The ministry statement cited Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani as categorically saying in the National Assembly that Pakistan did not believe the ISI, as an agency of the government of Pakistan, or its present and former officials could be subjected to civil litigation in US courts and "we intend to take appropriate steps to obtain dismissal of this action."

Gilani had also announced in Parliament that the ISI chief would not appear in any US court in connection with the Nov. 26, 2008 Mumbai terrorist attack.

Gilani was responding to a fiery speech by opposition leader Nisar Ali Khan, who took the government to task over what he described as a failed foreign policy.

A US court has summoned ISI Director General Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha and other officials as also Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) commander Zakiur Rahman Lakhvi and Jamaat-ud Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed, the alleged masterminds of the Mumbai attack.

The 26-page lawsuit was filed before a Brooklyn court by family members of Rabbi Gavriel Noach Holtzberg and his pregnant wife, Rivka, who were among the 166 people killed during the attack.

Apart from Pasha, who has been director general of the ISI since September 2008, the court has also summoned his predecessor Lt. Gen. Nadeem Taj and ISI officials Maj. Samir Ali, Azam Cheema and Maj. Iqbal.

Commenting on the court summons, former President Pervez Musharraf said in London: "Neither the courts of Pakistan can summon the director of the CIA nor the US courts have any jurisdiction to summon the chief of the ISI."

Pakistani Kareem Khan has threatened to sue in a Pakistani court CIA Director Leon Panetta, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates and a man he said was the CIA's station chief in Islamabad for the "wrongful death" of his son in a US drone attack last year in Pakistan’s North Waziristan region.