Pakistan: The attack on Karachi police

After a period of relative calm, Karachi was the scene of a car bomb attack last Thursday, and the target an officer of the special investigations unit, SSP Farooq Awan. Thanks to his bullet and bomb proof vehicle, Awan survived with minor injuries but two passers-by were killed and five other people were injured. This was the third failed attempt on the officer's life. Over the recent months, several other policemen have lost their lives in targeted killings. These attacks are an evidence of the ongoing security operations' effectiveness, and the risks police are taking in the performance of their duties. A lot more effort and time, though, is needed to eliminate the scourge of terrorism from this country.

A sectarian group Jundollah claimed responsibility for this latest act of terrorism. A few days earlier, the same group had claimed credit for killing the son of a prominent Shia scholar as well as a grenade attack on a police check post on the Shara-e-Faisal that left at least four policemen injured. In what looked like a reprisal attack, the incident was followed by another sectarian terrorist group killing a close relative of Mufti Naeem. According to the city's chief of counter-terrorism unit, Jundullah has become active after a gap of about one-and-a-half years. It is worthwhile to note that Jundullah, which for quite some time has been carrying out terrorist attacks in northern areas, especially Gilgit-Baltistan, is also known to have a nexus with the Taliban. The ongoing military operation in North Waziristan has achieved major success, putting the Taliban on the run. That seems to be the explanation why these terrorists have once again become so active in Karachi. It is pertinent to recall also that just recently head of the Punjab Taliban, Ismatullah Muawiya, issued an announcement, saying from now on the group is to lay down arms and focus only on preaching Islam and Sharia in Pakistan while continuing to engage in "practical jihad" in Afghanistan.

Clearly, the terrorists are in disarray. But they are not going to abandon their agendas and the violent means to accomplish them unless and until thoroughly defeated. The government's achievements in North Waziristan will come to a naught without elimination of these militants. As a senior military commander averred the other day, an intelligence-based counter-terrorism operation needs to be undertaken throughout the country. The police have a special role to play in it, and hence are vulnerable to targeted attacks. Luckily for the officer in the present instance, he was protected by a bomb-proof vehicle. Confronting militants in a city of over twenty million like Karachi would not be easy for any best prepared police force. But as various Sindh government leaders are now saying, the province's police are both small in number and ill-equipped to deal with the challenges at hand. The federal government needs to respond to the province's request for help in an urgent and appropriate manner. The situation in other provinces is not going to be an easy task, either. But it is a task that must be accomplished with patience and determination.