DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan -- A U.S. missile strike killed three suspected militants in a Pakistani tribal region near the Afghan border on Friday, a reminder of the weapons at American disposal at a time of intense strain with Islamabad, two Pakistan officials said.
Stepping up the tempo of the missile strikes is seen as one possible American option if Pakistan does not act on Washington's stepped up demands to attack Afghan militants sheltering on the Pakistani side of the border.
Last week, U.S. officials accused Pakistan's spy agency of assisting the Haqqani militant faction in attacks on Western targets in Afghanistan, the most serious allegation yet of Pakistani duplicity in the 10-year war.
The drone-fired missiles hit a vehicle near the Angore Adda border town of South Waziristan, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. The victims were associates of Maulvi Nazir, a prominent militant commander in the region, according to the officials.
South Waziristan was the main sanctuary for the Pakistani and foreign militants until the military launched an offensive there in 2009. The region has also witnessed scores of American drone attacks.
The missile attacks are seen at the most effective weapon Washington has at hitting al-Qaida and Afghan militants like the Haqqanis in the northwest. There were more than 100 such attacks last year; this year there have been around 50.
Friday, September 30, 2011
U.S.-Pakistan rift widens over Haqqani clan
Jalaluddin Haqqani, the warlord brigand who with his extended family and an army of 10,000 tribal fighters rules a mountain kingdom in both Afghanistan's eastern provinces and neighbouring Pakistan's North Waziristan, is a throwback to the story of this region a hundred years ago and more.
He is a perfect fit for a part in Rudyard Kipling's stories of "the Great Game" between Britain and Russia for influence on the Northwest Frontier of India, or soldier-turned-novelist John Masters' memoirs of his days as a young Gurkha officer stationed at the limits of empire in the 1930s, or even the records of Field Marshal Frederick Earl Roberts of Kandahar and his punitive war against the Afghans in 1879.
But Jalaluddin Haqqani, his son Sirajuddin, who now manages the day-to-day running of the family business of murder, extortion and deadly intrigue, and their clan followers are a very modern problem.
The always tenuous alliance between the Pakistan army, the country's Inter-Services Intelligence directorate (ISI) and the American-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan could well collapse because of the Haqqani network.
The implications of that for the efforts by ISAF to bring the war against Taliban insurgents down to an acceptable level of insecurity before handing over to the neophyte forces of President Karzai, as well as a violent parting of the ways between the United States and Pakistan, are too gloomy to contemplate.
The crux of the friction is that the U.S. military and the Central Intelligence Agency have believed for years that the Haqqani network is closely linked to and sometimes acts as an agent for Pakistan's ISI.
This persistent rumble of American mistrust of the dedication of their Pakistani allies came to a head last week.
Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff who for years has led the efforts to cooperate with the Pakistani military and intelligence services, publicly accused the ISI of colluding with the Haqqani network in the Sept. 13 attack on the American Embassy in Kabul.
"The Haqqani network acts as a veritable arm of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency," Mullen told the U.S. Senate armed services committee.
And as Washington edges toward naming the Haqqani network as a foreign terrorist organization, Pakistan's Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani on Thursday sought national unity against the Americans.
He convened a highly unusual meeting with all political and religious parties to counter the American allegations and the implied threat that U.S. forces will enter Pakistan to clean out the Haqqani vipers' nest if Islamabad is unwilling to do so.
Coming soon after the May action when, without consulting Islamabad, U.S. special forces flew in and killed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden at his hideout in the Pakistani military cantonment of Abbottabad, Gilani's anxieties about further encroachments on his country's sovereignty are understandable.
Gilani and his ministers insist their government has no functional relationship with the Haqqani network. Indeed, Interior Minister Rehman Malik has said it is the CIA that "trained and produced" the Haqqani organization during the mujahedeen war against the Soviet Union invasion of Afghanistan in the 1980s.
It is true that like most mujahedeen groups, Jalaluddin Haqqani and his fighters received aid in the 1980s from the CIA in the proxy war against Moscow. Haqqani was even welcomed to the White House by then president Ronald Reagan.
But in the chaotic scramble for power in Afghanistan following the Soviets' withdrawal, Haqqani sided with the fundamentalist Islamic Taliban and became minister of tribal affairs when they took power in Kabul.
But with the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan 10 years ago to root out al-Qaida, Jalaluddin Haqqani and his men returned to managing the family business of brigandage.
The Americans blame Haqqani for the January 2008 attack on Kabul's Serena Hotel in which six people were killed, the July 2008 bombing of the Indian Embassy in Kabul on behalf of ISI, the December 2009 suicide bombing of U.S. base Camp Chapman in which seven key CIA officers were killed, the attack on Kabul's Inter-Continental Hotel this June and the Sept. 10 truck bomb attack on Combat Outpost Sayed in Wardak province as well as the Kabul U.S. Embassy attack days later.
For several years the Americans have been trying to kill the Haqqanis. In July 2008 one of Jalaluddin's sons, Omar, was killed by ISAF forces in Afghanistan.
The following September six missiles were fired by American drone aircraft at a Haqqani compound.
Jalaluddin and son Sirajuddin were not there. But among the 23 people killed were one of Jalaluddin's two wives, a sister, a sister-in-law and eight of his grandchildren.
That is not the kind of loss Northwest Frontier warlords are inclined to forgive or forget.
Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/news/canada-in-afghanistan/Pakistan+rift+widens+over+Haqqani+clan/5482153/story.html#ixzz1ZRBYUfCq
He is a perfect fit for a part in Rudyard Kipling's stories of "the Great Game" between Britain and Russia for influence on the Northwest Frontier of India, or soldier-turned-novelist John Masters' memoirs of his days as a young Gurkha officer stationed at the limits of empire in the 1930s, or even the records of Field Marshal Frederick Earl Roberts of Kandahar and his punitive war against the Afghans in 1879.
But Jalaluddin Haqqani, his son Sirajuddin, who now manages the day-to-day running of the family business of murder, extortion and deadly intrigue, and their clan followers are a very modern problem.
The always tenuous alliance between the Pakistan army, the country's Inter-Services Intelligence directorate (ISI) and the American-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan could well collapse because of the Haqqani network.
The implications of that for the efforts by ISAF to bring the war against Taliban insurgents down to an acceptable level of insecurity before handing over to the neophyte forces of President Karzai, as well as a violent parting of the ways between the United States and Pakistan, are too gloomy to contemplate.
The crux of the friction is that the U.S. military and the Central Intelligence Agency have believed for years that the Haqqani network is closely linked to and sometimes acts as an agent for Pakistan's ISI.
This persistent rumble of American mistrust of the dedication of their Pakistani allies came to a head last week.
Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff who for years has led the efforts to cooperate with the Pakistani military and intelligence services, publicly accused the ISI of colluding with the Haqqani network in the Sept. 13 attack on the American Embassy in Kabul.
"The Haqqani network acts as a veritable arm of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency," Mullen told the U.S. Senate armed services committee.
And as Washington edges toward naming the Haqqani network as a foreign terrorist organization, Pakistan's Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani on Thursday sought national unity against the Americans.
He convened a highly unusual meeting with all political and religious parties to counter the American allegations and the implied threat that U.S. forces will enter Pakistan to clean out the Haqqani vipers' nest if Islamabad is unwilling to do so.
Coming soon after the May action when, without consulting Islamabad, U.S. special forces flew in and killed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden at his hideout in the Pakistani military cantonment of Abbottabad, Gilani's anxieties about further encroachments on his country's sovereignty are understandable.
Gilani and his ministers insist their government has no functional relationship with the Haqqani network. Indeed, Interior Minister Rehman Malik has said it is the CIA that "trained and produced" the Haqqani organization during the mujahedeen war against the Soviet Union invasion of Afghanistan in the 1980s.
It is true that like most mujahedeen groups, Jalaluddin Haqqani and his fighters received aid in the 1980s from the CIA in the proxy war against Moscow. Haqqani was even welcomed to the White House by then president Ronald Reagan.
But in the chaotic scramble for power in Afghanistan following the Soviets' withdrawal, Haqqani sided with the fundamentalist Islamic Taliban and became minister of tribal affairs when they took power in Kabul.
But with the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan 10 years ago to root out al-Qaida, Jalaluddin Haqqani and his men returned to managing the family business of brigandage.
The Americans blame Haqqani for the January 2008 attack on Kabul's Serena Hotel in which six people were killed, the July 2008 bombing of the Indian Embassy in Kabul on behalf of ISI, the December 2009 suicide bombing of U.S. base Camp Chapman in which seven key CIA officers were killed, the attack on Kabul's Inter-Continental Hotel this June and the Sept. 10 truck bomb attack on Combat Outpost Sayed in Wardak province as well as the Kabul U.S. Embassy attack days later.
For several years the Americans have been trying to kill the Haqqanis. In July 2008 one of Jalaluddin's sons, Omar, was killed by ISAF forces in Afghanistan.
The following September six missiles were fired by American drone aircraft at a Haqqani compound.
Jalaluddin and son Sirajuddin were not there. But among the 23 people killed were one of Jalaluddin's two wives, a sister, a sister-in-law and eight of his grandchildren.
That is not the kind of loss Northwest Frontier warlords are inclined to forgive or forget.
Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/news/canada-in-afghanistan/Pakistan+rift+widens+over+Haqqani+clan/5482153/story.html#ixzz1ZRBYUfCq
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Gilani hits back at US, says Pak cannot be asked to 'do more'
Islamabad: Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani today countered US accusations linking ISI to terror groups in Afghanistan, calling them "surprising", while stating that his country cannot be pressured to "do more" in the war against terror.
"Pressure cannot be put on Pakistan to do more (in the war on terrorism). Our national interests must be respected under all circumstances," Mr Gilani said while opening a meeting of the country's political leadership that he convened to forge a consensus response to tensions with the US.
The premier rejected allegations by senior US officials, including military chief Admiral Mike Mullen, linking Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) to the Haqqani network and recent terror attacks in Afghanistan, saying these accusations were a
cause of concern for Pakistan.
Referring to steps taken by Pakistan to back the peace and reconciliation process in Afghanistan and a sudden spurt in terror attacks in the neighboring country, Mr Gilani said, "In the light of these events in Afghanistan, the US leadership's statements were surprising for us as they were contrary to Pakistan's sacrifices and successes against terrorism and extremism". He added, "While rejecting all these accusations, we have focused on positive and responsible ways to resolve these problems".
Enhancing positive and deeper contacts at all levels alone can pave the way for solving these problems, Mr Gilani said, adding,"all doors for dialogue are open" to resolve differences with the US.
"Pressure cannot be put on Pakistan to do more (in the war on terrorism). Our national interests must be respected under all circumstances," Mr Gilani said while opening a meeting of the country's political leadership that he convened to forge a consensus response to tensions with the US.
The premier rejected allegations by senior US officials, including military chief Admiral Mike Mullen, linking Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) to the Haqqani network and recent terror attacks in Afghanistan, saying these accusations were a
cause of concern for Pakistan.
Referring to steps taken by Pakistan to back the peace and reconciliation process in Afghanistan and a sudden spurt in terror attacks in the neighboring country, Mr Gilani said, "In the light of these events in Afghanistan, the US leadership's statements were surprising for us as they were contrary to Pakistan's sacrifices and successes against terrorism and extremism". He added, "While rejecting all these accusations, we have focused on positive and responsible ways to resolve these problems".
Enhancing positive and deeper contacts at all levels alone can pave the way for solving these problems, Mr Gilani said, adding,"all doors for dialogue are open" to resolve differences with the US.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Despite bail, Afaq Ahmed detained for one month
KARACHI: Mohajir Qaumi Movement- Haqiqi (MQM-H) chief Afaq Ahmed has been detained for one month under the Maintenance of Public Order (MPO) ordinance despite being released on bail by the Sindh High Court (SHC).
Section 144 was imposed before the release orders of Ahmed were submitted.
Around 500-1,000 MQM-H supporters, who had gathered outside the Malir District Jail, expecting Ahmed’s release started protesting and blocked the National Highway.
On Monday, Ahmed was granted bail on condition of submitting Rs1 million as a surety bond by the SHC in his last pending case – the murder of an activist of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) in 2009.
He was expected to be released from the jail on Wednesday after seven years of his detention, from where he was supposed to visit his father’s grave before going to his house in Landhi.
Who is Afaq Ahmed?
Ahmed, once close to the MQM chief Altaf Hussain, developed differences with him in the 1990s. Following an operation against the party in June 1992, Ahmed and Aaamir Khan led the breakaway faction later called Mohajir Qaumi Movement-Haqiqi.
The MQM-H established its hold in Liaquatabad, Landhi, Korangi, and New Karachi with the Lines Area sector being their stronghold. These areas were later dubbed ‘no-go areas’ for members, associates or supporters of Altaf Hussain.
The rival factions have long accused each other of killing workers and supporters.
Ahmed emerged as a strong opponent in the late 1990s but in early 2000 was forced to go underground as government agencies launched a search operation against him.
In 2004, when the MQM came into power and Arbab Ghulam Rahim was the then Sindh chief minister, Ahmed was arrested and has been in prison ever since. His headquarters known as the ‘White House’ was razed to the ground, sending a strong signal to the MQM-Haqiqi.
Ahmed still wields influence amongst a section of the Urdu- speaking community. His release may be the beginning of a new friction in Sindh’s politics.
Despite bail, Afaq Ahmed detained for one month
KARACHI: Mohajir Qaumi Movement- Haqiqi (MQM-H) chief Afaq Ahmed has been detained for one month under the Maintenance of Public Order (MPO) ordinance despite being released on bail by the Sindh High Court (SHC).
Section 144 was imposed before the release orders of Ahmed were submitted.
Around 500-1,000 MQM-H supporters, who had gathered outside the Malir District Jail, expecting Ahmed’s release started protesting and blocked the National Highway.
On Monday, Ahmed was granted bail on condition of submitting Rs1 million as a surety bond by the SHC in his last pending case – the murder of an activist of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) in 2009.
He was expected to be released from the jail on Wednesday after seven years of his detention, from where he was supposed to visit his father’s grave before going to his house in Landhi.
Who is Afaq Ahmed?
Ahmed, once close to the MQM chief Altaf Hussain, developed differences with him in the 1990s. Following an operation against the party in June 1992, Ahmed and Aaamir Khan led the breakaway faction later called Mohajir Qaumi Movement-Haqiqi.
The MQM-H established its hold in Liaquatabad, Landhi, Korangi, and New Karachi with the Lines Area sector being their stronghold. These areas were later dubbed ‘no-go areas’ for members, associates or supporters of Altaf Hussain.
The rival factions have long accused each other of killing workers and supporters.
Ahmed emerged as a strong opponent in the late 1990s but in early 2000 was forced to go underground as government agencies launched a search operation against him.
In 2004, when the MQM came into power and Arbab Ghulam Rahim was the then Sindh chief minister, Ahmed was arrested and has been in prison ever since. His headquarters known as the ‘White House’ was razed to the ground, sending a strong signal to the MQM-Haqiqi.
Ahmed still wields influence amongst a section of the Urdu- speaking community. His release may be the beginning of a new friction in Sindh’s politics.
Section 144 was imposed before the release orders of Ahmed were submitted.
Around 500-1,000 MQM-H supporters, who had gathered outside the Malir District Jail, expecting Ahmed’s release started protesting and blocked the National Highway.
On Monday, Ahmed was granted bail on condition of submitting Rs1 million as a surety bond by the SHC in his last pending case – the murder of an activist of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) in 2009.
He was expected to be released from the jail on Wednesday after seven years of his detention, from where he was supposed to visit his father’s grave before going to his house in Landhi.
Who is Afaq Ahmed?
Ahmed, once close to the MQM chief Altaf Hussain, developed differences with him in the 1990s. Following an operation against the party in June 1992, Ahmed and Aaamir Khan led the breakaway faction later called Mohajir Qaumi Movement-Haqiqi.
The MQM-H established its hold in Liaquatabad, Landhi, Korangi, and New Karachi with the Lines Area sector being their stronghold. These areas were later dubbed ‘no-go areas’ for members, associates or supporters of Altaf Hussain.
The rival factions have long accused each other of killing workers and supporters.
Ahmed emerged as a strong opponent in the late 1990s but in early 2000 was forced to go underground as government agencies launched a search operation against him.
In 2004, when the MQM came into power and Arbab Ghulam Rahim was the then Sindh chief minister, Ahmed was arrested and has been in prison ever since. His headquarters known as the ‘White House’ was razed to the ground, sending a strong signal to the MQM-Haqiqi.
Ahmed still wields influence amongst a section of the Urdu- speaking community. His release may be the beginning of a new friction in Sindh’s politics.
Pakistan's double-game: treachery or strategy?
(Reuters) - Washington has just about had it with Pakistan.
"Turns out they are disloyal, deceptive and a danger to the United States," fumed Republican Representative Ted Poe last week. "We pay them to hate us. Now we pay them to bomb us. Let's not pay them at all."
For many in America, Islamabad has been nothing short of perfidious since joining a strategic alliance with Washington 10 years ago: selectively cooperating in the war on extremist violence and taking billions of dollars in aid to do the job, while all the time sheltering and supporting Islamist militant groups that fight NATO troops in Afghanistan.
Pakistan has angrily denied the charges, but if its critics are right, what could the explanation be for such duplicity? What strategic agendas might be hidden behind this puzzling statecraft?
The answer is that Pakistan wants to guarantee for itself a stake in Afghanistan's political future.
It knows that, as U.S. forces gradually withdraw from Afghanistan, ethnic groups will be competing for ascendancy there and other regional powers - from India to China and Iran - will be jostling for a foot in the door.
Islamabad's support for the Taliban movement in the 1990s gives it an outsized influence among Afghanistan's Pashtuns, who make up about 42 percent of the total population and who maintain close ties with their Pakistani fellow tribesmen.
In particular, Pakistan's powerful military is determined there should be no vacuum in Afghanistan that could be filled by its arch-foe, India.
INDIA FOCUS
Pakistan has fought three wars with its neighbour since the bloody partition of the subcontinent that led to the creation of the country in 1947, and mutual suspicion still hobbles relations between the two nuclear-armed powers today.
"They still think India is their primary policy," said Talat Masood, a retired Pakistani general and prominent political analyst. "India is always in the back of their minds."
In an interview with Reuters on Tuesday, Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani - unprompted - complained that Washington's failure to deal even-handedly with New Delhi and Islamabad was a source of regional instability.
Aqil Shah, a South Asia security expert at the Harvard Society of Fellows, said Islamabad's worst-case scenario would be an Afghanistan controlled or dominated by groups with ties to India, such as the Tajik-dominated Northern Alliance, which it fears would pursue activities hostile to Pakistan.
"Ideally, the military would like Afghanistan to become a relatively stable satellite dominated by Islamist Pashtuns," Shah wrote in a Foreign Affairs article this week.
Although Pakistan, an Islamic state, officially abandoned support for the predominantly Pashtun Taliban after the 9/11 attacks on the United States in 2001, elements of the military never made the doctrinal shift.
Few doubt that the shadowy intelligence directorate, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), has maintained links to the Taliban that emerged from its support for the Afghan mujahideen during the 1979-1989 Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.
Until recently, there appeared to be a grudging acceptance from Washington that this was the inevitable status quo.
That was until it emerged in May that al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden - who was killed in a U.S. Navy SEALs raid - had been hiding out in a Pakistani garrison town just two hours up the road from Islamabad, by some accounts for up to five years.
Relations between Pakistan and the United States have been stormy ever since, culminating in a tirade by the outgoing U.S. joint chiefs of staff, Mike Mullen, last week.
Mullen described the Haqqani network, the most feared faction among Taliban militants in Afghanistan, as a "veritable arm" of the ISI and accused Islamabad of providing support for the group's Sept. 13 attack on the U.S. embassy in Kabul.
The reaction in Islamabad has been one of stunned outrage.
Washington has not gone public with evidence to back its accusation, and Pakistani officials say that contacts with the Haqqani group do not amount to actual support.
However, Imran Khan, a Pakistani cricketer-turned-populist-politician, said this week that it was too much to expect that old friends could have become enemies overnight.
He told Reuters that, instead of demanding that Pakistan attack the Haqqanis in the mountainous border region of North Waziristan, the United States should use Islamabad's leverage with the group to bring the Afghan Taliban into negotiations.
"Haqqani could be your ticket to getting them on the negotiating table, which at the moment they are refusing," Khan said. "So I think that is a much saner policy than to ask Pakistan to try to take them on."
REGIONAL GAME
The big risk for the United States in berating Islamabad is that it will exacerbate anti-American sentiment, which already runs deep in Pakistan, and perhaps embolden it further.
C. Raja Mohan, senior fellow at New Delhi's Centre for Policy Research, said Pakistan was probably gambling that the United States' economic crisis and upcoming presidential elections would distract Washington.
"The real game is unfolding on the ground with the Americans. The Pakistan army is betting that the United States does not have too many choices and more broadly that the U.S. is on the decline, he said.
It is also becoming clear that as Pakistan's relations with Washington deteriorate, it can fall back into the arms of its "all-weather friend", China, the energy-hungry giant that is the biggest investor in Afghanistan's nascent resources sector.
Pakistani officials heaped praise on Beijing this week as a Chinese minister visited Islamabad. Among them was army chief General Ashfaq Kayani, arguably the country's most powerful man, who spoke of China's "unwavering support".
In addition, Pakistan has extended a cordial hand to Iran, which also shares a border with Afghanistan.
Teheran has been mostly opposed to the Taliban, which is dominated by Sunni Muslims while Iran is predominantly Shi'ite. But Iran's anti-Americanism is more deep-seated.
"My reading is the Iranians want to see the Americans go," said Raja Mohan, the Indian analyst. "They have a problem with the Taliban, but any American retreat will suit them. Iran in the short term is looking at the Americans being humiliated."
ARMY CALLS THE SHOTS
The supremacy of the military in Pakistan means that Washington has little to gain little from wagging its finger about ties with the Taliban at the civilian government, which is regularly lashed for its incompetence and corruption.
"The state has become so soft and powerless it can't make any difference," said Masood, the Pakistani retired general. "Any change will have to come from the military."
Daniel Markey, a senior fellow for South Asia at the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations, said the problem lies with a security establishment that continues to believe that arming and working - actively and passively - with militant groups serves its purposes.
"Until ... soul-searching takes place within the Pakistani military and the ISI, you're not likely to see an end to these U.S. demands, and a real shift in terms of the relationship," Markey said in an online discussion this week. "This is the most significant shift that has to take place."
(Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
"Turns out they are disloyal, deceptive and a danger to the United States," fumed Republican Representative Ted Poe last week. "We pay them to hate us. Now we pay them to bomb us. Let's not pay them at all."
For many in America, Islamabad has been nothing short of perfidious since joining a strategic alliance with Washington 10 years ago: selectively cooperating in the war on extremist violence and taking billions of dollars in aid to do the job, while all the time sheltering and supporting Islamist militant groups that fight NATO troops in Afghanistan.
Pakistan has angrily denied the charges, but if its critics are right, what could the explanation be for such duplicity? What strategic agendas might be hidden behind this puzzling statecraft?
The answer is that Pakistan wants to guarantee for itself a stake in Afghanistan's political future.
It knows that, as U.S. forces gradually withdraw from Afghanistan, ethnic groups will be competing for ascendancy there and other regional powers - from India to China and Iran - will be jostling for a foot in the door.
Islamabad's support for the Taliban movement in the 1990s gives it an outsized influence among Afghanistan's Pashtuns, who make up about 42 percent of the total population and who maintain close ties with their Pakistani fellow tribesmen.
In particular, Pakistan's powerful military is determined there should be no vacuum in Afghanistan that could be filled by its arch-foe, India.
INDIA FOCUS
Pakistan has fought three wars with its neighbour since the bloody partition of the subcontinent that led to the creation of the country in 1947, and mutual suspicion still hobbles relations between the two nuclear-armed powers today.
"They still think India is their primary policy," said Talat Masood, a retired Pakistani general and prominent political analyst. "India is always in the back of their minds."
In an interview with Reuters on Tuesday, Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani - unprompted - complained that Washington's failure to deal even-handedly with New Delhi and Islamabad was a source of regional instability.
Aqil Shah, a South Asia security expert at the Harvard Society of Fellows, said Islamabad's worst-case scenario would be an Afghanistan controlled or dominated by groups with ties to India, such as the Tajik-dominated Northern Alliance, which it fears would pursue activities hostile to Pakistan.
"Ideally, the military would like Afghanistan to become a relatively stable satellite dominated by Islamist Pashtuns," Shah wrote in a Foreign Affairs article this week.
Although Pakistan, an Islamic state, officially abandoned support for the predominantly Pashtun Taliban after the 9/11 attacks on the United States in 2001, elements of the military never made the doctrinal shift.
Few doubt that the shadowy intelligence directorate, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), has maintained links to the Taliban that emerged from its support for the Afghan mujahideen during the 1979-1989 Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.
Until recently, there appeared to be a grudging acceptance from Washington that this was the inevitable status quo.
That was until it emerged in May that al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden - who was killed in a U.S. Navy SEALs raid - had been hiding out in a Pakistani garrison town just two hours up the road from Islamabad, by some accounts for up to five years.
Relations between Pakistan and the United States have been stormy ever since, culminating in a tirade by the outgoing U.S. joint chiefs of staff, Mike Mullen, last week.
Mullen described the Haqqani network, the most feared faction among Taliban militants in Afghanistan, as a "veritable arm" of the ISI and accused Islamabad of providing support for the group's Sept. 13 attack on the U.S. embassy in Kabul.
The reaction in Islamabad has been one of stunned outrage.
Washington has not gone public with evidence to back its accusation, and Pakistani officials say that contacts with the Haqqani group do not amount to actual support.
However, Imran Khan, a Pakistani cricketer-turned-populist-politician, said this week that it was too much to expect that old friends could have become enemies overnight.
He told Reuters that, instead of demanding that Pakistan attack the Haqqanis in the mountainous border region of North Waziristan, the United States should use Islamabad's leverage with the group to bring the Afghan Taliban into negotiations.
"Haqqani could be your ticket to getting them on the negotiating table, which at the moment they are refusing," Khan said. "So I think that is a much saner policy than to ask Pakistan to try to take them on."
REGIONAL GAME
The big risk for the United States in berating Islamabad is that it will exacerbate anti-American sentiment, which already runs deep in Pakistan, and perhaps embolden it further.
C. Raja Mohan, senior fellow at New Delhi's Centre for Policy Research, said Pakistan was probably gambling that the United States' economic crisis and upcoming presidential elections would distract Washington.
"The real game is unfolding on the ground with the Americans. The Pakistan army is betting that the United States does not have too many choices and more broadly that the U.S. is on the decline, he said.
It is also becoming clear that as Pakistan's relations with Washington deteriorate, it can fall back into the arms of its "all-weather friend", China, the energy-hungry giant that is the biggest investor in Afghanistan's nascent resources sector.
Pakistani officials heaped praise on Beijing this week as a Chinese minister visited Islamabad. Among them was army chief General Ashfaq Kayani, arguably the country's most powerful man, who spoke of China's "unwavering support".
In addition, Pakistan has extended a cordial hand to Iran, which also shares a border with Afghanistan.
Teheran has been mostly opposed to the Taliban, which is dominated by Sunni Muslims while Iran is predominantly Shi'ite. But Iran's anti-Americanism is more deep-seated.
"My reading is the Iranians want to see the Americans go," said Raja Mohan, the Indian analyst. "They have a problem with the Taliban, but any American retreat will suit them. Iran in the short term is looking at the Americans being humiliated."
ARMY CALLS THE SHOTS
The supremacy of the military in Pakistan means that Washington has little to gain little from wagging its finger about ties with the Taliban at the civilian government, which is regularly lashed for its incompetence and corruption.
"The state has become so soft and powerless it can't make any difference," said Masood, the Pakistani retired general. "Any change will have to come from the military."
Daniel Markey, a senior fellow for South Asia at the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations, said the problem lies with a security establishment that continues to believe that arming and working - actively and passively - with militant groups serves its purposes.
"Until ... soul-searching takes place within the Pakistani military and the ISI, you're not likely to see an end to these U.S. demands, and a real shift in terms of the relationship," Markey said in an online discussion this week. "This is the most significant shift that has to take place."
(Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
US missile strike kills 3 in northwest Pakistan
DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan — Pakistani intelligence officials say an American missile strike has killed at least three people in a militant stronghold near the Afghan border.
he two officials say a pair of missiles struck a house near the town of Wana in South Waziristan on Tuesday.
They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk with reporters.
Washington has fired scores of missiles into northwest Pakistan since 2008 to target Taliban and al-Qaida operatives.
The latest strike comes at a time when tension are already high between Washington and Islamabad following a recent claim by a top U.S. military officer, Adm. Mike Mullen, that Pakistan's main spy agency backed those militants who carried out attacks against American targets in Afghanistan.
Pakistan has denied the allegation.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan's interior minister vowed Tuesday to attack Chinese militants hiding out in his country's tribal region, an apparent attempt to curry favor with China at a time when its alliance with the U.S. is severely strained.
Rehman Malik relayed the strong show of support for Beijing after a meeting in Islamabad with Chinese Public Security Minister Meng Jianzhu.
Meng's visit comes as Pakistan's ties with the U.S. have soured over allegations that Islamabad supports Afghan insurgents that are based in Pakistan's tribal regions.
Some Pakistani officials hope that China can fill the diplomatic and economic void if Washington decides to sever or downgrade ties with Islamabad.
Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani heaped praise on China, saying the friendship between the two countries was "higher than mountains, deeper than oceans, stronger than steel and sweeter than honey."
However, many analysts doubt that China is interested in replacing the billions of dollars in aid the Americans give Pakistan every year.
Security and political ties between Pakistan and the United States hit a near crisis-point after a top U.S. military officer, Adm. Mike Mullen, claimed last week that Pakistan's main spy agency backed militants that carried out attacks against American targets in Afghanistan. Pakistani officials have denied the allegations and said Washington is trying to use Pakistan as a scapegoat for its troubled war in Afghanistan.
But China also has concerns about the spread of Islamist militancy in Pakistan.
Muslim militants from China's western Xinjiang are known to be training and fighting on the Pakistan side of the Afghan border, along with al-Qaida and other international extremist networks. They have claimed attacks in China and issued statements threatening Beijing.
"We will strike very hard against them," Malik said. "Anybody who is the enemy of China is the enemy of Pakistan."
It remains unclear how Pakistan will do this. Most of the militants are believed to be in the North Waziristan tribal area. Pakistan's army has a presence there, and the U.S. has repeatedly asked Islamabad to move against militants there. However, Pakistan has so far not launched an offensive against militants there.
Malik said Sunday that Islamabad had killed or extradited several Chinese militants, but didn't say when or from where.
___
he two officials say a pair of missiles struck a house near the town of Wana in South Waziristan on Tuesday.
They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk with reporters.
Washington has fired scores of missiles into northwest Pakistan since 2008 to target Taliban and al-Qaida operatives.
The latest strike comes at a time when tension are already high between Washington and Islamabad following a recent claim by a top U.S. military officer, Adm. Mike Mullen, that Pakistan's main spy agency backed those militants who carried out attacks against American targets in Afghanistan.
Pakistan has denied the allegation.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan's interior minister vowed Tuesday to attack Chinese militants hiding out in his country's tribal region, an apparent attempt to curry favor with China at a time when its alliance with the U.S. is severely strained.
Rehman Malik relayed the strong show of support for Beijing after a meeting in Islamabad with Chinese Public Security Minister Meng Jianzhu.
Meng's visit comes as Pakistan's ties with the U.S. have soured over allegations that Islamabad supports Afghan insurgents that are based in Pakistan's tribal regions.
Some Pakistani officials hope that China can fill the diplomatic and economic void if Washington decides to sever or downgrade ties with Islamabad.
Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani heaped praise on China, saying the friendship between the two countries was "higher than mountains, deeper than oceans, stronger than steel and sweeter than honey."
However, many analysts doubt that China is interested in replacing the billions of dollars in aid the Americans give Pakistan every year.
Security and political ties between Pakistan and the United States hit a near crisis-point after a top U.S. military officer, Adm. Mike Mullen, claimed last week that Pakistan's main spy agency backed militants that carried out attacks against American targets in Afghanistan. Pakistani officials have denied the allegations and said Washington is trying to use Pakistan as a scapegoat for its troubled war in Afghanistan.
But China also has concerns about the spread of Islamist militancy in Pakistan.
Muslim militants from China's western Xinjiang are known to be training and fighting on the Pakistan side of the Afghan border, along with al-Qaida and other international extremist networks. They have claimed attacks in China and issued statements threatening Beijing.
"We will strike very hard against them," Malik said. "Anybody who is the enemy of China is the enemy of Pakistan."
It remains unclear how Pakistan will do this. Most of the militants are believed to be in the North Waziristan tribal area. Pakistan's army has a presence there, and the U.S. has repeatedly asked Islamabad to move against militants there. However, Pakistan has so far not launched an offensive against militants there.
Malik said Sunday that Islamabad had killed or extradited several Chinese militants, but didn't say when or from where.
___
Monday, September 26, 2011
Officials: No action against Haqqani network by Pakistan military
Islamabad, Pakistan (CNN) -- The Pakistani Army has decided not to take action against the Haqqani network for the time being despite a fresh wave of intense pressure from Washington for a military offensive against the Pakistani-based militant group, two military officials told CNN on Monday
Pakistan's army chief Gen. Ashfaq Kayani summoned an impromptu meeting early Sunday with top generals, two Pakistani military officials told CNN. They asked for anonymity because they are not authorized to talk to the media.
The meeting comes days after the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, made allegations that Pakistan's Intelligence agency, ISI, has direct links with the Haqqani network and was involved in the attack on the U.S. Embassy in Kabul last week.
"The allegation of Pakistan's involvement on the attack on U.S. Embassy in Kabul is just a conspiracy against us," one of the officials said.
He went on to say that the United States was using Pakistan as a scapegoat for its imminent defeat in Afghanistan.
A second official said the decision about taking action against the Haqqani network would be made public at a later time, maybe by the Foreign Ministry, but he did not say when.
The second official said the military has decided not to take action, for the time being, because the army is stretched too thin with several other operations against militants in northwest Pakistan. This is the same reason the army has used on numerous occasion in the past to explain why they have not launched an operation in North Waziristan, where the Haqqani network is based.
"We are not in a position to undertake an operation at this point," the official said.
In a statement Friday, the White House demanded that Pakistan break any links it has with the Haqqani network despite Pakistan's insistence that it had no links with the group.
Pakistan's Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar has been on a diplomatic mission in the United States and is scheduled to speak at the U.N. General Assembly despite receiving orders by Pakistan's prime minister to return to Pakistan.
Pakistan's army chief Gen. Ashfaq Kayani summoned an impromptu meeting early Sunday with top generals, two Pakistani military officials told CNN. They asked for anonymity because they are not authorized to talk to the media.
The meeting comes days after the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, made allegations that Pakistan's Intelligence agency, ISI, has direct links with the Haqqani network and was involved in the attack on the U.S. Embassy in Kabul last week.
"The allegation of Pakistan's involvement on the attack on U.S. Embassy in Kabul is just a conspiracy against us," one of the officials said.
He went on to say that the United States was using Pakistan as a scapegoat for its imminent defeat in Afghanistan.
A second official said the decision about taking action against the Haqqani network would be made public at a later time, maybe by the Foreign Ministry, but he did not say when.
The second official said the military has decided not to take action, for the time being, because the army is stretched too thin with several other operations against militants in northwest Pakistan. This is the same reason the army has used on numerous occasion in the past to explain why they have not launched an operation in North Waziristan, where the Haqqani network is based.
"We are not in a position to undertake an operation at this point," the official said.
In a statement Friday, the White House demanded that Pakistan break any links it has with the Haqqani network despite Pakistan's insistence that it had no links with the group.
Pakistan's Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar has been on a diplomatic mission in the United States and is scheduled to speak at the U.N. General Assembly despite receiving orders by Pakistan's prime minister to return to Pakistan.
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Women in Saudi Arabia to vote and run in elections
Women in Saudi Arabia are to be given the right to vote and run in future municipal elections, King Abdullah has announced.
He said they would also have the right to be appointed to the consultative Shura Council.
The move was welcomed by activists who have called for greater rights for women in the kingdom, which enforces a strict version of Sunni Islamic law.
The changes will occur after municipal polls on Thursday, the king said.
King Abdullah announced the move in a speech at the opening of the new term of the Shura Council - the formal body advising the king, whose members are all appointed.
"Because we refuse to marginalise women in society in all roles that comply with sharia, we have decided, after deliberation with our senior clerics and others... to involve women in the Shura Council as members, starting from next term," he said.
"Women will be able to run as candidates in the municipal election and will even have a right to vote."
Continue reading the main story
“Start Quote
This is something we have long waited for and long worked towards”
Nimah Ismail Nawwab Saudi writer and activist
Cautious reformer
The BBC's world affairs correspondent Emily Buchanan says it is an extraordinary development for women in Saudi Arabia, who are not allowed to drive, or to leave the country unaccompanied.
She says there has been a big debate about the role of women in the kingdom and, although not everyone will welcome the decision, such a reform will ease some of the tension that has been growing over the issue.
Saudi writer Nimah Ismail Nawwab told the BBC: "This is something we have long waited for and long worked towards."
She said activists had been campaigning for 20 years on driving, guardianship and voting issues.
Another campaigner, Wajeha al-Huwaider, said the king's announcement was "great news".
"Now it is time to remove other barriers like not allowing women to drive cars and not being able to function, to live a normal life without male guardians," she told Reuters news agency.
Correspondents say King Abdullah has been cautiously pressing for political reforms, but in a country where conservative clerics and some members of the royal family resist change, liberalisation has been very gradual.
In May more than 60 intellectuals called for a boycott of Thursday's ballot saying "municipal councils lack the authority to effectively carry out their role".
Municipal elections are the only public polls in Saudi Arabia.
More than 5,000 men will compete in municipal elections on Thursday - the second-ever in the kingdom - to fill half the seats in local councils. The other half are appointed by the government.
He said they would also have the right to be appointed to the consultative Shura Council.
The move was welcomed by activists who have called for greater rights for women in the kingdom, which enforces a strict version of Sunni Islamic law.
The changes will occur after municipal polls on Thursday, the king said.
King Abdullah announced the move in a speech at the opening of the new term of the Shura Council - the formal body advising the king, whose members are all appointed.
"Because we refuse to marginalise women in society in all roles that comply with sharia, we have decided, after deliberation with our senior clerics and others... to involve women in the Shura Council as members, starting from next term," he said.
"Women will be able to run as candidates in the municipal election and will even have a right to vote."
Continue reading the main story
“Start Quote
This is something we have long waited for and long worked towards”
Nimah Ismail Nawwab Saudi writer and activist
Cautious reformer
The BBC's world affairs correspondent Emily Buchanan says it is an extraordinary development for women in Saudi Arabia, who are not allowed to drive, or to leave the country unaccompanied.
She says there has been a big debate about the role of women in the kingdom and, although not everyone will welcome the decision, such a reform will ease some of the tension that has been growing over the issue.
Saudi writer Nimah Ismail Nawwab told the BBC: "This is something we have long waited for and long worked towards."
She said activists had been campaigning for 20 years on driving, guardianship and voting issues.
Another campaigner, Wajeha al-Huwaider, said the king's announcement was "great news".
"Now it is time to remove other barriers like not allowing women to drive cars and not being able to function, to live a normal life without male guardians," she told Reuters news agency.
Correspondents say King Abdullah has been cautiously pressing for political reforms, but in a country where conservative clerics and some members of the royal family resist change, liberalisation has been very gradual.
In May more than 60 intellectuals called for a boycott of Thursday's ballot saying "municipal councils lack the authority to effectively carry out their role".
Municipal elections are the only public polls in Saudi Arabia.
More than 5,000 men will compete in municipal elections on Thursday - the second-ever in the kingdom - to fill half the seats in local councils. The other half are appointed by the government.
Saturday, September 24, 2011
Pakistan warns that U.S. accusations may cost Washington an ally
Pakistani officials warned Friday that they could jettison the United States as an ally if American officials continued to accuse Islamabad's intelligence agency of assisting a leading Afghan Taliban group in recent attacks in Afghanistan.
Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar cautioned the U.S. against airing allegations such as the blunt charge of collusion between Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency, known as ISI, and the militant Haqqani network made Thursday by Adm. Michael G. Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, before the Senate Armed Services Committee.
"You cannot afford to alienate Pakistan; you cannot afford to alienate the Pakistani people," Khar said in New York, speaking to a Pakistani television channel. She was in the U.S. for the U.N. General Assembly session.
Pakistani army chief Gen. Ashfaq Kayani in a statement called Mullen's remarks "very unfortunate and not based on facts."
Pakistani officials continued to tersely reject the allegations and challenged the U.S. to furnish evidence of ties between the country's intelligence community and the Haqqani group.
Mullen called the Haqqani network "a veritable arm" of the ISI and said the intelligence agency helped Haqqani militants during attacks Sept. 13 on the U.S. Embassy in Kabul as well as a truck bomb blast in Wardak province three days earlier that injured 77 American troops.
U.S. military officers and former officials say ISI communicated with Afghan insurgents who attacked the U.S. Embassy and NATO headquarters nearby and appears to have provided them with equipment.
Estimated to number more than 10,000 fighters, the Haqqani network uses Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal region along the Afghan border to launch suicide bombings, commando-style assaults and other strikes on U.S., Afghan and North Atlantic Treaty Organization forces in eastern Afghanistan and in the capital, Kabul.
The group has never carried out any attacks against targets in Pakistan. The country's links with the Haqqani network date to the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s, when the ISI backed the group's founder, Jalaluddin Haqqani, and other resistance fighters.
Mullen's allegations probably will widen the chasm between Pakistan and the U.S., tenuous allies whose mutual mistrust deepened considerably this year. The U.S. commando raid in May that killed Osama bin Laden in the city of Abbottabad raised questions in Washington about whether elements of the Pakistan's intelligence agencies knew that the Al Qaeda leader had been hiding for five years just a few miles north of the capital, Islamabad. The January arrest of CIA contractor Raymond Davis, accused of shooting to death two Pakistani men he said were trying to rob him, sparked fear among Pakistanis that scores of CIA operatives were secretly roaming the country.
To get Pakistan to act against the Haqqani network, Washington has signaled a willingness to link future financial aid with Islamabad's cooperation against extremists, and has hinted that it could even mount some kind of unilateral, targeted strike on Haqqani strongholds in Pakistani territory.
In Karachi, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani told reporters that the onus was on Washington to pull back and begin mending frayed relations between the two countries.
"They can't live with us; they can't live without us," Gilani said. "So I would say to them that if they can't live without us, they should increase contacts with us to remove misunderstandings."
Security analyst Javed Hussain, a retired Pakistani brigadier, said a U.S. strike on Haqqani would backfire, given the array of militant groups beyond the Haqqani network that also use North Waziristan as a base of operations.
"It would be a strategic blunder," Hussain said. "North Waziristan is a hornet's nest.... They would all converge and coordinate activities against the U.S. Can [Defense Secretary Leon E.] Panetta or President Obama afford to open another front under the present circumstances? If he does, good luck to him."
Experts say no measure may be enough to prod Pakistan's security establishment into severing ties with the Haqqani group. The military views the militant network as a valuable asset in a post-U.S. Afghanistan to prevent nuclear archrival India from extending its influence to Kabul. Pakistan's military and intelligence chiefs have always regarded India, and not Islamic extremists, as their primary enemy.
Pakistan's military leaders, says security analyst and former Pakistani Gen. Talat Masood, "do feel that the policy they are pursuing is, in the long term, in their interest.... There are others in Pakistan who believe this association with the Haqqani network is extremely detrimental to Pakistan's interests. But they are in the minority."
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