Monday, October 12, 2020
#Pakistan - #Coronapandemie - The second wave
By Attiya Munawer
#Pakistan - Bureaucracy under PTI - Civil servants as rolling stones
The Army Public School in Peshawar Report
Rahimullah Yusufzai
Nearly six years after the deadliest terrorist attack in Pakistan’s history, a judicial commission has shed some light on the incident that caused the martyrdom of 147 persons, including 132 schoolchildren, at the Army Public School in Peshawar.
It isn’t common in Pakistan for reports of judicial commissions formed to inquire into important incidents to be made public. Often such commissions are constituted to calm down the citizens. The government’s refusal to make public the Hamoodur Rahman Commission report on the 1971 debacle in East Pakistan that led to its separation and creation of Bangladesh is widely quoted as an example of hiding facts and keeping the people in the dark. Ironically, the report was leaked by unknown sources to the Indian media which broke the story.
However, in the case of the Army Public School (APS) carnage, the Supreme Court of Pakistan headed by Chief Justice Gulzar Ahmed ordered the government to make the report of the judicial commission public and also give its copy to the parents of the victims along with the government’s response to it. The apex court under the then Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar had taken suo motu notice of the incident in response to the demand by the victims’ parents and asked the Peshawar High Court in October 2018 to set up the judicial commission.
The bereaved parents, who split into at least two groups owing to differences in their ranks, had been staging protests to demand a judicial probe as they believed that the real culprits involved in it had not yet been apprehended. Even now some of them are calling it an incident of “target-killing” rather than an act of terrorism. Though the government and the Pakistan Army have done their best to console and compensate the families of those martyred and wounded through cash payments, plots of land, special education facilities and overseas trips, most of the parents have maintained that their loss was huge and unforgettable. They wanted answers to their questions as to how the army-run school was left almost undefended on that fateful day, December 16, 2014, which was the anniversary of the fall of Dhaka.
Though the government managed to arrest four men based in Peshawar and Khyber, in December 2015 for their involvement in the attack as they had allegedly facilitated the six terrorists who stormed the school, their conviction by a military court and hanging did not satisfy the parents as they argued that the masterminds of the assault had yet to be nabbed and punished. They also wanted those guilty of neglect in protecting the school to be identified and taken to task.
Senior army officials at the time of the attack had pointed out that most of the available troops in Peshawar had been sent to North Waziristan to participate in the Zarb-e-Azb military operation, the biggest operation to-date against terrorists in Pakistan launched in June 2014, and the subsequent Khyber-1 action.
However, the one-man judicial commission of Peshawar High Court, consisting of Justice Mohammad Ibrahim Khan, noted that the security guards present in the school weren’t properly positioned to engage the attackers and buy time for the Quick Response Force and Rapid Response Force, both of whom were rushed to the site of the incident. Besides, it said, the security patrol present near the school was misled by the terrorists who set their vehicle on fire to distract its attention and enter the school premises from the rear to launch the attack. Though the commission in its report praised the armed forces for offering sacrifices and winning the battle against terrorists, it nevertheless noted that “the incident of APS plagued their success stories which deserved deification.” It admitted that terrorism in Pakistan had reached its peak in 2013-14, but it “doesn’t obligate us to hold that our sensitive installation(s) and soft target(s) could be forsaken as a prey to the terrorists’ attack.”
Senior army officials at the time of the attack had pointed out that most of the available troops in Peshawar had been sent to North Waziristan to participate in the Zarb-e-Azb military operation.
The commission, which compiled the 525-page report after recording the statements of 132 persons, including 31 army and police officials, during its nearly 20 months proceedings, had also mentioned the porous border between Afghanistan and Pakistan and unrestrained movement of Afghan refugees as a reason for the entry of the terrorists who attacked the school. The report used strong words such as “infidels” for the facilitators of the attack. It also noted that some of those found guilty of negligence including army personnel had already been awarded punishment.
Concerning the widespread belief that the APS had not been properly protected despite a threat alert by the National Counter Terrorism Authority (Nacta), the commission argued that the alert was of a generic nature about terrorists seeking to target army families and academic institutions as retribution for the successful military operations, Zarb-e-Azb and Khyber-1.
Chief Justice Gulzar Ahmad made two important observations while hearing the case after submission of the judicial commission report in his court. He regretted that traditionally “lower-ranked officials” were held responsible for such incidents and those holding senior positions were spared. He made the remark when the attorney general representing the government said that every possible action was being taken against those involved in the carnage. The chief justice also observed that the militants were able to “achieve their objective”, adding that the security institutions “should have been aware of this conspiracy”.
The two masterminds of the APS attack, both based in Afghanistan and belonging to the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), were subsequently killed in US drone strikes. Khalifa Umar Mansoor aka Umar Naray, who had claimed responsibility for the attack and was seen in pictures with the six terrorists as they embarked on their journey to Pakistan, was killed on July 9, 2016, in Afghanistan’s eastern Nangarhar province. The TTP head Maulana Fazlullah, who must have been aware of the planning of the terrorist assault on APS and had defended it, was eliminated in another US drone strike on June 14, 2018, in Kunar province.
These two deaths may have brought closure to the parents and relatives of the victims and the judicial commission’s report has tried to answer some of their questions. The tragedy will, of course, continue to haunt not only the victims’ parents but also rest of the nation.
The Cat and Mouse game between Pakistan and FATF
By Hafeez Hassanabadi
It is noteworthy to remind that Pakistan was blacklisted for two years in 2008 but somehow it made to grey list in 2010, but again it slid into blacklist for its shenanigans in 2012. Again it made to grey list in 2014. Later, it extracted itself from the grey to white list, however, in 2018 it was again put on the grey list. It shows that Pakistan has been playing cat and mouse games with the FATF, having been blacklisted twice and grey-listed three times since 2008. Despite being given the chance to improve itself, it has not broken its ties with terrorist organizations.
If it is ready to risk being globally isolated and lose ten billion dollars annually but not ready to give up its relationship with terrorists, then it means that the terrorists and their organizations are much more beneficial to Pakistan than the annual loss of ten billion dollars. Otherwise, how can a country that is on the brink of economic bankruptcy, sunken in external debt, faces internal political turmoil, begging for alms all over the world, play games with an influential international organization like FATF for the last twelve years?
In recent days, hastily laws have been passed in the Pakistani Parliament in the pretext of fulfilling the requirements of FATF, such as spying on people without permission, imprisoning them without giving any reason, transferring them to unknown places without any warrant or FIR. These illegal laws will reinforce the pre-existing state terrorism and create difficulties for personal freedom, including freedom of expression. Pakistan, at the state level, has been treating its citizens in an illegal and inhumane manner for a long time. The rampantly disappearing thousands of Baloch, Pashtuns and Sindhis without giving any reason, getting them killed by unknown people, strewing of mutilated corpses are routine practices in Pakistan. Now that these inhuman measures have the legal backing, it is not difficult to imagine how miserable could be the life of a common man when faced with such absolute power of a state that has never bothered to respect the human rights of its citizens.
The dangerous thing is that the courts in Pakistan are not independent, which certainly reinforces the fact that the law can be molded and folded according to the will of the state, which means the laws, that are being made in keeping with the demands of FATF, are the laws that will further allow the unstrained state to increase its lawlessness by hoodwinking the international community.
If Pakistani forces can find out secular Baloch and Pashtun political activists and kill them in remote villages and mountains of Balochistan, Waziristan; then why it has failed to apprehend bin Laden, Mullah Omar, Akhtar Mansour, Dawood Ibrahim, Ranjit Singh Neta of Khalistan Zinda Bad Force, Babar Khalsa International, Leaders of Wadhwa Singh Babar, Khabir Singh of Khalistan Zinda Bad Force, Paramjit Singh of Khalistan Commando Force,
at a time when Pakistan was listed in grey and black because of being non-compliance with FATF’s demands and remain hidden from the eyes of Pakistani agencies under the shadow of Pak army cantonments in different cities of Pakistan?
Dozens of terrorists including Hafiz Saeed, Masood Azhar, Zakir-ur-Rehman Lakhvi are on the UN Security Council’s list of global terrorists, some of them have been arrested under the pressure of FATF, but the reality is different, they are not in any prison, rather, they’ve been provided VVIPs protocol in state-owned luxury guest houses, from where they’re continuing their terrorist activities in Afghanistan and India.
Baloch, Pashtun and Sindhi are subjected to the worst form of atrocities and brutalisation in Pakistan, and abroad, Afghanistan and Kashmir are their centers from where they are spreading their dirty mayhem all over the world which is known as global terrorism.
The intensification of their activities in Kashmir and the extent of the horror of their war in Afghanistan are no secret. There are still at least three or four Pakistani nationals among every ten terrorists who’re killed in Afghanistan every day and they belong to Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Muhammad fighting under the umbrella of one or another terrorist organization.
While providing training camps to Afghans themselves with all kinds of facilities, is a different topic. It is quite clear that if their terror activities have not been affected, it means the arrest of their leaders, the closure of their accounts, the confiscation of their properties are all eyewash tactics Pakistan continuously uses to further its hidden agenda of Punjabi domination.
The catchy slogan, “Operation Zarb-e-Azb” was carried out in 2015 to eradicate terrorists but in reality, it was all about evacuating its deep state assets and transferring them to safe havens in Afghanistan, Kashmir and Balochistan so that they could be saved from any possible US drone attacks.
Pakistani army cashed in billions of dollars from US and NATO in the name of war against terrorism by a simple act of deception that it was a genuine ally against terrorism, while the homes, shops and properties of innocent Pashtuns were demolished as evidence of its performance, and anyone who raised a voice against this atrocity was selectively killed.
As a result of these atrocities Pashtun Protection Movement, PTM was formed by Pashtun nationalists. State terrorism is also on the rise in occupied Balochistan. On the one hand, hundreds of madrassas have been turned into factories for producing terrorists, on the other, the dirty act of rampant abduction of educated secular members of Baloch society is continuing. While the process of torture and dumping of mutilated dead bodies of Baloch political activists never abates.
Those who are aware of the state-sponsored terrorism, money laundering and corruption, are well aware that Pakistan must have arranged alternatives for these terrorists before closing their accounts and businesses, exactly in the same way as Pakistan’s military generals, politicians, bureaucrats steal billions in the name of their relatives by manipulating under the pretext of business.
The FATF does not need to go far; it should only trace the overseas assets of some of the Pakistani ex-army generals including Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Gen. Kayani, Gen. Jahangir Karamat, Gen. Mirza Aslam Baig and Gen. Asim Saleem Bajwa how these generals have misused their power to commit every robbery and corruption – How they’ve laundered billions of Pakistani rupees into dollars and shifted the black money abroad and how they’ve fooled the civilized world, including the United States, in the name of the war on terror by turning terrorism into a lucrative business and money earning industry?
In the process, they will also learn how Pakistani generals have turned occupied Balochistan into an “efficient” delivery corridor of billions of dollars’ drugs from Afghanistan to the rest of the world against the will of Baloch and how they’ve entrapped Afghans in a stupid war thereby exploiting and exporting their minerals resources with the fake name of Pakistani brand.
The economic interests top the list in Pakistan’s proxy war against Afghanistan, besides many other political motives behind terror catastrophes in Afghanistan that have directly benefited Pakistani security forces. That is why they are hatching each passing day a new kind of conspiracy to perpetuate their terrorism in Afghanistan.
If the FATF wants to stop Pakistan from supporting terrorism, it must ensure two more things: first, to bring to justice the heads and sponsors of those terrorists who were killed and captured in Afghanistan and Kashmir and secondly ensure that all terrorists are referred to the International Court of Justice because they’ve been designated as global terrorists by the UN Security Council.
We are convinced that if the FATF ensures the accountability of the masterminds of the terrorists in Afghanistan, Kashmir and around the world who are linked to and centered in Pakistan, at least fifty to sixty percent of all such crimes in the world could be reduced. This is what the FATF is trying to control. Otherwise, Pakistan will not only maintain the financial support and political backing of these terrorists at the state level but will also try new ways to mislead the world.
In conclusion, it is enough to say that if a state can terrorize its citizens, how can one expect it to have mercy on others? Hence, we strongly argue that blacklisting Pakistan is the best solution to contain it until it has practically given up all forms of sponsorship of terrorists.
https://balochwarna.com/2020/10/01/the-cat-and-mouse-game-between-pakistan-and-fatf/
Pakistan Is Doing Its Own Political Reengineering in Kashmir
BY KUNWAR KHULDUNE SHAHIDAfter condemning New Delhi for its machinations in Jammu and Kashmir, Islamabad is quietly changing the status of Gilgit-Baltistan on its side of the Line of Control.
Ahead of general elections in the Pakistan-administered region of Gilgit-Baltistan on Nov. 15, 554 candidates had submitted their nomination forms to run. India, which also claims the area as part of the broader dispute about the border between the two countries, has slammed the decision to hold the vote as an illegal annexation.
In some ways, New Delhi is right about Islamabad’s intentions. It is holding the elections as part of an attempt to mainstream the area as a fifth province of the country. The move also comes in reaction to India’s own decision last year to revoke Article 370 of its constitution, which had granted Indian-administered Kashmir some autonomy and had protected the region against any attempts from the central government to repopulate it with non-Kashmiris.
Why Pakistan will regret opening the door to radical Islamist parties
Pakistani politics may see a three-way tug-of-war between a middle-class populist, an aggressive military establishment and radical Islamists.
Across Asia, populists and authoritarians have taken advantage of the pandemic to go after their political opponents. Last week, Pakistan’s already frail opposition was dealt a further blow: A case was filed against the former prime minister and stringent critic of the military, Nawaz Sharif, for “sedition,” while former president Asif Ali Zardari was formally charged with corruption. Sharif and Zardari lead different parties and are old antagonists; all they have in common is that they are now tentative and distrustful allies against the army-backed government of Prime Minister Imran Khan.
https://theprint.in/opinion/why-pakistan-will-regret-opening-the-door-to-radical-islamist-parties/521686/
#FATF regional group says Pakistan’s measures ‘not sufficient’ against terror financing
