Washington— Donald Lu, the United States Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia, denied the cipher claims against him during a Senate hearing on Wednesday.
He made the remark while testifying before a subcommittee of the US House Committee on Foreign Affairs during a hearing titled ‘Pakistan After the Elections: Examining the Future of Democracy in Pakistan and the US-Pakistan Relationship’.
Lu was asked to provide an assessment on the allegations made against him by the PTI founder.
Regarding the cipher case, he rejected the PTI founder’s assertion and stated that he had no role in removing the former PM from power.
He referred to the cipher issue as a “conspiracy theory, lie, and complete falsehood”.
Meanwhile, Lu claimed that the claims against him over the last two years had resulted in repeated death threats against him and his family.
“There is a line of acceptability and I think at times, some of the free speech has verged into threats of violence which is not acceptable in our society,” he went on to say.
He went on to say, “Pakistan is an important partner country of the United States and there is concern over the shutdown of the Internet during the election as incidents of mistreatment of journalists were also reported during the election.”
However, he stated that there should be a thorough inquiry into charges of election manipulation, and that US authorities were concerned about incidences of election abuse and violence leading up to the election.
Regarding US-Pakistan relations, he stated that America has always supported Pakistan because the former has invested in the latter for 67 years, and that both countries have also collaborated in the fight against terrorism.
He stated that Pakistan’s economic recovery would benefit bilateral relations.
