Pakistan: PML-N government with regard to tackling the TTP... '' Prisoner of self-created illusions ''

While terrorists rarely let a day pass without a bloody attack on innocent people, the PML-N government fails to admit the failure of its policy of appeasement. Instead of condemning the terrorists it still calls them ‘misled people’ and blames the US for sabotaging the one-sided peace process which the TTP had never owned. One fails to understand how long the PML-N leadership will take to disabuse itself of the ill-founded notion that the TTP was serious about talks till the killing of Hakimullah Mehsud. While Nawaz Sharif calls the drone strikes a breach of Pakistan’s sovereignty he does not condemn the hosting by the Taliban of hundreds of armed Uzbeks, Chechens, Arabs and Uighurs in Waziristan despite their launching some of the deadliest attacks inside Pakistan. Despite having been spurned by the TTP, Sharif has again advocated dialogue with the terrorist network.

After more than half a year in office and the talks still nowhere in sight, Nawaz Sharif has appealed to Imran Khan, Fazlur Rehman, Samiul Haq and Munawar Hassan to help kick-start the dialogue. Does this imply that Sharif has lost confidence in his interior minister? Nisar says, the PMLN government had initiated the dialogue process in the light of the decisions taken at the APC. This requires that the government again convene the APC to report the progress made. While Sharif is planning to seek the help of the religious parties and Imran Khan, why is he hesitant to listen to the views of PPP, ANP and MQM who too were a part of the APC? Why hesitation to listen to the other view?

Seven months in power and the promised national security policy is still under consideration. What Nisar said on Thursday was a rehash of what he had said four months back: the policy will have three components i.e. covert, strategic, and operational and NACTA will be the focal point for counter-terrorism while a Joint Intelligence Directorate will be established under it for analysis and coordination among various intelligence agencies. This implies that there has been no advance in the direction during the last few months.

While the government leadership lives in a self-created world of illusions the terrorist attacks continue to rock the country. On Thursday, one of the several groups and splinters attacked a Tablighi gathering in Peshawar killing ten. The TTP spokesman has denied his group’s involvement. The interior ministry however needs to tell the people who was behind the attack and what it is doing to bring it to the book besides trying to hold talks with it.