April 30, 2012
By: Momin Iftikhar

Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden’s killing by US Navy SEALs on May 2, 2011, stands out as a benchmark in explaining the complexity of Pak-US relations. As its first anniversary approaches, the event is certain to initiate a debate in the US and Pakistan, highlighting the contradictions embedded in a highly complex, stressful and multidimensional relation spanning the last decade. The passage of a year might have dulled the pain, yet the anger and bitter feelings continue to rankle, impinging upon Pakistan’s sense of pride and patriotism. Not only in Pakistan, the incident is certain to receive a high coverage within the US as well where the general election campaign is about to start and the Democrat camp intends to cash in on the derring-do “Operation Geranimo”, seeking to underscore President Barack Obama’s penchant for firm handling of national security affairs; a domain which has traditionally been a forte of the Republican Presidents.

Another aspect that coincides with the anniversary is the expected release of Osama’s three widows – Kharia Hussain Sabir, Siham Sharif and Amal Ahmad Abdul Fateh – who have been deported to Saudia Arabia and have already provided a detailed account of his wanderings in Pakistan and the manner in which he outwitted his pursuers. Certainly, much speculation and hard knocks are in store on the opportunity provided by the anniversary and Pakistan needs to do its best in thwarting this vicious and no-holds-barred propaganda campaign in waiting.

2011 was truly a terrible year in the context of Pak-US relations. Apart from the calamitous Abbottabad raid, it was repeatedly punctuated by incidents of US military/intelligence walking roughshod over Pakistan’s sovereignty; pushing the troubled relations to the edge of the precipice. In January 2011, Raymond Davis, the CIA contractor whom President Obama referred to as “our diplomat in Islamabad”, shot to death two people on one of the busiest intersections in Lahore, while a third bystander was run down by the car sent by the US Consulate to aid him. It was widely believed that he was one among a large contingent of US intelligence operators who had, in an unauthorised and surreptitious manner, saturated Pakistani landscape to run clandestine spy networks. There was strong public reaction when he was plucked out of the Lahore jail by invoking the provisions of paying blood money to the relatives of the slain persons, permitted by the Sharia law. The US raid killing Osama further added fuel to the fire of simmering animosity and a swell of anti-US public anger began to take shape. It is instructive to note that a June 2011 Pew Poll found that 75 percent of Pakistanis held an unfavourable view of the United States; 70 percent believed that it is an enemy rather than a friend; and 70 percent saw it as a possible military threat to Pakistan – indicating to a prescient grassroot premonition of the things waiting to unfold shortly.

Following the Abbottabad raid by six months, in November 2011, when collective nerves were still raw and throbbing, the US forces’ inexplicable cross border attack on a Pakistani military outpost on Salalah Ridge killing 24 soldiers and wounding 13 exacerbated the Pak-US tensions to breaking point. The result is widespread and entrenched feelings of anti-Americanism, whereby many Pakistanis believe that the relations between the two countries are exploitative to the extreme, calling for an urgent for correcting of the imbalance.

Consequently, the public pressure has forced Pakistan to shut the conduit for Nato supplies into Afghanistan and to end US utilisation of the Shamsi Airbase that was being used by the CIA for drone operations. The restrictions may ease out, but tensions in bilateral relations are likely to remain calling for remedial US action to ameliorate the situation.

Notwithstanding the acrimony, there is an urgent necessity to hold tempers on the occasion of the anniversary. As a first step, the US must not use the brouhaha over Abbottabad raid to gloss over the ground realities that stand in sharp contrast to the claims made by its establishment about Pakistan military and intelligence’s prior knowledge of Osama’s hiding spot. While fabricating such a jaundiced view, it is simply impossible to overlook Pakistan’s notable successes against Al-Qaeda big fish over the last decade, or lose sight of intelligence cooperation that provided the vital lead for tracking Osama to his final hideout. Thousands of terrorists have been captured or killed by Pakistani agencies in the last decade, but top five terrorists apprehended in Pakistan need particular mention.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, the reported mastermind of 9/11, was nabbed on March 1, 2003, by Pakistani intelligence from Rawalpindi. The US had offered a $25 million reward leading to his arrest or death. He is currently detained in Guantanamo Bay. Abu Faraj al-Libi, believed to be number three in the then Al-Qaeda’s hierarchy, was arrested on May 2, 2005, in Mardan. He is now a detainee at Guantanamo. Both Khalid Sheikh and Abu Faraj provided important leads that led to the pinpointing of Osama at the Abbottabad compound. Another Guantanamo inmate; Abu Zubadeh was captured on March 28, 2002, in Faisalabad. As reported in a 2002 US legal opinion, he is alleged to have “managed a network of training camps” and “been involved in every major terrorist operation carried out by Al-Qaeda.” Ramzi bin al-Shibh was captured on September 11, 2002, in Karachi and was one of the five “most wanted terrorists” by Washington. As head of the 9/11 hijackers cell in Germany, he set up a financial network to siphon funds to militants in America, including Marwan al-Shehhi, who crashed United Airlines Flight 175into the World Trade Centre. Finally, Umer Patek, arrested in Abbottabad on March 29, 2011, was the Indonesian terrorist mastermind, who played a key role in the 2002 Bali bombings forming a crucial link in coordinating Al-Qaeda cells in Southeast Asia.

Another poignant aspect, which is largely ignored in the US security and media circles, perhaps by design, is that despite intensive scrutiny of available evidence, there is no smoking gun that could support the CIA-backed thesis that Osama was being sponsored by elements in Pakistan’s intelligence community. Pakistan’s security establishment has faced much slandering from US policymakers and advisors on this baseless account leading to unnecessary suspicion and finger-pointing. Yet, the treasure trove of computer discs, containing terabytes of computer data retrieved by the SEAL team from Osama’s Abbottabad compound has yielded no evidence of Pakistan’s complicity, despite scanning millions of documents. This prominent and undeniable fact may prove to be the initiating point in reconciling widely varying perspectives and perceptions of cooperation between the security establishments of the two countries.

The writer is a freelance columnist.
-The Nation

May 2, 2012
By Saeed Qureshi
Exclusive Article

Round the year, the visitors of various categories keep coming from Pakistan to the United States and other affluent destinations around the world. The individuals, the troupes and the groups arrive here either for showbiz programs or for collection of funds for the religious causes, for social projects and humanitarian missions that they claim are aimed at the welfare of the downtrodden and unprivileged sections of the society.

There are multitudinous sects whose leaders and arch preachers travel to the Western Europe and more particularly to the United States for charity, donations and for funds to run and sustain their widely publicized charitable organizations and public welfare societies that are ubiquitous all over the globe.

The political bigwigs also come from time to time for raising both the membership and donations. The mystics, the shrine holders, the holy figures known as Pirs and saints too undertake odysseys and collect pile of money from their overseas devotees.

Some of these NGOs and philanthropic organizations claim to provide dowry for the weddings of the brides and bridegrooms of the families that cannot afford such huge financial undertakings and in many cases the marriageable girls remain without being settled in married life.

Now we have seen here many showbiz celebrities and religious luminaries showing up in hugely attended congregations with lavishly served dinners. Their entire emphasis is on mustering funds for relief to the impoverished, building a mosque in Pakistan, funding religious seminaries, embellishing the shrine of a dead saint or mystic, or teaching the reading of Arabic. Some of these demagogues can sing the religious hymns with captivating melodious voices. In their florid sermons they overwhelm the faithful with allurement of paradise and fright of the hellfire.

Their appearances are replicas of the centuries old religious stalwarts with bushy long beards, flowing robes and a turban or cap over their heads. Not only that they impress their overseas audience with their sartorial elegance but also with the divine messages and good tidings of living in paradise in the hereafter for donations that they exhort tem to make generously.
These are all well played gimmicks and charades that these acrobats specialize in. They collect money in the name of God, religious, social and community service. But back home they forget or set aside by design of what they had pledged so solemnly in front of the expatriate fellow citizens.

The donation collecting bands that come to the foreign green pastures to graze once or twice in year are accorded enthusiastic ovations and extravagant receptions. Some of these guys are professional mafias for swindling money. The obvious reason is that instead that the number of the poor and resource-less should decrease and the graph of poverty should scale down, the situation shows reverse trends.

The hosts of such visitors conduct the donation collecting functions either at the mosques or in posh hotels. On such occasions they circulate literature detailing soul-stirring humanitarian causes and high sounding social welfare missions that would have left no needy or poor person in the community either in the United States or in Pakistan.

Prior to giving them more donations, the immigrant communities should look into the bona-fides of these visiting individuals and the groups and ensure that they have translated their past promises into concrete reality with regard to the community service.

In Pakistan’s context one dollar means nearly a hundred rupees in Pakistan. If someone can raise, for instance, one hundred thousand of dollars in one visit, he would have made ten million rupees in Pakistan’s currency which indeed is a very fabulous and hefty amount.

In Pakistan several pop singers and showbiz artistes have placed themselves on the path of serving the poor and marginalized sections of society. They profess to allocate their earnings for their altruistic missions. Some of them have launched relief schemes such as houses for the shelter-less, free healthcare, food supplies, clothing, household items, free schoolings for the children of the poor families and helping the female victim of domestic violence. Some of them claim to provide water, power, paved access roads and pavements in villages where there remains mud or dirt all over.

The People’s Party government too initiated a mammoth program of providing cash assistance to the poor families in Pakistan through the so called, “Benazir Income Support Program”. But as usual, there are a thousand flaws in this otherwise a spectacular scheme that could ensure food and clothing to the hungry and the underdogs of the society. Reprehensibly, the chunks of the huge reservoir of funds are milked by the mighty and the office bearers from the chairperson to the lowest levels.

The program is patently obscure from the public oversight and as such its enormous funds can be easily misappropriated. False and forged lists of the recipients are wide in circulation and money is gobbled in their names by the people in charge of the distribution in a transparent manner.

There are countless complaints that speak for the loathsome reality that the stupendous funds allocated to this highly publicized mega sized income support program are being misused and hugely diverted to the undeserving people, mostly the political supporters and party workers.

Big chunks of the funds are reported to be devoured by such people as party office bearers, MNA’s and MPA’s. This fraudulent distribution of the state funds to the wealthy and influential or touts and thugs cannot be checked by any means as the distributors and custodians also partake in this easily available windfall bounty.

Both the public and private humanitarian and benevolent schemes and lofty welfare plans seem mostly to be either lip service or merely ploys for self-enrichment by the crafty individuals and groups. The poverty still stalks Pakistan and most of the people still hanker for one single meal.
The distinguished visitors like Rahat Fatah Ali Khan are not swindlers nor do they collect foreign exchange for some non-existent or spurious welfare schemes. They are professional singers who by their unique performance and awesome entertainment get the return that is due to them.

Within the United States, the local religious groups and conglomerations keep holding the functions and donation dinners for either building mosques or to fund a social welfare outfit or NGO. These organizations some of whom are one man show are purportedly meant to feed the hungry, provide healthcare to the sick and give funds to those who cannot make their both ends meet.
In almost every mosque In Dallas and Texas where I reside, there are frequent unending appeals for donations and charity to run the mosques. Besides more mosques keep coming up for which a sizeable budget is indispensible. While building of mosques and maintaining these houses of God are virtuous and noble endeavors, very little is being done for community service especially for those who do not have enough earnings to pay their bills and eat comfortably.
The health care bills are staggering and beyond the reasonable limits for most of the immigrants to pay. There is a battalion of doctors who are good Muslims. With the exception of one or two they never thought of providing free or less expensive treatment to their less resourceful co- believers.
Then the Muslim communities are divided along regional, linguistic and ethnic lines. The Muslims from the Middle East remain aloof from their counterparts from other parts of the world. The mosques are treated not as abodes of God but property of particular ethnic community or sect. I have yet to see a homogeneous interaction or solidarity between the Muslims with different regional or national background.

A Spanish female who converted to Islam some ten years ago and is married to an Egyptian Muslim told me that 75 percent converts to Islam in the United States revert to their previous faiths. The reason she outlined was that embracing Islam results mostly getting oneself excommunicated by the family, rejected by the relatives besides being cut off from the society that predominantly professes the Christian faith.

But when, after being motivated by the stunning and impelling demagogy of the Islamic preachers, they enter the fold of Islam, there is hardly anyone coming to their succor by way of either financial support or taking care of their material needs even for the barest minimum living.

Faced with isolation, alienation and social abandonment, and deprived of even courteous calls or interaction by the fellow Muslims, they leave Islam in complete dejection and under overpowering frustration. No one from among the Islamic NGOs and the humanitarian associations is available to even listen to the heart breaking woes of these new converts to Islam. The indigent, neglected, caste away, jobless, ailing, people with immigration problems and target of racial or religious discrimination finally cannot sustain their fervor for Islam and agony of misery and forsake it.

It is praiseworthy and even is a religious duty to disseminate Islamic virtues and teachings to the non- Muslims. But it is equally vital to help the converts to Islam in all possible manners for their survival because they are cast off by their families and religious circles. There should be special committees to take care of those who embrace Islam so that their sacrifice is well rewarded and they do not retract from the new religion.

These committees should establish special funds to provide food, shelter and other necessities of life to the needy till they are economically self reliant. The Muslims with businesses should provide them the jobs on preferential basis. But regrettably no attention has been given to these most urgent and pressing priorities, which could be instrumental in keeping the new Muslims within the fold of Islam and motivating others to join it.

The writer is a senior journalist and a former diplomat. He is also a regular contributor to pkarticleshub.com

May 2, 2012
By Rahimullah Yusufzai

A year after Al Qaida’s founder, Osama Bin Laden, was killed by American commandoes in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad — known for its military institutions, pleasant climate and quality schools — the distrust between Pakistan and the United States has not been overcome.

Rather, the mistrust widened following another incident on November 26, 2011, when Nato air strikes killed 24 Pakistani soldiers in the Mohmand tribal region bordering Afghanistan and caused an outrage in Pakistan. Differences over the circumstances that led to the attack have persisted with Pakistan calling the air strikes deliberate and the US arguing that these were carried out in self-defence.

There was fallout of the deaths of the Pakistani soldiers in what should have essentially been “friendly fire” if Pakistan and the US were truly allies. Pakistan blocked overland supplies for Nato forces in Afghanistan, got vacated its Shamsi airbase in Balochistan from the US drones parked there and boycotted the second Bonn conference on Afghanistan. Such has been the animosity between the two countries that Nato supplies through Pakistan remain blocked five months after the Mohmand Agency incident, the US has continued its drone strikes in Pakistan’s tribal areas using bases in Afghanistan despite Islamabad’s protests and Islamabad and Washington continue to differ on ways and means for fighting the “war on terror” and ending the Afghan conflict.

The relationship wasn’t stable even prior to the raid by helicopter-borne US SEALs on the Abbottabad compound where the world’s most-wanted man had reportedly been living for about six years. Their ties were prone to misgivings and uncertainty, but both sides overlooked the differences and focused on the positives to make the relationship work. However, the Abbottabad attack embarrassed and angered the Pakistan government and its powerful military beyond their endurance level. Complaints of being kept in the dark by their American allies were made and it was argued that US had violated Pakistan’s borders and sovereignty in a manner not seen before.

The US had reasons to celebrate Bin Laden’s elimination as he was its public enemy No 1, blamed not only for the 9/11 attacks, but also quite a few in the past. US President Barack Obama could not let go an opportunity to eliminate Bin Laden after the missed chance in Tora Bora in Afghanistan in December 2001. Upsetting a distrustful ally, Pakistan, wasn’t too big a price to pay if the Obama administration could finally track down and kill Bin Laden. In the process, the US could deliver a strong message that it possessed the capability to take revenge even if the enemy was hiding in another corner of the world.

Unlike the US which declared Bin Laden’s death as a major achievement, for Pakistan it was a huge embarrassment. It has been suggested that Islamabad feigned ignorance even though the US had informed a few top civil and military officials in Pakistan about the Abbottabad raid without identifying that the “high-value” target was Bin Laden because it was felt this would be a lesser embarrassment than admitting that it knew about the intruding American helicopters and yet was unable to do anything about it. The situation could become clear if the Abbottabad Commission set up by the Pakistan government to probe the incident manages to independently finalise its report and persuades the authorities to make its findings public. The commission has been holding its sessions for a year now and has interviewed more than 100 eyewitnesses, civil and military officials, analysts, and even Bin Laden’s three wives.

Efforts to repair the damage to Pakistan-US relations have continued and recently the first high-level American civil and military officials visited Pakistan after the Mohmand Agency incident last November. The talks did not yield any breakthrough as the new terms of engagements recommended by Pakistan’s parliament are problematic for the US, which has its own set of demands in response to those made by Pakistan for an end to the drone strikes and conditional reopening of the Nato supply lines.

As for Al Qaida, Bin Laden’s assassination was the most severe blow it suffered to date. It had been weakened by the Nato military operations in Afghanistan and by Pakistan’s security forces in the tribal areas. The capture of several Al Qaida figures in Pakistan and the death of many others in US drone strikes had further diminished its strength.

Under its new leader, Ayman Al Zawahiri, Al Qaida has been striving to remain relevant to the changing situation best exemplified by the Arab Spring that has empowered the Arab masses to bring peaceful political change in their countries. In hiding apparently in Pakistan and struggling to survive after Bin Laden’s assassination, Al Zawahiri’s foremost weapon nowadays is his frequent videotape messages on issues concerning the Islamic world and the West.

Though Al Qaida isn’t finished and a hardcore of its members still believe that terrorist strikes are the only way to tackle the US and its allies, it is finding it difficult to attract new recruits, provide finances for its activities and control territory in sovereign states.

I knew from two meetings with Bin Laden in 1998 in Afghanistan that he wished to die rather than being captured by the US and humiliated and it so happened that his wish was fulfilled on May 2, 2011. He was also conscious about his legacy and the depleted Al Qaida is now facing an uphill battle to keep it alive and inspire a new generation of followers. Ironically, the unseen image of a dead Bin Laden is being used by President Obama as a resounding achievement of his presidency and a reason why he deserves re-election.

Rahimullah Yusufzai is a senior journalist based in Peshawar.
Source: Gulf News

May 2, 2012
By Tariq Fatemi

For those of us whose primary interest is national security issues, the prime minister’s conviction by the Supreme Court could not have come at a more awkward moment for our relations with the United States.

Pakistan has had many spats with the US, but US Special Envoy Mark Grossman’s meetings with the country’s leadership last week was another reminder of how concern about domestic fallouts has come to impinge on decision-making in both countries, even on foreign policy issues.

Though our relationship with the US is replete with episodes of breakdowns, none has agitated our people with greater anguish than the Salala tragedy. Developments thereafter confirmed that the euphoria associated with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s claim of a “strategic partnership” proved as short-lived and inconsequential, as spring snow in Washington. Moreover, fearing a crescendo in anti-American sentiments, the government acquiesced to demands that parliament undertake a review of relations with the US. Not only did the process proceed at a desultory pace; the government did nothing to restrain those who sought to whip up popular passions in the guise of national honour and dignity. In the process, the government may have scored a few brownie points, but today finds itself in the straitjacket imposed by the parliamentary resolution. The US response was not exemplary either, for fearing a backlash from the Republicans, US President Barack Obama has been hesitant to offer an apology which, had it been tendered in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy, would have done much to assuage hurt feelings here.

Though Grossman tried to remain upbeat, highlighting US priority in the reopening of Nato supply routes while offering release of our Coalition Support Fund claims, the impression of a stalemate was confirmed by US officials to the New York Times, especially on the issue of ‘apology’ and drone attacks. The American position reportedly stiffened on suspicion that the April 15 attacks on Kabul had been carried out by the Haqqani network, which is suspected of having ties with Pakistani intelligence agencies.

The continuing mistrust and resultant crisis in Pakistan-US relations can help neither country, nor promote the cause of peace in Afghanistan, especially at a time when the Afghan endgame necessitates greater coordination and enhanced understanding between the two countries.

The US would do well to recognise that Pakistan’s demand for an apology is justified and should be acceded to expeditiously. So, too, should it show understanding for Pakistan’s serious reservations about drone attacks, instead of refusing “to listen”, as Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar has complained. Of course, Pakistan has to remain engaged, to either convince the US as to why the drone attacks are now no longer permissible or to come clean and tell the people when, why and under what circumstances we had agreed to these operations. For the US, the reopening of the Nato supply routes is critical and surely an understanding can be reached if the US were to give an assurance that only non-lethal goods would be transported. The US can also make it more palatable by agreeing to random inspection and paying for damage to the highways and road system. With regard to the Haqqani network, it is true that neither the US nor Nato allies can afford to ignore brazen and well-coordinated attacks on Afghan cities, which may not have inflicted heavy casualties but did become a source of major embarrassment. The US cannot, however, ask Pakistan to launch attacks on the Haqqani network, while itself engaging the Taliban in a dialogue.

Political turmoil and increasing uncertainty at home are likely to adversely impact our ability to focus on critical foreign policy issues. This must not, however, weaken our resolve to conclude speedily and on a mutually satisfactory basis, the resetting of our relations with the US. The overriding objective should be to renegotiate a more sustainable relationship, one that recognises the capacities and limitations of the partnership. Stalemate is not an option for either!

-The Express Tribune

By Syed Talat Hussain
Published: May 3, 2012

The writer is a senior journalist and works for Dawn News

Pakistan’s relations with the US are in a royal mess. However, there is little realisation, and even less acknowledgment, of the troubled path that lies ahead. Instead, a bizarre exercise in sugar-coating bilateral bitterness continues unabated. In a recent speech, foreign minister Hina Rabbani Khar mistook her rich imagination for facts. She said: “We are working with our American friends to establish an ecosystem in which we can both do for each other the things that we can mutually benefit from”.

This requires serious grammatical and diplomatic deciphering. More seriously, this is outlandish official optimism that is irrelevant to reality. The fact of the matter is that the recent meetings in Islamabad, with the US Special Envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan Marc Grossman and his team, were an unmitigated disaster. These were marked by exceptional stiffness in Washington’s stance and Islamabad’s inability to solicit even a vague assurance from the visitors that they were willing to take the high-flying terms and conditions set by parliament to re-engage with the US seriously.

Grossman minced no words. Various sources confirm that he was straight as a rod in saying no to “a simply-worded but clear apology”. The message was: “Whatever Washington has said so far is what there is going to be as far as an apology for the Salala incident is concerned”. Out-of-the-box efforts by Ambassador Sherry Rehman to somehow create a middle ground for the apology failed. These were too little, too late, and too detached from parliament’s stance. On the gridlock on Nato supplies, Grossman made it clear that Pakistan’s participation in the important upcoming Nato Summit was subject to the opening of the routes. The same precondition was attached to Islamabad getting some of the Coalition Support Fund (CSF) reimbursements. There was also disagreement on the total amount that Washington is expected to pay to Pakistan. The over-$3 billion cash crop that the government was hoping to reap was reduced to half and that, too, if the traffic carrying sinews of war against Afghans began to flow from Pakistan into Afghanistan. On drone attacks, the US position remained rigid. As the attack in Miramshah indicated, this policy, too, would continue. Washington is in no mood to pay heed to the “collective will of the people’s representatives” in Pakistan or to lend a serious ear to the hollow chest thumping by the country’s foreign office over this relentless breach of national sovereignty. To cut a long story short, what the US is telling Islamabad is that ‘you may not like it but you got to lump it’.

Incredibly, this is exactly what Ms Khar, under the able guidance of the PM house and the presidency is inclined towards doing — lumping all that she and her bosses publicly spit at with exaggerated and fake contempt. The rulers in Islamabad are seriously thinking of reopening the Nato supplies even without getting any apology from Washington — something that was offered two months ago but was postponed on Islamabad’s request just to make parliament’s recommendations look more credible.

There is little or no preparation to deal with the awkward situation of drones pounding targets inside Pakistan and Nato supplies moving smoothly through a formal agreement at the same time. Desperate for the CSF money and caught in its own trap of publicly debating and posturing on sensitive issues of foreign policy, the current lot in Islamabad has no action plan to stabilise the wonky equation with the US. There is not even a stopgap arrangement, much less a properly conceived game plan.

Washington has sensed this lack of direction and has upped the ante. Moreover, whatever little attention the so-called principals of policymaking could pay to the urgent task of redefining relations with the US, is now being expended in saving the skin of a convicted PM, and through him, the president himself. There is little coordination and even less internal cohesion. The army high command had to consult its legal advisers to know whether the meeting chaired by Yousaf Raza Gilani after his conviction was legal for them to attend or not. The president’s meeting with the Grossman team was incoherent and directionless. President Asif Ali Zardari’s grasp of serious matters was on astounding display as he rattled off his “worked view” without consulting anyone. The last leg of the Grossman tour ended on a grossly tame note, and most notepads in this meeting with the president remained unused. Nobody could figure out what was being said.

Washington has mapped the internal weakness of the government very well.
The US knows that beggars will be losers if they try to become choosers. It is piling up pressure and tightening the screws. This is the ecosystem that is developing between Pakistan and the US. Ms Khar will be well-advised to read the weather report correctly.

The Express Tribune

Mohammad Malick
Friday, May 04, 2012


The writer is editor The News, Islamabad.

The US and Pakistani governments are eager to get on with life after renegotiating their terms of engagement, or endearment, if you will. Marc Grossman and other top guns have been flying in and out of town and hectic negotiations are going on in Islamabad. On Thursday evening, Ambassador Munter was scheduled to separately call on the foreign minister, the foreign secretary and Pakistan’s envoy to the United States. In a similar vein, parlays are being held at various levels, both declared and secret. There is a palpable sense of urgency and the peace making intentions of both aides appear kosher. But are only positive intentions enough?

For the reconciliation process to gain traction and momentum, one side must give more than the other, at least in the initial stage. ‘Who?’ is the question. The two sides will have to take the zeal out of their respective policy positions and replace it with pragmatism if they are to lay the foundation of a viable strategic relationship based on long-term positive objectives rather than transient tactical negatives.

For the moment, a mix of domestic compulsions and typical negotiating tactics have forced both sides to adopt tough public postures. That President Obama faces election later this year as does the ruling establishment in Pakistan, give or take a few months, has made sensible diplomacy subservient to short term political priorities. The yawning gap of mistrust between the two sides only adds to the complexity of the situation. To develop a mutually acceptable common narrative however, we need to first have a clear understanding of the two conflicting narratives.

The American narrative: “These Pakistanis call themselves our allies, take our billions, but run with the Haqqanis. Instead of getting the terrorists they grant them safe havens. Heck, they even blocked war supplies to our troops in Afghanistan. The military intelligence establishment has been playing double games with us. Now they want a seat of honour at the all-important Nato summit in Chicago later this month but do not want to make any conciliatory gesture to earn the invitation. They insist that nothing moves forward on GLOCs till President Obama issues a public apology for Salala. These guys must be joking. There was a time we had agreed to offering this apology but the Pakistanis told us that “it was not the right time”. The apology offer wasn’t going to remain on the table forever. Jesus, will someone tell these guys the world does not move on Islamabad standard time. They keep complaining about how we are not paying the stuck up $1 billion due under CSF but never talk about how they overbilled us on several occasions.

“They think that they are holding all the cards in Afghanistan. Well guess what, it’s time to cut these guys down to size and let them known that the train is leaving the station, with or without them. Just like Chicago is happening and the long-term Nato vision on Afghanistan will be spelled out, with or without them. Instead of taking ownership of foreign policy making, the government first passed the buck to parliament and now appears reluctant to take steps to translate ambiguous recommendations into practical measures.

“It’s time they realised that with every passing month their leverage based on the Afghan issue is decreasing and once we are out, and we will be, no matter how battered and bruised, that influence will diminish drastically. And lord help them if they think the American public and media no longer have the appetite for the US administration going for costlier and more complicated alternatives to Pakistan in the Afghanistan situation. The truth is that the mood back home is in favour of kicking the Pakistani rearend and nothing sells better than a John Wayne approach in an election year. They need our billions in aid, our nod to IMF and WB for life saving loans, ours and the European markets for trade and still think they can tell the US and Nato to go to hell?”

The Pakistani narrative: “The Yanks suffer from typical imperial arrogance. They attach strings to every offer, every gesture, including an invitation to Chicago. We missed Bonn and will miss Chicago too if we must, if not accorded due respect and importance. But tackling Afghanistan while keeping out Pakistan is about as intelligent as expecting peace in Afghanistan without engaging the Haqqanis and their allied Taliban. They call us allies but treat us like some rent-an-army-and-a-country for a few dollars. They engage in cold blooded slaughter of our 27 soldiers and officers and have the cheek to not only refuse to apologise but also insist that it was not their fault. They do not comprehend the enormous symbolism of an apology for Salala. An apology must come. We can always discuss the wording and have been waiting for a draft from the US as well, but the Washington guys need to come down from their high horses. Nothing begins without some sort of an apology.

“They go behind our backs, invade the country, and create this Osama drama. Instead of acknowledging our cooperation over the years they accuse us of being either complicit or incompetent while we have lost thousands of troops, officers and people in fighting terrorism. Their flat refusal to budge an inch on the modalities of drone attacks has left us with little maneuvering room in the face of a hostile media and public opinion. Droning the targets is one thing, drowning the government an altogether different matter.

“The Yanks have been trying to keep us out of the loop while engaging one Afghan group after another and also carving an unreasonably big role for India in Afghanistan’s future. That they will fail in such efforts is a given but they keep trying nevertheless and try undermining our legitimate interests in Afghanistan. They expect us to use our influence with the Haqqanis to bring them to the negotiating table but persecute us for maintaining links with them. What impractical duplicity.

“They are treating our parliamentary recommendations with contempt and do not understand the political implications of us being perceived as capitulating before the Americans if we go ahead with reopening routes without any tangible gestures from the other side. When a bigger power makes a concession it is called honourable generosity, but a similar initiative by the smaller one is berated as shameless capitulation. We may be in a position to reciprocate any gesture of generosity but not to make one. We definitely need to re-embrace the US but not end up in a deadly bear hug.”

Short-term solution: It will take a long time and sustained efforts to reconcile the two narratives, neither being totally unjustified. The US must make the first ‘gesture’ to start the stalled process. An apology for Salala is a must and such a public apology will also go a long way in securing tactical private support on a mutually agreed drone programme. An invite to Chicago must come without any conditions, and come now. It would do wonders if the stuck up CSF payments were released ‘un-conditonally’. The US must use its influence to mend relations between Kabul and Islamabad instead of exploiting them for myopic short-term tactical advantages. Pakistan must be kept in the loop on Afghanistan. For its part, Pakistan must stop playing the victim, stop lying to its allies and stop being duplicitous. It should instead openly spell out its national interests and hold the line. We need the world more than it needs us, and the sooner we realise this the better.

Email: mohammad.malick1@gmail.com

-The News

Posted on May 5, 2012 by admin786| Leave a comment
By: Inayatullah

The Pakistan-US talks on a revised relationship stand stalled. Who is suffering more because of this delay? Obviously Pakistan!

The drone attacks continue and so do Nato supplies by air. The US is, of course, keen to have the land route reopened. The alternative land route is longer and costlier. Supplies through the northern side have continued all along.

It is now generally conceded that Pakistan’s insistence on a public apology for the Salala slaughter has lost steam with the USA unwilling to do so. Washington, it is understood, was ready to do it after the Hillary-Hina meeting in London, but the government in Pakistan then advised the US to wait for the parliamentary review. It is no longer considered politic for Barack Obama to do so on the eve of US presidential elections.

The attacks in Kabul with the finger pointing at the Haqqani group based in Pakistan have stiffened the US stance. Other developments with far-reaching consequences as the signing of a new pact by Presidents Obama and Karzai in Kabul extending US stay by 10 years is bound to have broad implications for the future of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The Qatar initiative with the Taliban has come to a halt for various reasons, including delay in the release of a number of Guantanamo prisoners and delisting of certain individuals from the UN Security Council’s sanction list. The “trilateral core group” meeting held in Islamabad last week to bring about reconciliation in Afghanistan too has ended without any substantial results.

Mr Obama, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize after he became President, has been hailed as “warrior-in-chief” by a well known American writer Peter L. Berger: “Soon after Mr Obama took office, he reframed the fight against terrorism. Liberals wanted to cast anti-terrorism efforts in terms of global law enforcement – rather than war. The President did not choose this path and instead declared war against Al-Qaeda and its allies.

“Compare Mr Obama’s use of drone strikes with that of his predecessor. During the Bush administration, there was a drone an American attack in Pakistan every 43 days; during the first two years of the Obama administration, there was a drone strike there every four days. And two years into his presidency, the President was engaged in conflicts in six Muslim countries: Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen and Libya.

“The man who went to Washington as an “anti-war” President was more Teddy Roosevelt than Jimmy Carter. It took Mr Obama only a few weeks to act in Libya in the spring of 2011 when Colonel Muammar el-Qaddafi threatened to massacre large portions of the Libyan population. (Declared Obama) I will not hesitate to use military force to take out terrorists who pose a direct threat to America. Once in office, Mr Obama signed off on a large increase in the number of CIA officers on the ground in Pakistan and an intensified campaign of drone warfare there.

“Mr Obama plans to be in Chicago for the Nato summit meeting in late May, just as the election campaign heats up. He will arrive knowing that the United States and Afghanistan have already agreed to a long-term strategic partnership that is likely to involve thousands of American soldiers in Afghanistan, in advisory roles, after combat operations end in 2014.”

All this serves to establish that Obama is tough and inclined to be ruthless.

In sharp contrast to a determined administration in USA, all that we have in Pakistan is a weak, dithering and vulnerable federal government.

First, they shifted responsibility to the Parliamentary Committee to frame and finalise recommendations. Even after these recommendations were made, little of constructive work has been done. No clear policy lines have been formulated. And time, a scarce commodity for Pakistan, has rolled on.

Not only was there no debate in Parliament, little has been done to take people and all parties into confidence on such issues of vital importance for the future of the country.

While there is weight in asking for an ‘apology’, no headway has been made to get this part of the new deal sorted out. The invitation for the Chicago Conference has not been received. What if Pakistan is not invited and decisions are taken about Afghanistan by passing Islamabad?

Now that the drone strikes have restarted signalling a rejection of one of the important parliamentary recommendations, how is Islamabad to negotiate new terms of engagement? The defiance of the highest court of the country has made Pakistan a laughing stock amongst the comity of nations. If we gleefully demonstrate disrespect to our supreme national institution, is the world going to pay much respect to our claims and postures?

The fact of the matter is that the government of the day lacks the will and the capacity to take clear and feasible decisions. Salala took place six months ago. We are still considering how to move forward to address its fallout. Increasing instability in the country is bound to have its toll.

The US special representative, Marc Grossman, and his team have had a number of meetings with top-notch Pakistanis, civil and military officeholders. Little of any concrete results, however, have come so far.

All that we have been left with is a wishy-washy statement from our Foreign Office spokesperson given at the weekly media briefing last Thursday. Mr Moazzam Ahmad Khan said that another meeting of the Defence Committee of the Cabinet was being held to “review mechanism to implement parliamentary recommendations.” He referred to the meetings with Grossman. He expected that the US would show “more understanding and patience.”

What “more understanding and patience”?

There is little realisation that dithering, dragging of feet and the circus that Pakistani politics has become, have only added to the complexity of the issues involved. With an economy going down by the day, with soaring internal and external debt, and with the law and order in tatters, an indecisive Pakistan is a sitting duck to be hit from right and left.

Political opposition alone can compel the government to see reason and not further jeopardise the country’s interests. It is unfortunate that there is no such united effort to inject sense into the federal ruling elite.

Just imagine a tainted head of state pitted against a determined and ruthless President of the most powerful country in the world and wonder about the days to come.

The writer is an ex-federal secretary and ambassador, and political and international relations analyst.

Email: pacade@brain.net.pk
-The Nation

May 6, 2012
By Arif Ansar

If anyone doubted that US and Afghanistan would not be able to reach a strategic deal, that notion was dispelled this week. President Obama arrived in Kabul on Tuesday for a nighttime mission to sign a strategic pact with his Afghan counterpart, President Karzai. The agreement defines the American role in Afghanistan beyond 2014, when its forces are expected to withdraw.

What’s astounding is how little is known about the composition of the agreement. For the most part, the critical aspects such as the level of economic assistance and the strength of troops will be defined later. In other words, the deal is vague in details, and it is hard to ascertain what facts and assumptions became the basis for it. This is not obviously accidental; most of this is to cover US strategic intent and posture.

If one starts to follow the headlines and what is known about the ground reality, it presents a bleak picture for the coalition forces and the present Afghan government. Taliban have recently been able to carry out such brazen attacks in Kabul that even an optimist would be forced to convert. After a decade of warfare, things are not getting any better even in the capital.

So where does this leave any rational western policymaker? There is a realisation that they cannot kill their way to victory. If it were so, Vietnam would not have turned out the way it did. This does not mean that deadly force does not work; the case of Japan presents a different example. However, in the present environment, both these options are not viable. If it were not due to economic compulsions and lessons of history, NATO would have probably carried on indefinitely in Afghanistan.

These stark realities have forced the mission more towards smart technologies (drones) and the use of Special Forces. Yes, it is important to eliminate the enemy foot soldiers, but more significant, in the new premise, is to go after and neutralise the head honchos, wherever they reside. As it appears now, the political reconciliation will only come after. No wonder the negotiations with the Taliban are in such disarray.

Things get quite murky when we talk of the mission. What was the US objective in Afghanistan and what would signify its accomplishment? US came to Afghanistan after 9/11 to eliminate Al-Qaeda and prevent Afghanistan from ever becoming a safe haven for extremists. However, overtime, not only Afghanistan and FATA have persisted as the safe havens, but many new ones are emerging in northern Africa and Middle East. Thus, the scope of the mission and its reach is increasing by the day while the economic resources needed to back such a tremendous undertaking are dwindling.

According to the strategy that came out of Obama’s review of Afghan policy, any group that parts with Al-Qaeda will be included in the reconciliation process. In reality, Quetta Shura and Haqqani network have remained on the US hit list while Kashmiri jihadists, such Lashkar-e-Tayyiba (LeT), have also made it on the list. There is no evidence to suggest the crosspollination between these groups has decreased.

PoliTact had noted in earlier assessment that extending the mission beyond Al-Qaeda to other affiliate groups is going to complicate the mission. This goal is certainly not achievable by the 2014 deadline. Furthermore, this approach is reinforcing the perception that US presence in the region has less to do with Afghanistan and is more about Iran and Pakistan. During a talk at the Woodrow Wilson Center back in November, a former White House senior aide Vali Nasr had predicted that the future US presence in the region is going to be more about Pakistan and Iran.

The evolution has also raised questions in the American policy circles that Afghanistan should not be consuming a major chunk of resources, especially as the war against terror is now not limited to any one country. Furthermore, the focus of the fight against extremists and non-state actors should not distract US and NATO from preparing against the emerging state actors in the Asia Pacific. Ultimately, both these influences are impacting global power politics. Middle East, where many of the new safe haves are popping up, is a major energy source for the established and the emerging powers. The political wrangling over Iran’s nuclear ambition, and how the US sanctions on its oil exports are playing out, provide an interesting case study.

Soon after the agreement was signed, US emphasised that it does not want a long-term military bases in Afghanistan. These clarifications were directed more at Pakistan and Iran. The motives of China and Russia are more complex. On the one hand, China and Russia will like to see US remain entangled in Afghanistan and thus avoid its full concentration. On the other hand, both countries are concerned about loosing their allies. At some level, both nations also sympathise with the US; China has problems with Muslim extremists in Xinjiang province while Russia continues to have disturbances in Dagestan and Chechnya. The US-Afghan strategic agreement needs to be understood in this global context.

Nonetheless, a primarily military approach to the Afghan conflict has not worked up to this point and there is minimal chance it will in the future. While the status quo cannot prevail, change brought upon by force is not likely to last either. The best way to bring about transformation is to convince those impacted by it, on how they will benefit from the change.

In this respect, quick results on the Afghanistan-Pakistan-India economic and trade cooperation, also known as the New Silk Road initiative, provides the best hope. For it to work though, Iran would also have to be on board. Additionally, the reasons behind the trust deficit amongst different players will have to be genuinely addressed. In a recent meeting of the Afghan-India Council in New Delhi, it was decided that India would soon host an investment meeting on Afghanistan. Thirteen countries are to be invited to this forum, including Iran, Pakistan, Russian and China. It is this kind of transparent diplomacy that presents the best chance of renovating the region.

The writer is the chief analyst for PoliTact (www.PoliTact.com and http:twitter.com/politact) and can be reached at aansar@politact.com
-Pakistan Today

May 6, 2012
By ATIF K. BUTT

It’s been a decade when the US invaded Afghanistan with the world’s most modern and well-trained military force including troops of more than 40 countries equipped with latest weaponry. After spending a large span of ten years and billions of dollars, the US and its allies are not in a position to claim that they have completely taken over the control of Afghanistan. The recent attacks of Taliban on the US, British, German and Japanese embassies and the NATO headquarters in Kabul are evident that the foreign forces led by the US are unable to protect themselves and they are so vulnerable even in their stronghold that happens to be the capital of Afghanistan as well. The incident is not the only one of its kind but it is one of the incidents that occur almost every month in Kabul or in other cities of the war-hit country.

It’s a fact that the US and its allies cannot stay in Afghanistan without Pakistan’s support. Had Pakistan not provided its soil to the US-led NATO forces to invade Afghanistan, the history would have been written in a very different manner. From day one, Pakistan is working as a frontline ally of the US in the war on terror and they also have a history of healthy mutual relations. But now their relationship has come to a point where both of the allies are revisiting their terms of engagement with each other. Opinion makers and parliamentarians in Pakistan feel that the drone attacks inside Pakistani territory are fuelling hatred against America. This has also been conveyed to the US administration many times that these attacks are affecting the public opinion in Pakistan negatively.

The statistics show that civilian casualties during the drone attacks are more than double as compared to the number of militants that were killed by this unmanned weapon. Even many innocent children have lost their lives due to these attacks. The civilian killings are really condemnable and they are totally unacceptable, no matter you call it collateral damage or what. Even the US administration knows that the attacks are against the international law as they are killing the innocents more in number. Besides hatred against the US, these attacks have become a source for the promotion of militant ideology in the areas where they have killed women and innocent children. Instead of chasing the militants with drones, if the US had spent even half of the amount, that it had invested into the drone technology for the Afghan-bordering areas of Pakistan, to promote education, the scenario would have been very different today.

The recent drone attack on a girls’ high school in North Waziristan’s Miranshah area is first of its kind as it has hit an educational institution. Had it been a working day the damage could be far more than expectation. This incident could become another bone of contention between the two countries as Pakistan’s Foreign Office has condemned the attacked and has termed it as the violation of country’s sovereignty. The FO also summoned Political Counsellor of the US Embassy in Islamabad Jonathon Pratt and registered its protest with him. This kind of attacks and violations of the international law and Pakistan’s sovereignty might become a big trouble for the US and the NATO forces in the days to come.

An important summit of all the stake holders in Afghanistan is going to be held on 20 and 21 of this month to discuss the withdrawal of NATO troops from the war-torn country starting in the start of 2014. If the US administration did not realise that the drone attacks are not helpful for them and if such strikes continued, it might not be possible for Pakistan to participate in the NATO conference. In the recent months, Pakistan has already boycotted a very important meeting regarding the fate of Afghanistan in Bonn, Germany, after an airstrike by the NATO helicopters on a check post killing 28 Pakistani soldiers. Moreover, the future drone strikes could also halt the possibilities of reopening of the NATO supply line in Pakistan.

Atif K. Butt is a Lahore-based journalist and can be accessed at atifk.butt@gmail.com.
Source: counterpunch

May 8, 2012
By Shahzad Chaudhry

I must admit I have been a supporter of getting on with the Americans. My reasons have been pretty straight: stopping the war in Afghanistan is key to bringing about some control over the violence that has engulfed Pakistan. And this can only happen if a semblance of stability takes hold in Afghanistan giving enough confidence to the Americans to be reassured about their 2014 withdrawal as planned, if not a year earlier. Withdrawal of foreign forces will nullify the primary cause of Afghan resistance and could lead to increased chances of peace and stability. That is also the key to the Afghans vacating Pakistani territories and proceeding back to their own country. Left with its own deviants, Pakistan can then employ the necessary means to bring them back to the normal fold, or at least, have a clearly defined ‘Enemy of the State’ that it must put down.

For the war to stop then the Pakistanis and the Americans must work together and that is only possible if they are talking to each other. The inverse is true as well. Any reason given to the American military machine to hang on to Afghanistan means a continuation of the war and the associated strife; which really means Pakistan remains in the hot-house that it has been in ever since this war against terror began. I mean that much more in the socioeconomic sense, which then becomes the perpetuating factor of both the war and the associated socioeconomic strife by providing easy recruits out of an increasingly dispossessed population. Obviously we want out of this dark hole. Pakistan must do all to make it easier for the Americans to leave, even if that means working with them in the face of popular anti-Americanism — despite Salala and the drones.

Why can’t we get on with the Americans? Simply, because the combined wisdom of parliament among other things has suggested that the Americans offer an apology over Salala, and that the Americans must cease drone operations over Pakistan? When these prerequisites are met, will the relationship be reestablished along some agreed lines and supplies from Pakistan begin to flow?

The apology bit first.

The Americans played hard with Pakistan after Salala by first refusing to accept their obvious mistake when they killed 26 Pakistani troops in a deliberately targeted attack that violated all precepts of war by using disproportionate force, practically picking out each soldier in engagement with gunship helicopters. Their effort to browbeat Pakistan into accepting their rather innocuous inquiry into this homicidal adventure was successfully thwarted. They have reluctantly come around to a popular Pakistani position that has demanded an unqualified apology over the incident. However, this was some time back.

Feelers began to arrive sometime in February that the US indeed might offer a public apology. It was widely believed that this might happen when Hillary Clinton and Hina Khar were to meet in London somewhere around that time. But by then, Pakistan had taken a popular public position that relations with America were now to be guided by parliament — and the government sought a delay with a view to time it with a parliamentary committee’s completion of the review process, as well as to accrue political gains domestically. Pakistan missed an opportunity which, though largely symbolic, would have added space for a reset of the bilateral relations. Both sides need to get through this despite the distinct possibility that each will now need to pay a political price for it.

Next on to the drones: the other beast that is complex in strategic effect, yet brilliant in tactical utility. Both sides frame the proposition on drones in a different light and it is important that the contexts be clearly understood. First, whom does the strategic negativity of using drones affect? Not the US, since to the Americans its application is purely tactical, meant to gain tactical benefit, and feeds into their larger military objective of weakening the Taliban and eliminating al Qaeda. The adverse strategic fallout is for Pakistan which must face up to a local reaction when such disproportional force is used to eliminate a few militants (and which ends up taking the lives of a few more in the vicinity of the target(s) — the unintended collateral damage). Drones provide to the Americans a disproportionate advantage that tilts the battlefield in their favour. Do the Americans mind that? This mismatch of the nature of effects to both sides, tactical versus strategic, makes it a rather complex issue to agree on. Parliament’s insistence that this remains an essential precondition makes matters worse.

Drones are a bonafide tool of war, and a brilliant one at that. Their use — at times in support of Pakistan’s own operations against militants — has given beneficial dividends. Any side which perceives being aggressed upon by the presence of drones though has the right to intercept those and bring them down. Pakistan is wary of such a route because of the implied consequences and because that may give reason to the Americans to first, expand the war and drone targets to the Pakistani territories, and two, make them stay longer in Afghanistan (which would end up countervailing Islamabad’s strategic interest in seeing the Americans leave Afghanistan sooner than later).

As for parliament’s role, it has to be said that parliamentary enunciations of popular sentiment as a policy guideline is not a good idea. Even if the advice is not binding, such formulations can exercise a regressive pull if the negotiations towards such a policy are meant to find an agreeable mean. That flexibility must stay with the negotiators and is the space in which agreements can be decided upon. So what is the solution? We should avoid insisting on any of these as quid pro quo if the intent is to indeed find a workable framework with the US. We need to work around them; negotiate an agreeable operational methodology for the drones; it may be the more acceptable evil when compared with the alternatives that an ongoing war can throw at us.

-The Express Tribune