as British courts cannot go to court.
On May 6, 2022, Hafeez received a reply allowing him to reopen the appeal, based on new evidence of a violation of Article 6 of the ECHR. This action was dismissed by the UK High Court on May 26, 2022.
No Help From Pakistani Authorities
As it stands, Hafeez now faces an upcoming boarding in New York to face the charges. In Belmarsh prison, the former Pakistani gold dealer remains hopeful and defiant.
“One witness at a time has come forward to put a good word on me and the United States knows I’m not involved, but there is a larger agenda to bring me down. The United States is determined to eliminate me to achieve its goals. but I believe in Allah.”
Hafeez is disappointed that the governments of Pakistan under Imran Khan and now the PDM have ignored him and purposely not helped him.
“I have helped Pakistani institutions against some of the biggest drug trafficking efforts, but at a difficult time they have failed me and offered no help as a Pakistani citizen. It is sad.”
The DEA and NCA did not respond to questions from this writer.
