Security & defenceThe post-9/11 partnership
The Raymond Davis affair
A CIA contractor’s shooting of two men in Lahore set off a seven-week standoff over diplomatic immunity and opened the worst year in relations since 2001.
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Lahore, January 2011
Punjab, Pakistan
31° 33′ N · 74° 20′ E
Lahore, January 2011
Punjab, Pakistan
31° 33′ N · 74° 20′ E
What happened
On 27 January 2011, at a traffic junction in Lahore, Raymond Davis shot and killed two young men on a motorcycle, Faizan Haider and Muhammad Fahim, whom he said were armed and trying to rob him1,2. A third Pakistani was killed when a US consulate vehicle sent to assist him struck a motorcyclist. Davis was arrested and charged with murder.
The immunity dispute
The US government said Davis was an accredited member of the administrative and technical staff of the US Embassy in Islamabad, entitled to immunity under the Vienna Convention, and that Pakistan was violating its international obligations by holding him; President Obama publicly referred to him as "our diplomat"3. In February it was reported that Davis was a CIA security contractor3. Pakistani officials and courts questioned his status, and a Lahore court ruled that he did not have immunity4. The case inflamed public opinion in Pakistan; protests demanded he be tried, and the issue became entangled with domestic politics and with the activities of American intelligence personnel in the country.
Resolution
On 16 March 2011 the case was resolved under Pakistan's Islamic law provisions on diyat (blood money): the families of the two men were paid about $2.4 million and pardoned Davis, the court acquitted him, and he immediately left the country1,5. The State Department said the US government had not paid the compensation; reporting at the time suggested the arrangement was facilitated by Pakistani authorities5,6.
Why it mattered
The affair exposed the scale of CIA activity in Pakistan and intensified suspicion between the CIA and the ISI, which reportedly pressed for limits on American intelligence personnel and drone operations. For many Pakistanis it was a symbol of an unequal relationship; for Washington it showed how quickly public anger could constrain Pakistan's government. Six weeks later the Abbottabad raid deepened the crisis.
Sources
- Davis released after blood money deal, Gulf Times, 16 March 2011 · Press
- American blood money and a question of reparations, Middle East Research and Information Project (MERIP), June 2011 · Scholarly
- American jailed in Pakistan worked for CIA, NPR, 22 February 2011 · Press
- Pakistan: CIA man has no immunity, Al Jazeera, 3 March 2011 · Press
- Behind the scenes of Raymond Davis’s release, Foreign Policy, 16 March 2011 · Press
- Raymond Davis released (RFE/RL), GlobalSecurity.org, 16 March 2011 · Press
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