Pakistan - The Fate Of Abductees - Gillani & Taseer

On Sunday, former Prime Minister, Syed Yousuf Raza Gillani received a phone call from his son, Ali Haider Gillani, who has been in the custody of the Taliban since May 9, 2013. In the brief conversation, Haider assured his father of his safety, while his captors reiterated their demand for the release of several Al-Qaeda militants held in Pakistani prisons. This new development in the kidnapping saga brings into focus the plight of several other high profile abductees – such as Shahbaz Taseer, son of the slain Salman Taseer – which had slipped from the public limelight in recent months. Also surfaces the difficult question of the correct government’s policy towards negotiating with militants, which up till now has been unarticulated and ad-hoc. Should the government cater to the demands of the militants to secure the release of high-profile abductees, even if it entails inadvertently furthering the cause of the said militants?
The instinctive – and sentimental – answer is yes. It is the state’s job to protect its citizens at all cost, and wilfully rejecting the option of doing so would surely elicit a strong backlash from the public; especially the family members of the victims. Apart from this normative burden, there are several policy points, which favour such an answer. A government official or a politician whose family member has been kidnapped by militants is liable to manipulation – having a key official crippled by sentiment is damaging to the government’s efforts. Furthermore, the failure to recover high profile abductees not only damages the perception of state control – already crucially weakened in the tribal regions – and forces politicians to stay away from controversial issues and hard-line stances out of fear for their relatives. The Taliban have increasingly shown their willingness to target children of senior politicians and government officials, with the son of President Mamnoon Hussain being the latest. The state needs to counter this fear to give its officials the freedom to take bold steps.
Yet these arguments apply equally to clandestine rescue operations and ransom negotiations; and while the government has employed a flexible policy in this area, the uncertainty is also damaging. Haider Gillani can be freed if the demands of the captors are met; yet is the life of one person worth the release of several hardcore militants – which will inevitable contribute to more death and destruction? This seemingly heartless question becomes more pressing when we consider that the government would never negotiate such a transfer for a common soldier or civilian. The prisoner release not only helps the militants, it reassures them that kidnapping is a lucrative trade, prompting them to go for even bigger marks. A ‘no negotiation’ policy - like the one employed by the U.S – at least makes kidnapping redundant; albeit at the cost of a few lives. Whatever policy the Pakistan government employs, it must keep both sides in mind.