THE assault by terrorists on a naval aviation base in Karachi has once again demonstrated the extent of the roots of terrorism in the country.

Even if the attackers did not have sympathisers and informants inside, the way they carried out the assault shows they had an active network in neighbouring areas and an operational cell through which they managed to procure heavy weapons and carry them into the naval base. The same can be said of other high-profile terrorist attacks targeting security forces throughout the country, including the October 2009 attack on GHQ in Rawalpindi.

The spread and reach of terrorists in Pakistan has become a critical challenge for the state. The attacks that they have launched have shown that they are capable of striking anywhere in the country. And yet ambiguity remains pervasive in society on the issue of terrorism. The collective mindset reflects a state of out-and-out denial.

The conventional approach to threat perception in Pakistan is a major obstacle to understanding the gravity of the situation. Whether they publicly admit it or not, Pakistani security officials and policymakers consider madressahs and religiously inclined communities to be more receptive or vulnerable to absorbing violent tendencies. That approach is also reflected in the country’s counter-terrorism strategies and is on display everyday at security checkpoints, where every bearded man is seen as a suspect. The madressahs indeed have a significant share in the ongoing wave of violence, and many analysts believe that between 10 and 15 per cent of them have direct or indirect links with terrorist organisations. But focusing on them alone amounts to taking a simplistic view of a wider problem.

A closer look at the cadre of militant organisations involved in Kashmir and Afghanistan finds mainly youth educated at formal educational institutions. Student wings of religious political parties as well as sectarian, charity, radical and militant organisations remain active in colleges and universities. Other wings of such organisations seek to influence various segments of society.

Almost every religious organisation, whether its ambitions are political, sectarian or militant, maintains wings with a specific focus on women, traders, lawyers, doctors and teachers, among others. These wings play a considerable role in promoting radicalisation and have an array of tools at their disposal to increase their influence. They consistently rely on radical literature and publications and disseminate the message not only through the usual printed word but also through CDs and DVDs. Militant organisations in Pakistan are increasingly using the Internet as an instrument to promote radicalisation and spur recruitment, with the youth as their specific target.

International terrorist organisations, such as Al Qaeda, have also benefited from this level of radicalisation, by generating financial and human resources as well as cultivating favourable perceptions among the populace in some parts of the country. According to an Asia Online report, several hundred students from Karachi affiliated with the student wing of an offshoot of a religious political party have joined Al Qaeda training camps in North Waziristan Agency in Fata. The report described that as a more dangerous development for Pakistan than any previous Al Qaeda alliance, as student wings can boast Al Qaeda’s recruitment drive and enhance its political influence.

One of the most critical segments of society in the country includes government departments, mainly security institutions, where the infiltration of terrorists and extremists is increasing by all accounts. Former president Gen Pervez Musharraf admitted in 2004 that some junior officials of the Pakistan Army and Pakistan Air Force (PAF) had links with terrorist organisations. Later, 57 PAF employees were arrested in connection with an assassination attempt on Gen Musharraf. At least some of the arrested PAF employees have also been convicted on the charge. Dr Usman, the mastermind of the October 2009 GHQ attack, was a deserter from the army’s medical corps.

The terrorists have also penetrated other government institutions besides the security agencies. According to the Pakistan Security Report 2010 by the Islamabad-based think tank Pak Institute for Peace Studies (PIPS), the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government had constituted a committee to sack government employees found guilty of supporting militants. As many as 165 government employees were sacked on that ground.

The former divisional commissioner of Malakand, Syed Muhammad Jawed, who was taken into custody for suspected links with terrorists, may be one example of the terrorists’ influence in high places. There are many more, which shows the vulnerability of state institutions. Last year, police in Islamabad arrested an employee of the Council of Islamic Ideology, who had allegedly helped Faisal Shahzad, the New York bomb plot suspect who was convicted on terrorism charges.

The challenge is considerable by all means but it has become graver still because a coherent counter-terrorism and counter-militancy policy and the requisite vigilance by government agencies continue to remain absent. Accurate threat perception is the key to an effective response to terrorist threats. A clear approach that does not make distinctions on dubious grounds of good and bad militants is required. Vetting and security clearance of government officials, mainly in law-enforcement departments, is more crucial than ever.

Better policing and coordination among law-enforcement agencies must be the obvious first steps, but it is also abundantly clear by now that a one-size-fits-all security approach would not work in Pakistan anymore simply because of the dissimilar security challenges. For instance, security threats in the tribal areas and parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are inherently different from those in Punjab and urban Sindh. The tribal areas are in the throes of an extremist militancy, which has a local and regional context and the militants have resorted to violent terrorism as a tactic against the security forces.

In mainland Pakistan, however, terrorism has its roots in the ideological, political and sectarian narratives developed by the religious parties, militant groups and, at times, by the state itself. The disparate nature of threats calls for an equally diverse and imaginative approach to counter them.

Roots of terrorism | Opinion | DAWN.COM

By Mohammad Waseem

THE debate about the cre ation of new provinces remains alive. Shahbaz Sharif’s remarks about looking towards Karachi in Sindh rather than the Seraiki in Punjab regarding this agenda led to a severe backlash from the MQM and PPP.

Later, the PML-Q was exposed to internal divisions on the issue of creating the Hazara province. Prime Minister Gilani has promised to put the Seraiki province on the agenda after the next elections. After partition, India acknowl edged language as a legitimate entity for the political community. It took up the comprehensive project of reorganising the states on a linguistic basis. This removed a major irritant in the way of national integration by redrawing boundaries and thus strengthened the federation.

However, Pakistan condemned the language-based identity of provinces as a recipe for national disintegration. This policy kept ethno-linguistic sentiments alive and weakened the federation. The army and certain right-wing politicians supported proposals for new provinces commensurate with existing administrative units such as divisions, thus cutting across ethnic lines.

The ethnic communities of Sindh, Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were incensed at the non-recognition of their community rights and the lack of provincial autonomy. The 1973 constitution ushered in the era of recognition of the ‘majority’ communities of the ‘minority’ provinces as flag-bearers of their respective nationalisms. While these communities developed stakes in the preservation of the classical boundaries of their provinces, the respective ‘minority’ communities became restive under the new scheme of things.

In addition to the centralist army and bureaucracy, ethnic leaderships have been befuddled by the complexities of the situation on the ground that hampered their agenda for provincial reorganisation. For example, the Pakhtun leadership would not take up the issue on a linguistic basis because of a sizeable community of Hindko-speaking people living in their province, not only in the Hazara division but also in the heart of the province — the Peshawar valley.

Any attempt at reorganising the province would reduce the size of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. This is anathema to Pakhtun nationalists.

Two areas of Pakhtun concentration outside Khyber Pakhtunkhwa that could have boosted the strength of its core community, i.e. Fata and the Pakhtun belt of Balochistan, remained hostile to their amalgamation with that province. Especially Fata’s illusory gain as an autonomous region proved to be a net loss to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in terms of demography, strategic importance and an enhanced status in the federation.

The Baloch leadership has been similarly shy about the agenda of reshaping their province on a linguistic basis that would mean the loss of a large chunk of northern Balochistan populated by Pakhtuns. Furthermore, the Brahvispeaking people of the Mengal tribe can pose a problem in the event of the political mobilisation of language, threaten ing a further cut in the size of the province. In this way, Balochistan stands to lose considerable territory and population. This would further marginalise it in the national scheme of things.

Sindh remains a confusing case for the agenda of creating new provinces. On the one hand, it is the ‘sacred’ homeland of Sindhis who would not like to see it vivisected. On the other hand, the ethnolinguistic divide between Sindhis and Mohajirs is deeply embedded in the political imagination of the two communities. The movement for a separate Karachi province has been simmering under the surface for four decades. But, geographical and demographic dimensions of the issue pose a daunting challenge to the MQM leadership.

There are Mohajirs living in Karachi as well as in the rest of urban Sindh. A Karachi province would destabilise millions of Mohajirs of the second category who would thus be stranded on the wrong side of a bloody line across the map of the province. They would be obliged to seek shelter in the new province in the wake of ethnic riots. Similarly, non-Mohajirs in Karachi would be rendered clueless and insecure, some even considering migration in the reverse direction. The perspective of a replay of the 1947 partition poses a horrendous challenge to the political leadership in Sindh.

Meanwhile, the Sindhi elite has developed considerable stakes in Karachi. Previously, one heard some Sindhi voices in favour of ‘giving’ Karachi to the Mohajirs and thus securing the rest of the province for their community, along with access to a seaport through Malir. However, Sindhis have made inroads into the bureaucracy and strengthened their pockets of support in the city. Meanwhile, the ANP has posed a new challenge to the erstwhile control of the MQM over the city. Sindhis’ hopes for a shared space in the city have been rekindled.

In Punjab, the ethnic mix has kept the whole issue of creating the new Seraiki province on the back burner. The firstwave migrants, i.e. settlers in the newly opened canal irrigation colonies were joined by the second-wave migrants of partition mainly from Punjabi but also non-Punjabi stock. The situation was further complicated by rivalry between Bahawalpur — the princely state in British India that enjoyed a ‘provincial’ status after partition — and Multan, the classical hub of the regional culture and language.

The project of the Seraiki province remains mired in controversy. Students and intellectuals have generally taken the lead in mobilising for a separate entity. But the political leadership of southern Punjab has traditionally looked towards Lahore rather than Multan as the symbol and focus of their ambition for power. Settlers and migrants favour mainstream Punjab and thus the PML-N leadership, while ‘locals’ who uphold the cause of Seraiki are partisans of the PPP. Some Mohajir strongholds in areas such as Rahim Yar Khan represent a spillover from the adjoining areas of Sindh.

The demographic complexity without a corresponding level of political mobilisation has led to status quo in different provinces. There is the additional requirement for a constitutional amendment to create new provinces, in the absence of a consensus on this issue. While the PPP and PML-Q have formally agreed to pursue the agenda for the Hazara and Seraiki provinces, it is difficult to predict any significant progress in this direction in the near future.

The writer is a professor at LUMS.

http://epaper.dawn.com/ArticleText.a...5_2011_007_005

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The Me you have always known, the Me that's a stranger still.

THE disorganised discussions on matters related to national security in the wake of the Abbottabad operation, and the havoc wrought by militants at PNS Mehran in Karachi betray a whopping decline in the quality of collective thinking.

There is great emphasis on peripheral matters while essential issues are being ignored, and one suspects a method in this madness.

This has happened earlier, whenever vested interests have wished a public debate to be diverted away from core issues and towards incidentals. For instance, the break-up of Pakistan in 1971 was blamed on Yahya Khan for his drinking and womanising, not on the system over which he presided.

As regards the Abbottabad operation, nearly all questions raised both at policymaking sessions and non-official chat forums relate to the US decision to ignore its loyal ally and the violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty. In view of these, the need to review Pakistan-US relations is being stressed.

These matters are no doubt important but far more critical is the issue of the inadequacy of the security cover — the failure to detect Bin Laden’s hideout and the US surveillance post in Abbottabad and the failure to register the US helicopters’ arrival in and departure from Abbottabad, even though newspapers had promptly reported the crashing of one of the aerial machines.

These aspects of the matter generate fears of intrusion into Pakistan by other elements and the possibility of undetected attacks on vital assets and installations. All that we have by way of an answer is routine rhetoric about impregnable security arrangements and assurances that the nuclear weapons will not be allowed to fall into the hands of the enemies of Pakistan, assurances that sound utterly hollow after the Abbottabad and Mehran debacles. The public wants credible assurances that not only will the nuclear weapons be protected against thieves but also that the people will be protected against radiation in the event of an unplanned explosion.

Likewise, much effort is being expended on finding out whether the militants who captured the Mehran base and kept the security forces at bay for many hours were four or six or 20; official spokespersons are busy retracting a statement — that the Mehran incident was no security lapse — and thus denying credit for the goof of the decade. The real issues are: the lack of security against militants, the quality of the raiders’ training and their discipline, the possible existence of militants’ accomplices within the services and the overall responsibility for national security.

After a fairly acerbic haggle the government has announced a five-member commission to probe the Abbottabad affair.

Unfortunately, the composition of the commission and disregard for the process of due consultation, especially with the opposition, have been criticised. Even after these objections have been met, it may be useful to bear in mind the difficulties faced in the past by bodies formed to probe matters in which the holy cows of the security establishment have been involved.

During the Musharraf reign a senator only wanted to know whether the government was going to set up a commission to probe the Kargil misadventure. The question was killed by the Senate chairman in his chamber. Even when commissions are set up their reports are usually not made public. What happened to the Hamoodur Rahman Commission’s report is history. The report of the judicial commission set up in 2010 to inquire into involuntary disappearances remains a secret. The government does not have the courage to release it and the judiciary is yet to take notice.

One should like to hope that whatever shape it eventually assumes the commission will look at the Abbottabad affair as one of the symptoms of the malaise that has been eating into the vitals of the state for decades. A better proposition should be to probe not only what happened on May 2, 2011 but the entire gamut of the security establishment’s relationship with the extremists and their activities in Pakistan and elsewhere. For this the commission may, if necessary, follow the Hamoodur Rahman Commission’s example and enlarge its mandate.

The stark reality everyone in Pakistan, regardless of one’s affiliation with the civil or military establishment, must face is that public faith in the efficacy of the system of planning and implementing security policies has suffered a huge blow. The political authorities are being blamed and rightly so for leaving security matters exclusively in the hands of military leaders.

True, the military must be largely responsible for carrying out security plans but it cannot be trusted with the task of fixing security objectives and priorities. That responsibility must be shouldered by elected governments under the closest possible supervision of parliament. Of course, the military has a right to express its views while policies are framed, and this never in public, but it cannot have veto rights. Any society in any part of the world that has violated this principle has come to grief.

A major issue, therefore, is the need to strengthen accountability mechanisms in security-related areas. What may be claimed to be in place at the moment might not meet the test even for internal audit. Bringing military planning under government control and all military expenditures under the purview of the auditor general and the Public Accounts Committee should help revive public confidence at least in the procedure if not the outcome.

There is no need to hide people’s reservations about the perks the military leaders enjoy and appear keen to flaunt in public. A large number of people have begun to share Gen Atiq-ur-Rahman’s anxiety and disgust at the top military officers’ love of ostentation and their casual approach to spending public money (see his memoirs, Back to the Pavilion). The people expect the defenders of their territory to be austere and self-abnegating, at least a shade more than the accursed politicians.

It is also necessary to review the security doctrine embedded in Gen Zia’s or President Leghari’s design for a National Security Council which gave the armed forces a decisive say in all fields of governance — from social welfare to foreign policy. Pakistan will become stronger and its security will be better guaranteed if parliament and civil society are allowed to debate and contribute to the security planning processes.

This obviously means that the Foreign Office and the people cannot be excluded from the process of reviewing or recasting Pakistan’s relations with the US. Or with India, China, Iran or any other state for that matter. What Pakistan needs today is not only a thorough probe into the circumstances leading to Abbottabad and Mehran but fresh thinking to avoid being a “disappointment to its people and a danger to the world” as a British magazine has put it.

Let

HARDLY had the military recovered from the humiliation suffered at the hands of the Abbottabad debacle, the navy found itself in the dock for being unable to defend an airbase for over 15 hours from the devastating attack of some half a dozen insurgents.

To be upstaged by US Navy SEALs and stealth helicopters in Abbottabad was one thing, perhaps even pardonable, but to be outsmarted by a small group of terrorists who held out for almost a day against the much more superior combat capability and equipment of an elite force was stunning and far more mortifying. Similar attacks have proved that no branch of the military is out of the terrorists’ reach.

While the minutiae of the event — and of countless other previous ambushes on strategic targets — continue to unravel, highlighted by the mysterious death of a prominent journalist investigating the possible infiltration of the base by Al Qaeda, it is becoming clear that such incidents cannot be treated in isolation. We need to look for systemic factors that give rise to the recurrence of such disasters that erode the state’s capacity and the public’s morale. The recent (in camera) debate in parliament and the remarkably candid confessional statements of the military and intelligence representatives made therein, have brought home the somberness of the issues facing the nation.

Unfortunately, the discourse so far has remained confined to blame games and turf wars and there has been little introspective effort to understand the Pakistani predicament or an attempt to work towards a pragmatic and sustainable solution. It is indeed puzzling that despite the clear and present existentialist threat to the state from strident terrorist elements, its leading institutions and guardians are at best in denial and at worst in deep somnolence showing a cavalier indifference. Business as usual is the pervading norm in all institutions at all levels from the president and prime minister to the SHO, in the hope that the storm will die down, as in the past.

The Pakistani state and its institutions have acquired the reputation — if exaggeratedly — of serial negligence, culpability, complicity and incompetence through the inculcation of a ‘culture of impunity’, attributed by the US State Department to its record on human rights, which in American parlance is restricted to women’s and minorities’ rights.

The notion has applicability to a much wider range of state responsibilities, including the alleviation of poverty, access to education and provision of other basic entitlements of the population through the mobilisation of domestic resources — and reduction of foreign dependence — in an equitable and efficient manner. The US has now suddenly become aware of the duplicitous behaviour of state elements, while having failed to bat an eyelid so long as such egregious behaviour served its own ends, e.g. during the anti-Soviet Afghan jihad and in the more recent Raymond Davis affair.

By supporting anti-democratic military regimes in the past and by becoming an accessory in the progressive withdrawal of the state from its social and economic responsibilities, the US has undermined the Pakistani state’s capability to rise up to the political and economic challenges of a modern emerging nation. This culture of impunity is now so deeply rooted that no institution is subject to an independent accountability mechanism. The entire state structure, and to an extent other allied institutions, including the media and civil society organisations, as well as ordinary citizens, have become infected with greed, corruption and illegality.

Those culpable have become too big to fail or be held accountable. Calls for independent inquiry commissions are heeded with reluctance and even when constituted their reports are often consigned to the dustbin of history.

Hoping that the present series of security lapses will lead to better investigative and punitive results is unrealistic. As a result, mutual back-scratching and political quid pro quos help to bandage a creaky state structure and prevent it from collapsing, with the US and other allies, including China, providing a helping hand in pursuit of their own national interests.

However, if serious efforts are to be made to avoid the impending doom predicted by many, the present status quo will have to be changed in many ways. The public’s impatience about the continued deterioration in the economic situation is likely to reach a climax after the announcement of the budget, which is unlikely to provide any relief to the poor and will bring harsher economic policies.

The events in Abbottabad and Karachi last month, like those in Dhaka four decades ago, beckon us to search for a new strategy for a radical adjustment between our civilian and military imperatives, especially in the fields of economics and foreign policy — which are crucially interlinked through our unexamined dependence on the US. They also highlight the need for a serious dialogue with India to normalise our relations on a fast-track basis. Ties had gained momentum just before Abbottabad. We have shied away too long from addressing these fundamental issues and must pull out our heads from the sand..

In the wake of its recent twin debacles, the military is increasingly being perceived as a white elephant that grazes well beyond the boundaries it is supposed to protect and is the most obvious candidate for institutional reforms. However, it is obvious that our political class is more likely to be trampled by rather than to rein in the roaming elephant.

A culture of impunity | Opinion | DAWN.COM

Emotions versus reality

By Ardeshir Cowasjee

THIS publication’s WikiLeaks scoop (well done, by the way!) has certainly opened things up, and we are being hit in the face with what actually transpires behind those wondrous closed doors, and what others actually think of us, rightly or wrongly.
WikiLeaks No.153436, was the subject of a Dawn report last month under the heading ‘US thinks anti-Americanism rife in NDU’, a particularly topical topic considering what the month of May brought to us — revelations of not only the ineptitude of our civilian leadership but failings which we never imagined could crop up in our mighty military. It could possibly slightly illuminate the murk surrounding Abbottabad and Mehran.

In 2007, the National Defence College was upgraded as the National Defence University. Its role is “to impart higher education in policy and strategy formulation at various tiers with emphasis on national security and defence, and act as a national think tank”. Amongst its students are those considered by the military to be highly capable and educated graduates of the various military institutions.

That was the year that US ambassador Anne Patterson addressed the students of the NDU (her cable was not sent until 2008). Questions put to her were “astonishingly naïve and biased” about the US: “The elite crop of colonels and brigadiers are receiving biased NDU training with no chance to hear the alternative views of the US.” She was especially concerned about what she termed the “lost generation”, military officers who missed out on International Military Education and Training during the “sanction years” (1990 onwards to 2001).

Ms Patterson quoted a US colonel who had attended an NDU course who was not only startled at the antiAmericanism but also at the naïvety evinced when it came to Pakistan’s security machinery and even its society.

This should surprise us, but no, it does not. Neither do the rank feelings about the US: “The senior-level instructors had misconceptions about US policies and culture and infused their lectures with these suspicions”, which are shared by the students though, as remarked the colonel, both instructors and students were happy having their children study at universities in the US and UK.

One must suppose that the good colonel was somewhat horrified when he wrote, as we are to read: “The NDU students also obtained financial perks, such as a free trip for pilgrimage that could be taken at the end of the class’ official travels.” So, the culture of freebie invalid Haj or umra trips is not confined to the civilian lot.

Our ambassador to the US, Husain Haqqani, here on a visit (with Senator John Kerry) was invited to address the NDU which he did on May 18. His subject was ‘Emotion and reality in Pakistan’s foreign policy’. Pakistan emotions on the one hand, and US impatience on the other, have helped to build up, over the years, a trust deficit. No relationship is equal, it can never be (what HH did not say is that both partners have to be as tall as each other to be able to look one another in the eye). So why expect it to ever be — remember Lord Palmerston and his famous adage that in foreign policy there is not such thing as a permanent friend or a permanent enemy. National interest dictates.

At one point, early in his talk, he asked how many amongst his audience considered Pakistan’s principal security threat to be from India, or from within, or from the US, One third of the attendees indicated that it came from the US. How did he respond?

“If it really comes from the United States then we’ve already lost, ladies and gentlemen, because you can’t beat the United States in a military confrontation and that is the reality which we have to accept whatever our emotions. Because, let us be honest, we do not have the means to take on the one military power in the world that spends more on defence technology than the next 20 nations in the world. So that is where I think we sometimes end up having what I call an ‘emotional discussion’. I see it on Pakistani television all the time.” What is needed is a logical, reality-based foreign policy to advance Pakistan’s interests and to focus on education and a growing Pakistan’s economy as a realistic way to secure Pakistan’s interests for the future.

HH spoke of the global village that this world has become and how this country needs to join in — but how can it when its population is largely illiterate? Only 52 per cent of Pakistan’s children go to school (in India it is 92 per cent, Bangladesh 96 per cent, Sri Lanka 99 per cent). And of our 180 millions, over 90 million are under the age of 18. How do we integrate uneducated youths into the global village?

Well, realistically, would we not respond, first of all Pakistan should sort out the real threat from within, domestic terrorism which is shedding much blood, and the threat from without, India, which has in the past shed blood. Then get on with the urgent task of educating the young people who are the future of this country and who need to be a part of the 21st century if this country is ever to progress, if it is ever to be at eye level with other countries.

And, importantly, as said US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton recently in direct and clear language, we should realise that it is “up to Pakistan’s leaders” to stop blaming the United States for their country’s myriad economic, governance and security problems. “AntiAmericanism and conspiracy theories will not make the problems disappear.” ¦

EMAIL
arfc@cyber.net.pk

Source: Dawn ePaper

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A successful person is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks that other throw at him. (David Brinkley)

By Syed Talat Hussain

THE US inspection of Osama bin Laden’s last abode in Abbottabad has yet again raised the question our policymakers have avoided taking a position on: do criminals and terrorists operate from our soil?

The security establishment is hazy in its approach to the issue of safe havens and sanctuaries. Its ambiguity stems from the way Pakistan’s security establishment has traditionally responded to the issue of safe havens. Consider the following range of official responses over a decade.

Denial: Sanctuaries do not exist in the country. This is propaganda to give us a bad name and then hang us.

Qualified denial: Sanctuaries do not exist in the country. However, we have a porous border and cannot monitor with precision who comes and goes. There are many refugee camps along the border; it is only natural that various groups go back and forth. Smugglers, drug-pushers, kidnappers, etc are organised mafias who have operated through this opportunity zone for decades. If the US-Mexico frontier cannot be managed, asking for perfect Af-Pak border management is to overlook the complexity of the issue.

Give us information mantra: If anyone has information about these sanctuaries, they should pass it to us so we can take action. (This argument has been used frequently for both wanted men and the spaces where they hide. We have said this repeatedly about Osama bin Laden, about Ayman Al Zawahiri and Mullah Omar.) Interna Counterpunch: tional forces, particularly the US, should look at their own system of border monitoring and cross-border infiltration before they ask us to do more. We have more border posts than they have. We have more troops deployed on the border. We have been far more successful than they in fighting organised militancy on our side. Previously, there have been two battles across the border; one by international forces inside Afghanistan, which they have failed to win, the other on our side, which we have won. (In other words, we’re doing alright. Don’t lecture us.) Counter-complaint: Reverse infiltration is going on. The US hasn’t coordinated its war effort with us, creating a revolving door of militant movement. The hammer and the anvil have not been applied. Resultantly, US operations are driving militants into Pakistani territory.

Countercharge: In some cases, by removing border posts on the Afghan side a deliberate effort has been made to create tactical depth for Afghan-based militants who then recuperate inside Afghanistan with Afghan blessings and come back to scuttle Pakistan’s efforts. In some cases Afghan border forces have facilitated cross-border infiltration, making a lot of money. In some cases they have done it for anti-Pakistan reasons. With so many high-tech resources already deployed, this could not have escaped the notice of the foreign forces there. How come they don’t take action against them? They seem to be encouraging infiltrators, who carve hideouts on our side and move deeper into the urban areas to strike there.

Hydras of history argument: Echoes of the past continue to haunt. Jihadi networks developed over decades are not going to disappear acc ording to a date on the US political calendar. This requires time and patience. We are fighting hydras. Chopping their heads off is not going to pull them out of their holes. The foreigners contracted marriages and have produced a whole generation born and bred here. Children of the jihadis of yore have become, as it were, naturalised citizens. What are called sanctuaries are their homes. While they should leave, and we want them to, the question that nobody answers is where will they go. Why aren’t their governments accepting them?

Poverty proverb: Rich jihadis pay cash to buy hideouts. More aid and development (long-term projects) are needed to address people’s needs so they don’t fall to the temptations held out by rich jihadis from the Gulf.

Supply side problem: Jihadis arrive here from across the world, traversing many countries and regions. This includes western jihadis. How come this supply is not being curbed?

Demand side problem: These jihadis arrive because they see Afghanistan as the real battlefield. The presence of international forces works as a magnet. Prolonged occupation of Afghanistan is a demand puller. As long as there is turmoil there, jihadis are going to come from wherever they can and settle down along the border or inside Afghanistan. The sanctuaries are a consequence and not the cause of the Afghan problem.

Capacity cry: We don’t have the requisite capability to protect the border against infiltration. We need to be properly equipped. As long as technological know-how and the necessary wherewithal is not there it is difficult to fight and discover them. We are overstretched. India continues to assume the posture of a mighty adversary whose military assets are deployed for aggressive Pakistan-specific designs. Our focus is diffused on two borders. For Pakistan to take effective action against those hedged inside the tribal belt, we need Delhi to change its pressure tactics and talk peace. This is a longterm process.

Blowback theory: Taking on these sanctuaries, where the core is hiding, will have a severe blowback; all sleeper cells will become active. While we know that most tracks of terrorism inside Pakistan lead to these sanctuaries, taking on the base terrorists’ operations will open a Pandora’s box which we cannot handle at this point.

Our own people theory: They are our own people. We cannot kill them all. We must work towards reconciliation.

Our own people theory No. 2: They are our own people; if we have to kill the bad eggs among them we will do so, but at our own pace, in our own way.Not our own people, but we need them theory: They are not our own people but influential Afghan fighters who will stay powerful even after the US departs. We can’t pick a fight with them because that is like sticking matchsticks in a hornet’s nest. ¦ To be concluded The writer is a senior journalist at DawnNews.



Source: Dawn ePaper
Sanctuaries & safe havens

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A successful person is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks that other throw at him. (David Brinkley)

The internal challenge
BJP has to do nothing to destabilise the Singh government. It is already crumbling.

By M.J. Akbar

HAS the time come for the Congress high command to issue notices to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, his virtual deputy Pranab Mukherjee and his principal interlocutor for officially unofficial dialogue Kapil Sibal, for gross violation of discipline?
If it cannot muster up the courage to censure its own prime minister, it could always expel general secretary Digvijay Singh.

The party Singh wants to send Baba Ramdev to prison or perdition, whichever is nearer. The government Singh believes that acrobatic subservience by four ministers in the VIP lounge of Delhi airport, rather than within the more private environment of a drawing room, before the crusader-Baba, is the way forward to an honest India in which every politician glistens with moral fervour, and anyone giving or taking a bribe gets the noose he deserves.

It must be the summer. The government’s brain has melted. Whatever else may be your view of Baba Ramdev, you have to be a bit soft to believe he can be bribed by flattery. The Baba has not risen from a bicycle in Haryana to a private jet by being gullible. He is playing for much higher stakes.

The prime minister had two options when confronted by a ‘fast unto death’. He could either negotiate with a man who had everything to gain by confrontation; or he could have gone over Baba Ramdev’s head, as it were, and spoken directly to the India that was lining up in support of the Baba, not just in Delhi but in every small town.

Better still, he could have done both; negotiate at a minimalist level, and address India’s core concern comprehensively, decisively. The multiple negotiations with Ram dev have not only raised the latter’s stature in public life, but also ensured that the credit for any decision will go not to Dr Singh’s government but to the man who generated a midsummer day’s thunderstorm.

Pressure is guaranteed to ensure mistakes in decisionmaking. Dr Manmohan Singh would have handled pressure from opposition parties, but is unable to deal with parallel stress from two different, but interlinked points. The anger of the people has derailed governance. But his most difficult challenge is neither from the people nor from a crusader; it is from a faction within Congress that derives its power from proximity to Mrs Sonia Gandhi.

Digvijay Singh is the main spokesman of this faction, which is why he has the freedom to offer a continuous stream of alternative policy advice, on every matter from Assam to Kashmir, depending on the news of the day.

Digvijay Singh has done more to weaken the authority of Dr Manmohan Singh than anyone else; and a mute prime minister’s helplessness before this onslaught only confirms the power equations within today’s Congress.

Mrs Sonia Gandhi has also empowered her parallel cabinet, the National Advisory Council, which believes that Dr Singh’s cabinet and parliament should listen to its instructions. Some of its members specialise in pomposity when they are not heckling the prime minister. The strategy is transparent: to snatch credit if the government does anything right, and turn stridently accusatory if the government makes a mistake.

The Bharatiya Janata Party has to do nothing to destabilise the Manmohan Singh government, which is crumbling under the pressure of internal contradictions. Opposition parties need to do nothing except wait. Once upon a time they did not know how to. Now they have learnt.

Inevitable question: how long can a dysfunctional government totter around? Technically, forever (caveat: forever comes in 2014, the year of the next scheduled general elections). The mathematics of this parliament works in favour of the establishment. M. Karunanidhi may publicly rue the poor choice of friends he has made, meaning the Congress, but politically there is nothing he can do.

Potential new allies are in no hurry to touch a Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam toxic with corruption charges. Regional animosities in other states create a curious algebra. It would take some catastrophe, for instance, to bring Mulayam Singh Yadav’s Samajwadi Party and Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party on the same side of the voting platform in parliament. But is this impossible?

Dr Manmohan Singh’s government is not in any danger of being washed away by some sudden flood or devastated by an earthquake; its foundations are being eroded by inbred worms.

Dr Singh is flashing a sword, slashing the heart of a former cabinet colleague here, breaking the arm of a private- sector executive, which makes for temporary political theatre. What he needs is very powerful pesticide, to be sprayed at home.

The disease of corruption is not limited to enemies or allies who might have become dispensable. The Congress seems to believe that it can get away by speaking in multiple voices, each customised for whichever audience is in the hall.

Baba Ramdev has a significant advantage over the Congress in this test of wills. He has nothing to lose. The Congress does: it could lose power. ¦ The writer is editor of The Sunday Guardian, published from Delhi, India on Sunday, published from London and editorial director, India Today and Headlines Today.


Source:The internal challenge

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A successful person is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks that other throw at him. (David Brinkley)

Resurgence of the veil

By Madeleine Bunting



DURING the first half of the 20th century, millions of Muslim women decided to abandon the head coverings their mothers had used; in the second half of the century, millions of Muslim women resumed wearing the veil.
How and why these fluctuations of personal habit affected so many across the Muslim world is the question Leila Ahmed sets herself. In her book A Quiet Revolution, she focuses on Egypt, which was a key influence in both the unveiling and the veiling, to trace the many meanings which this piece of cloth has acquired.

It’s an acute study of how issues of political power and empire interact with women’s own claims to autonomy within families and communities. Ahmed beds her analysis into the wider political currents of Egypt without ever losing sight of women’s own interpretations of what they were doing and why.

What adds force to the analysis is the sense that the book has been a journey of personal discovery for Ahmed, a Harvard academic.

She grew up in Cairo in the 1940s, and was raised by a generation of women who never wore the veil; she absorbed from them the assumption that the veil was backward, a restriction of female autonomy. Like many Muslim women of her generation, the veil’s reappearance has been shocking, unexpected and regarded as a step backwards. Writing the book has forced her to reassess such assumptions, and come to a new, more positive understanding of the veil.

The book starts at the height of British imperialism in the late 19th century when Lord Cromer effectively ruled the protectorate of Egypt. Many of the issues raised in that time have uncanny resonances with the recent debate. In 1899 Qasim Amin published The Liberation of Women, which provoked a furore: he argued that European civilisation was clearly superior to that of Egypt; if women were not veiled in Europe, then it was clearly not necessary. In Ahmed’s words, he claimed that “Muslim societies are to be counted as advanced or backward by the extent to which they abandoned their native practices, symbolised by the veil”.

Following Amin, huge numbers of Egyptians westernised their furniture, their cities, their houses and their clothing. Amin wanted a profound transformation of Egyptian society: “It is impossible to breed successful men if they do not have mothers capable of raising them to be successful,” he wrote, making very clear that liberation of women was a means to achieving a better sort of man. At the heart of Amin’s “divided consciousness” as a Europeanised Egyptian was a modernisation strategy for the nation — and veiling was a crucial symbol.

Cromer, on completion of his term in office, boasted that he had “practically abolished” primary education in the country. Yet in a bestselling book he expanded on the inferiority of the “dark-skinned Eastern” and on how Islam ‘degraded’ women as exemplified by the practice of veiling. He set in train the notion of “saving brown women from brown men” (which, as Ahmed points out, was promoted by both Cherie Blair and Laura Bush ahead of the US invasion of Afghanistan).

For millions of Egyptian women, abandoning the veil was a statement of aspiration to modernity and held out the promise of education and work. It was not related, insists Ahmed, to secularisation; religious women were as likely to go unveiled as the less devout.

What turned this social trend around was the trauma of the Arab-Israeli wars in 1967 and 1973. The humiliating defeats of the Arabs were perceived as a punishment by Allah and led to a renewed religiosity. Meanwhile an alternative idea of modernisation strategy took hold — the Muslim Brotherhood’s demand for a more energetic religious practice. As Amin had once done, the Brotherhood called for a profound transformation of Egyptian society; as part of this political project, the veil would again become a central symbol. ¦ — The Guardian, London


Source: Resurgence of the veil

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A successful person is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks that other throw at him. (David Brinkley)

The summer offensive

A coordination mechanism for Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Nato forces is imperative with a view to developing a joint strategy to push back the present Taliban offensive.

By Khadim Hussain


AS per its announce ment, the Taliban mili tia has launched its summer offensive from the western side of Barawal, Upper Dir, which borders the Afghanistan province of Kunar.
The onslaught of the Taliban militia started on June 1, targeting the local security check post and indis criminately killing several dozen people of Barawal on the Pakistan-Afghanistan bor der. Keeping in view the reports that Swat Taliban leader Fazlullah had crossed over to Kunar after his militia was contained in Swat, the Taliban offensive must be seen in a larger strategic con text. Five points are worth considering in the analysis of the present onslaught.

To begin with, the presence of the militia in three areas in Upper and Lower Dir in the west of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has already been reported: the Osherai pass that links Swat with Upper Dir, Barawal that borders with Afghanistan’s Kunar province and the Maidan area of Lower Dir that borders with Bajaur Agency of northern Fata. Fazlullah and his high-profile commanders are believed to have fled from Swat during the military’s offensive against the Taliban via the pass of Osherai and crossed over to Afghanistan through Barawal. Second, the local lashkar of Amandara in Upper Dir had pushed the Taliban to Barawal and beyond in a severe gun battle last year. Local people claim to have seen the militia moving on the hills of Osherai and Barawal since then.

Third, the Taliban’s present offensive seems to be indiscriminate, focused on creating fear among the people of the locality. Analysts have already pointed out that isolating a community through destroying state and communication infrastructure and the indiscriminate killing of common people are tactics the Taliban have usually employed over the years to gain social control of a particular community and to force people to give up resistance.

Fourth, several of the commanders of the militant militia active in Malakand division in recent years have a detailed knowledge and understanding of the mountainous tracks and local communities since the late 1980s and early 1990s. That was when several militant adventurers moved to the intractable areas of Malakand division and established networks with the local militia of the Tehrik-i-Nifaz-i-Shariat-iMohammadi (TNSM). The TNSM had succeeded in bringing the entire state machinery in Malakand division to a standstill back in 1994, occupying the hills of Malakand, Karakar (Buner) and Swat (Matta and Mingora).

Fifth, the militant religious movement in Malakand division has created a circle of public support and sympathy among the local communities since 1989. A section of the youth in Malakand division has been militarily trained by the militia. Not all of them may have been either arrested or killed by the security agencies.

The above analytical framework allows one to assume that the present offensive in Barawal, Upper Dir, by the Taliban militia is a precursor of a continued battle between the security forces and the Taliban for the social and administrative control of Malakand division after high-profile targets were hit by drone predators in Fata. Moreover, the debate on a military operation in North Waziristan may have triggered the present offensive by the Taliban.

It seems unlikely that the alliance between the leadership of Al Qaeda, the Afghan Taliban, the Pakistani Taliban and militant organisations of other national and transnational groups might simply be waiting for the Pakistani artillery, infantry and air force to hit them in North Waziristan. Yet, the alliance might need some more time to dissipate into the Kurram, Orakzai and Khyber agencies.

The present offensive in Upper Dir might also be analysed along the lines that the alliance mentioned above may be looking for another familiar and well-trodden safe haven in the shape of Malakand division. If this proposition is in any way close to reality, it is likely that the militia might occupy the upper mountainous range of the Hindu Kush and take over social control of adjacent communities.

If they succeed in doing this, they may be able to hold back the security forces for a long time and allow the alliance’s leadership time in which to keep moving back and forth, carrying out formidable assaults on Nato and Pakistani security agencies.

The strategy to combat the Taliban’s present offensive for the social control of Malakand division should have certain constituents.

First, state intelligence agencies working under both the civilian and military leadership must develop a coordination mechanism for swapping information on a regular basis. The vulnerable infiltrating points from the north and the west, especially Barawal, Osherai and Maidan, must be properly and regularly monitored.

Second, local resistance to the Taliban must be owned and streamlined by state agencies so that ‘warlordism’ does not raise its head as another monster which the state must fight.

Third, an effective and timely strategic communication system must be developed as early as possible to defeat the Taliban propaganda. For this to happen, local civil society organisations, academia and media persons must be engaged as they understand the components of the Taliban propaganda and can easily render it ineffective.

Fourth, insurgency and terrorism must be dealt with. The security forces have to hit all the suspected infiltration points as well as suspected safe havens up in the hills of Malakand division. This must happen before the Taliban militia makes space for itself and dissipates among the local population. Time and the ease of movement shall play an important role in the success and failure of the present Taliban offensive.

The security forces’ counter-offensive may result in more attacks on the urban centres of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Fata, hence the importance of the state intelligence agencies. Crucially, it is now imperative to establish a coordination mechanism between Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Nato forces in Afghanistan with a view to developing a joint strategy to push back the present Taliban offensive. ¦ The writer is a researcher and political analyst.

EMAIL
khadim.2005@gmail.com


Source: The summer offensive

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A successful person is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks that other throw at him. (David Brinkley)

Millions of lives now being saved

By Sarah Boseley

AN estimated 6.6 million people with HIV in the developing world are now on drugs to keep them well and stop them developing Aids — a substantial increase since last year — according to the World Health Organisation.
The WHO’s announcement came as experts and campaigners commemorated the 30th anniversary of the first diagnosis of Aids. A US medical bulletin revealed on June 5, 1981 that five young, gay men in Los Angeles had a form of pneumonia that normally only appears in people whose immune systems have collapsed. They were the first documented cases of the HIV epidemic that was to sweep the globe.

There are now 33.3 million people globally living with HIV, which was once a death sentence. The roll-out of drugs across the developing world, subsidised by the donors of richer countries, is saving millions of lives.

Latest figures from the WHO show that last year saw a bigger increase in people in poor countries accessing the drugs than ever before — a rise of 1.4 million over the previous year. There has been a 16-fold increase in the numbers on antiretroviral treatment between 2003 and 2010. But nine million more people in low- and middle-income countries need the drugs and cannot get them.

“The impressive new estimates are an important milestone in the public health response to HIV that began 30 years ago,” said Dr Margaret Chan, WHO director general. “But we have much to do to reach the goal of universal access, and doing more of the same will not get us there. We need further innovation in HIV, including simpler and more accessible prevention and treatment approaches for all those in need.” New hope, but with new challenges, was offered by a trial which recently showed that antiretroviral drugs not only keep people with HIV well but prevent them from passing the infection to their sexual partners. Aids campaigners are now calling for the roll-out of drugs to be stepped up as a way of slowing the epidemic.

“Access to treatment will transform the Aids response in the next decade. We must invest in accelerating access and finding new treatment options,” said Michel Sidibe, UNAids executive director. “Antiretroviral therapy is a bigger game-changer than ever before — it not only stops people from dying, but also prevents transmission of HIV to women, men and children.” “Countries must use the best of what science can offer to stop new HIV infections and Aids-related deaths,” said UN deputy secretary general Asha-Rose Migiro. “We are at a turning point in the Aids response. The goal towards achieving universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support must become a reality by 2015.” Between 2001 and 2009, the global rate of infections declined by nearly 25 per cent, according to UNAids. That is a result of hard work on prevention and awareness of the infection, with people starting to adopt safer sexual behaviours, limiting their number of partners and using condoms more.

But ahead of a UN General Assembly special session meeting on Aids soon, experts warn there is much more to do and real dangers of slipping backwards if money for the battle against HIV starts to dry up. In 2010, funding dropped for the first time.

“I am worried that international investments are falling at a time when the Aids response is delivering results for people,” said Sidibe. “If we do not invest now, we will have to pay several times more in the future.” The International Aids Society, whose members are doctors and scientists working on HIV, is calling for more investment not only in care for Aids but to find a cure.

In the US, Anthony Fauci and Jack Whitescarver of the National Institutes of Health, which is the largest funder of HIV research in the world, said a huge amount of progress had been made. ¦ — The Guardian, London

Source: Dawn ePaper
Millions of lives now being saved

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A successful person is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks that other throw at him. (David Brinkley)