Talibanisation of Pakistan: The NWFP could break away

Islamabad, July 26: Pakistan Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani will discuss with US President George W. Bush at the White House on Monday the rising Taliban-led militancy in areas bordering Afghanistan, officials said on Friday.

This will be the second meeting between Mr Bush and Mr Gilani after their talks in Egypt in May. Washington has been demanding that Islamabad "effectively control" terrorism and destroy Taliban camps.

Islamabad has failed to curb the increasing influence of Taliban in the restive North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and was forced to hold talks with some of the militant leaders to convince them to have a ceasefire.

According to media reports, the Pakistani Taliban, that has been trained in Afghanistan, is effectively controlling many areas in the NWFP and Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA).

The News daily in its front page report on Friday said the NWFP "was on a fast track of breaking away from Pakistan because of Islamabad’s blind following of Washington’s war on terror".

However, a government official said the report was "highly exaggerated and beyond reality". According to him, the situation was "not good" but not as bad as the media portrayed.

He said the Prime Minister had been fully briefed on the situation and "the Americans know the reasons behind the problems". The official it was a myth that the Taliban was controlling many areas in Pakistan.

The official said that last week’s ultimatum by Taliban to the NWFP government to quit was aimed at creating media hype.

"Some elements with vested interests were giving the impression that NWFP was about to fall to Taliban, which is nothing but wishful thinking... Pakistani security agencies are in full control of the situation," the official said.

A PPP leader said the government was worried about the situation in FATA and NWFP and was "seriously considering handing it over to the army".

Requesting anonymity, the PPP leader said the situation had worsened because of border violations by the coalition forces based in Afghanistan.

"It is an open secret that some senior officers in the coalition, in collaboration with the Afghan leadership, were involved in arms and narcotics trade and making a lot of money," he said, adding the violations had been brought to the notice of the US and British authorities.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani has been warned by his coalition partners that Pakistan could lose its restive North West Frontier Province (NWFP) to the Taliban because of Islamabad’s "blind following" of the US-led global war on terror. "The situation in the NWFP is extremely worrisome as Wednesday’s meeting of (Pakistan’s ruling) coalition partners was warned in plain words that (it) was on a fast track of breaking away from Pakistan because of Islamabad’s blind following of Washington’s war on terror," the News reported on Friday.

"I am telling you that the Frontier province is breaking away from Pakistan," the newspaper quoted Maulana Fazlur Rehman of the junior coalition partner Jamiat-ul-Ulama-i-Islam (JUI) as saying during the meeting. Maulana Fazlur Rehman "did not understand the rationale for putting the integrity of our own country at risk just to please the United States," the News said.

The Awami National Party (ANP)-led NWFP government "too admitted that the local Taliban had extended their influence to most parts of the settled districts, including those surrounding the provincial capital (Peshawar)". The Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), which leads the country’s ruling coalition, is a junior partner in the NWFP government. A presentation by the Frontier government on the situation in the province, too, "was quite disturbing for those who attended the meeting", the newspaper said.

Source: The Asian Age, New Delhi

Political equality for Fata

An editorial in pakistan's Daily Mail

THE unabated violence in the tribal areas of Pakistan spawned by Taliban militancy and sectarian extremism came under sharp focus at three important fora. First, Prime Minister Gilani addressed the Grand Tribal Dirge at Peshawar where he asked the tribal Maalox to join hands with the government in the fight against militancy. Second, PPP co-chairman Asif Zardari met the PPP members of NWFP assembly in Islamabad and explained to them how the coalition government looks at the growing militancy in its socio-political context, that is at some variance with the military-led approach. Third, the NWFP cabinet discussed the Baitullah Mehsud ultimatum to resign and decided not to surrender to his demand. Meanwhile, clashes between the militants and security forces were reported from various parts of the troubled region.

The militants appeared to be retreating from the grim battlefronts in the Hangu salient, but were holding on to their positions in Swat district, particularly in its sub-district Matta. They also blew up a few government posts. More alarmingly, however, they waylaid and killed a prominent invitee to the grand jirga, Malik Shahjehan, as he set out from his Bajaur residence to hear from the prime minister, in addition to the reported killing of two “US spies”.

No doubt, Monday’s happenings are symptomatic of the government’s concern over the turmoil created by the militants, as they also bring out the enormity of that challenge. That the problem of militancy - one may call it Talibanisation - and its ramifications for the United States-led coalition campaign in Afghanistan should have come in for a closer look by the elected government, it was certainly warranted by the upcoming White House visit of the prime minister.

Equally important is the hard unpalatable truth in the matter that tends to unfold in the wake of these happenings. Firstly, these events unmistakably indicate that the government is in deep confusion as how to handle the growing challenge of militancy in the tribal areas that is now spreading to the settled areas of the NWFP. At the Grand Tribal Jirga the prime minister did two things. One, he implored the tribal elders, commonly called Maalox, to ‘deal’ with militants.

“You should talk to militants to renounce insurgency. Those who lay down arms are our friends and those who challenge the government’s writ are not sincere to the country,” he told them. Two, the prime minister announced a package of incentives, including 100 new ‘lungis’ - in odd reminiscence of the colonial days when British government would identify their loyalists by putting stripped turbans on their heads and fix some stipend to be regularly paid to them. It was a tribute to the system left behind by the British and kept alive by successive governments through appointed officials called political agents.

But when Prime Minister Gilani was decorating the newly discovered Maalox his party leader was telling the PPP members that lack of contact with mainstream political parties was one of major causes of the common tribal falling prey to single-dimensional ‘madrasa’ schooling. He wanted the Political Parties Act to be extended to the FATA so that secular parties have the chance to compete with religious parties in the tribal areas. Of course, the ANP-led NWFP cabinet thought that dialogue with militants is the best way to deal with militancy, though suspected “hidden hands” are trying to spoil the game.

Source: Daily Mail, Pakistan

URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-terrorism-jihad/talibanisation-pakistan-nwfp-break-away/d/311