Pakistan 'probably' knew where Osama bin Laden was hiding

Pakistan 'probably' knew where Osama bin Laden was hiding.Pakistan probably knew Osama bin Laden was hiding in Abbottabad, former head of the country's Inter-Services Intelligence says.

Pakistan's main intelligence agency probably knew where Osama bin Laden was hiding and hoped to use him as a bargaining chip before he was killed by US forces in 2011, a former spymaster has said.

Lieutenant General Asad Durrani, who led the country's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency from 1990 to 1992, made the comments while speaking on Al Jazeera's "Head to Head" interview show on Tuesday.

The al-Qaeda chief was tracked down after a 10-year manhunt to Abbottabad, a garrison town north of Islamabad where Pakistan's military academy is headquartered, sparking allegations authorities were colluding with the terror group.

A Pakistani government-appointed commission found nothing to support those claims, but also did not rule out the possibility of "'plausibly deniable' support" from current or former officials.

Asked whether it was possible for bin Laden to have lived in the town without the powerful ISI's knowledge, Durrani said: "My assessment ... was it is quite possible that they (the ISI) did not know, but it was more probable that they did.

"And the idea was that at the right time, his location would be revealed. And the right time would have been when you can get the necessary quid pro quo – if you have someone like Osama bin Laden, you are not going to simply hand him over to the United States."

Durrani, who emphasised that he had no specific knowledge of the issue, suggested Pakistan may have been harbouring bin Laden in the hope of getting a bigger say in the future of neighbouring Afghanistan, where US-led forces officially ended a 13-year combat mission at the end of 2014. "The quid pro quo to my mind ... (was) you get your Osama bin Laden, provided that, now let's agree, let's agree on how to bring the Afghan problem to an end," Durrani told Al-Jazeera, according to a transcript released by the broadcaster.

Pakistan was one of three countries that officially recognised the Taliban government which ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, and is often accused of continuing to provide covert support for their current insurgency.

A leaked Pakistani government report in 2013 said bin Laden arrived in Pakistan in the spring or summer of 2002 – after the 2001 US-led invasion of Afghanistan – and settled in Abbottabad in August 2005.

The report, which coined the term "governance implosion syndrome" to explain the extent of official failures to detect him, said he was once stopped for speeding and enjoyed wearing a cowboy hat.

Bin Laden was shot and killed following a dramatic helicopter raid by US special forces in the early hours of May 2, 2011.

Pakistan's Anti-Terrorist Enthusiasm Wanes. . . Again

By Farheen Rizvi 

When terrorists killed 160 teachers and children at a Peshawar school last December, a burst of commentary suggested that Pakistan would now change its ambivalence about Islamist extremism. Two months later, it seems that Pakistan's government and military are back to business as usual. A terrorist attack on a private school in Karachion Feb. 3 went virtually unnoticed. Admittedly, there were no fatalities in the Karachi attack. But the terrorists did lob a bomb and sent out a warning letter about attacking more schools if the government did not cease the executions of convicted terrorists on death row.

The terrorists are clearly serious about continuing and even expanding their war. But the authorities' response is far from serious.

For almost three decades, successive Pakistani governments have seen Islamist terrorists as assets for regional influence. As the terrorists turned inward, attacking Pakistanis and not just Americans in Afghanistan or Indians in disputed Kashmir, Pakistan started making distinctions among the terrorists. Those attacking abroad and adding to Pakistan's regional clout were "good Taliban" while those fighting Pakistanis were deemed "bad Taliban."

Pakistan's liberals, as well as its friends abroad, pointed out the critical flaw in this policy. The "good Taliban" often protected and helped the "bad Taliban." Several thousand Pakistanis have died in terrorist attacks inside the country as a result of the collaboration between "good Taliban" and "bad Taliban." Targets have included military bases, army headquarters and intelligence service offices. Major political figures have been killed and members of religious minorities, as well as the large Shia Muslim community, massacred.

The Peshawar school attack was supposed to be a turning point. The military, which had already started an operation to clear the country's northwest tribal regions along the border with Afghanistan of terrorist safe havens, promised to expand its fight. The government promised not to make distinctions among terrorist groups. A moratorium on the death penalty was ended and hangings of convicted terrorists on death row began amid public pressure. Two convicted terrorists were hanged in Karachi at dawnon the day the terrorists threw their warning bomb at a local school.

The terror, however, continues and is spreading to various cities of the country. The federal and provincial governments still seem clueless about a comprehensive strategy to deal with the terrorists. For example, schools have been asked to arrange their own security. The provincial government in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (where the Peshawar massacre took place) decided to arm school teachers, as if teachers with guns in classrooms would make children more secure.

The refusal to take the threat seriously is partly rooted in politics. The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government is run by the party of cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan, who has often shown sympathy and supported their narrative of a war between Muslims and the West. While campaigning in the 2013 election, Khan demanded "political space" and offices for Taliban in major cities of Pakistan, shocking the country's embattled liberals.

Imran Khan's campaign slogans of "Change" and for building a "New Pakistan" never attracted the ire of the Taliban. The Taliban violently interfered with the 2013 election campaign of liberal parties in Pakistan, but Imran Khan's PTI had a free run. Activists and senior leaders of liberal political forces were killed by terrorists during the campaign, but Khan's PTI and other right wing parties faced no such threat.

Khan was busy organizing street protests against the federal government headed by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif (on grounds that the 2013 election poll was rigged) when the Taliban attacked the Army Public School in his province. The incident forced him to stop the protests, but he has yet to take the terrorist threat seriously. Hence the dangerous symbolic gesture of providing guns to school teachers instead of identifying and arresting Taliban masterminds.

Under pressure by the military in the northwest, the Taliban and other nominally banned organizations are regrouping in the southern port city of Karachi. The city is a multi-ethnic and multi-religious cauldron of 20 million people without local government. It has become a battleground for sectarian conflict and reports suggest the city is surrounded by Taliban groups.
Since 2008, the province is run by the Pakistan Peoples Party of former President Asif Zardari. In 2013, the provincial government in Sindh, which includes Karachi, launched a paramilitary operation ostensibly against "killers and criminals" of the metropolis. But somehow that operation has targeted the party's opponents more than hardcore terrorists. The Taliban still remain able to threaten schools in the city.

Pakistan's leaders have wasted enough time in political squabbles and dithering while the Taliban slowly take over their cities. The country still faces the questions it did before the brutal murder of schoolchildren in Peshawar on Dec. 16: Will its military establishment really give up on "good Taliban" who advance strategic objectives across the border? Will the politicians stop supporting organizations banned by law but still operating openly? Will preaching hate against other religions or neighboring countries stop? Will Pakistan go beyond just condemning terrorist violence when it occurs instead of preventing it?

Pakistan’s Curious History of Disavowing its International Honorees

BY MOHAMMAD SHOAIB ADIL

Nobel Prize and Academy Award winners find little love in their homeland.

A sad irony of the Pakistani state is that when one of its citizens is awarded an international prize, he or she is often dubbed a part of some larger conspiracy against the state: from Faiz Ahmad Faiz, who won the Lenin Peace Prize in 1962; to Abdus Salam, who was awarded the Noble Prize for Physics in 1979; and Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, who received the Academy Award for Best Documentary in 2012. Now, Malala Yousafzai, Pakistan’s most recent Noble prize winner, is being castigated on the same charges.

This curious pastime of disavowing countrymen and women once they are recognized by the international community seems to have begun with Faiz, the legendary Pakistani poet who was given the Lenin Peace Prize by the Soviet Union for his life-long struggle to achieve world peace and universal brotherhood. He was an influential left-wing intellectual, and one of the most regarded poets to write in Urdu. As Pakistani journalist Mushir Anwar put it in a 2011 piece for the Express Tribune: “Faiz was not a just a poet, however, he had a multi-faceted personality. He was a world class journalist and editor, a trade unionist, a thinker and most important of all, a teacher.”

Yet Pakistan’s political leadership and military establishment sensed a deep conspiracy lay within Faiz’s honor. After all, it was the height of the Cold War, Pakistan was aligned with the United States, and they presumed the Soviet Union did not believe in God, making the prize an attack on Pakistan’s Islamic ideology. As Faiz’s niece recalled to two students at the American University in Cairo in 1998: “The government was cognizant of the honor awarded [to] Faiz, [and] it was reluctant to allow him to visit the Soviet Union in order to receive the award,” though eventually he was allowed to travel to receive it.

Then, in 1979, the Noble Prize for Physics was awarded to Salam — a noted Pakistani physicist who shared the prize with two American scholars — for his scientific achievements on the theory of unified weak and electromagnetic interaction between elementary particles; in essence, he predicted the existence of the ‘God particle.’ It was Pakistan’s first Nobel Prize in any category. But once again the state did not welcome this distinction because Salam belonged to an Ahmadi sect, a branch of Islam which had been declared ‘non-Muslim’ by Pakistan’s parliament in 1974. (Interestingly, Salam had actually left Pakistan in protest prior to receiving the award, and was living in Europe at the time.)

Pervez Hoodbhoy, a Pakistani physicist who once worked with Salam, toldEngland’s Daily Mail in 2012 that: “[T]he way his colleague had been treated was a tragedy…He went from [being] someone who was revered in Pakistan, a national celebrity, to someone who could not set foot in Pakistan. If he came, he would be insulted and could be hurt or even killed.”

When Salam died in 1996 and his body was repatriated to Pakistan, he did not receive a state funeral and the media largely ignored his death. Nor did society spare him the indignity of having the word “Muslim” removed from his grave. The epitaph originally read “First Muslim Nobel Laureate,” but was changed upon the orders of a magistrate.

Decades later, in 2012, Obaid-Chinoy’s documentary Saving Face, which highlighted the plight of girls who were the victims of acid attacks, won an Oscar — Pakistan’s first — for best short documentary. But while then-President Asif Ali Zardari conferred Pakistan’s highest national award, the“Hilal-i-Imtiaz” (Crescent of Excellence) upon Obaid-Chinoy and much of the state honored her, she was also the target of widespread criticism.

According to Bina Shah, a Pakistani novelist and commentator, “conservatives [blamed] Obaid-Chinoy for making Pakistan ‘look bad’ in the eyes of world. Well-known Urdu columnist Orya Maqbool Jan, for example, criticized Obaid-Chinoy, arguing that she should have refused to accept the award in protest of a U.S. bombing which killed more than 15 innocent Iraqi and Afghani citizens. Two years on, her motives are still being questioned: Prominent television journalist Talat Hussain asked Obaid-Chinoy why she had chosen such a subject, which presented a dark side of Pakistani culture, when she visited his talk show in April of last year.

This curious cycle repeated itself with Yousafzai, after it was announced that she had won the 2014 Nobel Peace prize. While Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif welcomed the award, many others took to social media to criticize the choice. “Malala Yousafzai may have won the Nobel Peace Prize, but she remains an object of hate for many Pakistanis who view her as a Western agent on a mission to shame her country,” the French wire service Agence France Presse reported. Novelist Shah noted that: “Another popular refrain was ‘drone attacks.’ Why had Malala not spoken out about drones at the U.N.? Why did everyone care so much about Malala and not the other girls murdered by drones? Why did America kill innocent children with drones and then lionize the young Malala to make themselves feel good that they actually cared about the children of Pakistan and Afghanistan?”

While Faiz may have been seen as a Russian agent for his peace prize, Yousafzai was accused of being Western one. Jan, the Urdu columnist,commented: “U.S. President George Bush’s tongue has been put into this girl’s mouth.” Some even suggested that she was simply trying to gain popularity and asylum in the West. The BBC reported that: “‘The Americans and Malala’s father conspired to get her shot so she can become a hero,’ was the somewhat surprising conclusion of one editor of a Mingora-based newspaper some months ago.”

After the announcement of the Nobel award, an association of privately-run schools in Pakistan celebrated an “I Am Not Malala Day” — a play on the title of Yousafzai’s 2013 book — after previously banning its members from buying the biography as it was too sympathetic to British Indian writer, Salman Rushdie. Yet even before she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, Yousafzai was viewed with derision in her native land.

When Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province’s government changed the name of the Government Girls College in Swat — Yousafzai’s hometown — to the Government Malala College for Girls in honor of her struggle for education,around 150 students attended a protest where they tore up and stoned photos of the well-known schoolgirl. The protesting students cited a fear that the school would be targeted by militants for its new name, revealing the power of the opposition to Yousafzai within parts of Pakistani society. One student stated: “I joined others who chanted slogans against Malala and pelted stones on her picture because she had left the country to settle abroad. We are poor, we cannot afford it and we will suffer because she has fled to Britain.” Yousafzai herself reportedly ended up supporting the move to reverse the name change on the basis that it could endanger the students.

In some countries, peace prize-winners and Oscar recipients are seen as some of the brightest stars in their respective fields and worthy of respect and admiration. But Pakistan, as one commentator put it, seems to be a nation of “confused priorities.” While some quarters call Yousafzai ‘the future of Pakistan,’ many others condemn her, as they did those who came before. In fact, a large number of Pakistanis has argued that Aafia Siddiqi, a Pakistani neuroscientist who is imprisoned in the United States on terrorism charges, is the nation’s real hero.

Video - Egyptian Music Ruby (Yal Rmosh)

20,000 Foreign Fighters Flock To Syria, Iraq

Foreign fighters are streaming into Syria and Iraq in unprecedented numbers to join the Islamic State or other extremist groups, including at least 3,400 from Western nations among 20,000 from around the world, U.S. intelligence officials say in an updated estimate of a top terrorism concern.

Intelligence agencies now believe that as many as 150 Americans have tried and some have succeeded in reaching in the Syrian war zone, officials told the House Homeland Security Committee in testimony prepared for delivery on Wednesday. Some of those Americans were arrested en route, some died in the area and a small number are still fighting with extremists.

The testimony and other data were obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press.

Nick Rasmussen, chief of the National Counterterrorism Center, said the rate of foreign fighter travel to Syria is without precedent, far exceeding the rate of foreigners who went to wage jihad in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Yemen or Somalia at any other point in the past 20 years.

U.S. officials fear that some of the foreign fighters will return undetected to their homes in Europe or the U.S. to mount terrorist attacks. At least one of the men responsible for the attack on a satirical magazine in Paris had spent time with Islamic extremists in Yemen.

Meanwhile, the White House circulated a proposal Tuesday that would have Congress authorize the U.S. military to fight Islamic State terrorists over the next three years. A formal request for legislation is expected on Wednesday.

Also at the White House, President Barack Obama praised Kayla Jean Mueller, the young American whose death was confirmed Tuesday. Mueller died while in Islamic State hands, though the group blamed a Jordanian airstrike, and Obama said, "No matter how long it takes, the United States will find and bring to justice the terrorists who are responsible for Kayla's captivity and death."

As for foreign fighters, officials acknowledge it has been hard to track the Americans and Europeans who have made it to Syria, where the Islamic State group is the dominant force trying to overthrow the government of President Bashar Assad. The U.S. Embassy in Syria is closed, and the CIA has no permanent presence on the ground.

"Once in Syria, it is very difficult to discern what happens there," according to Wednesday's prepared testimony of Michael Steinbach, the FBI's assistant director for counterterrorism. "This lack of clarity remains troubling."

The estimate of 20,000 fighters, from 90 countries, is up from 19,000, Rasmussen will tell the House committee, according to prepared testimony. The number of Americans or U.S. residents who have gone or tried to go is up to 150 from 50 a year ago and 100 in the fall.

Rep. Michael McCaul, the Texas Republican who chairs the committee, said in his prepared remarks that the Syrian war had created "the largest convergence of Islamist terrorists in world history." Sustained bombing by a U.S.-led coalition has not stopped the inflow, he noted.

McCaul's committee staff compiled from public sources a list of 18 U.S. citizens or residents who joined or attempted to join the Islamic State group, and 18 others who tried to or succeeded in joining other violent Islamic groups. The list includes three Chicago teens and three Denver teens who were radicalized and recruited online and were arrested after attempting to travel to Syria to join Islamic State fighters. It also includes Douglas McAuthur McCain, 33, a Californian who died in August while fighting with the Islamic State group near Aleppo.

U.S. intelligence officials do not make public their estimate of how many Americans currently are fighting in Syria and Iraq. In September, FBI director James Comey said it was "about a dozen."

Francis X. Taylor, who heads the Homeland Security Department's intelligence office, said in his prepared testimony for the hearing that "we are unaware of any specific, credible, imminent threat to the homeland."

However, he said, the department is concerned that Americans who join violent extremist groups in Syria "could gain combat skills, violent extremist connections and possibly become persuaded to conduct organized or 'lone-wolf' style attacks that target U.S. and Western interests. We also have become increasingly aware of the possibility that Syria could emerge as a base of operations for al-Qaida's international agenda, which could include attacks against the homeland."

Taylor said the U.S. is trying to instruct other governments on how best to track foreign fighters, including "how they can compare airline manifests and reservation data against terrorist watch lists and other intelligence about terrorist travel." He said the U.S. outpaces other countries in that effort.

The intelligence officials also discussed the possibility of homegrown attacks inspired by the Islamic State or al-Qaida but not directly connected to the groups. Rasmussen of the counterterrorism center appeared to downplay that threat, saying it "will remain at its current level resulting in fewer than 10 uncoordinated and unsophisticated plots annually from a pool of up to a few hundred individuals, most of whom are known to the (intelligence agencies) and law enforcement."

McCaul said he fears the Obama administration is blind to the looming dangers of homegrown radicalism of the kind that led to the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing.

"We have no lead agency in charge of countering domestic radicalization and no line item for it in the budgets of key departments and agencies," he said. "I am also concerned that the few programs we do have in place are far too small to confront a challenge that has grown so quickly."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/02/10/foreign-fighters-syria-iraq_n_6656114.html

Video - Syria conflict: BBC exclusive interview with President Bashar al-Assad

Video Report - Topless FEMEN protesters target former IMF director Strauss-Kahn at pimping trial

Video - Putin gifts Kalashnikov to Egypt president al-Sisi

Obama Calls Putin Regarding Ukraine Situation

The White House says President Barack Obama spoke by phone Tuesday with Russian President Vladimir Putin, urging the Russian leader to back a peace deal for Ukraine set for review Wednesday at a four-nation crisis summit in Belarus.

Obama's call, described in a White House statement, came as Ukraine reported that rocket strikes in the eastern city of Kramatorsk killed at least 12 people and wounded more than 80 others.  

Video Report - ISLAMIC STATE - Obama confirms death of US hostage Kayla Mueller

Video Report - New York's homeless census

Obama readying request to use force against Islamic State

BY PATRICIA ZENGERLE

The White House will ask Congress by Wednesday for new authority to use force against Islamic State fighters, congressional aides said on Monday, paving the way for lawmakers' first vote on the scope of a campaign that is already six months old. 

The United States is leading an international coalition against Islamic State, and PresidentBarack Obama launched an air campaign in August against the militant fighters, who have killed thousands of people while seizing swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria.

The administration's failure so far to seek a formal Authorization to Use Military Force for the campaign has caused some members of Congress to express concern that it overstepped the president's constitutional authority.

Others have said that lawmakers should weigh in on an issue as important as the use of military force.

The administration has said the campaign is legal, based on authorization passed under President George W. Bush in 2002 for the Iraq War and in 2001 for fighting al Qaeda and associated groups.

Nancy Pelosi, leader of the House of Representatives' Democrats, told reporters last week the White House would seek an authorization that would last three years. She said there had not yet been decisions about the geographic scope of an authorization or what limits would be placed on combat troops - "boots on the ground."

That issue is expected to be a major sticking point in debate. Many Democrats want to bar sending in U.S. combat forces, but several Republicans have insisted it would be inappropriate to limit military commanders.

Senator Bob Corker, the Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said hearings on the administration's request would start quickly.

The Obama administration had been in close consultations with lawmakers before making its formal request, which could make the approval process move more quickly, he said.

"There have been serious consultations, and there will be more serious consultations," he told reporters at the Senate.

Obama is also expected to seek a repeal of the Iraq war authorization, but not the 2001 authorization, which passed days after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Congressional aides told Reuters on Monday that was still the expectation for Obama's request, given discussions between the administration, lawmakers and congressional staffers. They requested anonymity because they were speaking about private consultations.

The White House has declined to comment on the timing or details of the request.

Video Report - Obama talks Netanyahu visit

Afghanistan - President Ghani Suspends Karzai's Request for Indian Arms

Government sources have confirmed that President Ashraf Ghani has suspended a request made by former president Hamid Karzai in his final months in office that India supply Afghanistan's military with heavy weaponry.

When the request was made, Karzai was on his way out, relations with India were continuing to grow, and the Afghan Ministry of Defense (MoD) had said the national security forces were in dire need of more heavy weaponry. President Karzai provided a list of weapons to the Indian government, which was initially rejected, but later New Delhi agreed to assess the request.

Regarding Ghani's choice to rescind the ask, Mohammad Mohaqeq, the Second Deputy of Chief Executive Officer Abdullah Abdullah, said that the government would likely get the weapons from another source. "If president the has rejected this, there is the possibility that he has thought of another place to confidently get these arms from," he said.

Mohaqeq went on to suggest that President Ghani would likely follow in Karzai's footsteps when it comes to expanding relations with India broadly speaking. "I believe that the president would have a trip to India and he will not contradict all the works of the former president, we need the equipment and should get it from anywhere."

The Afghan Ministry of Defense (MoD) has responded by reinforcing that they are in desperate need for the heavy weaponry. "So far we haven't received weapons from India for the national army," MoD deputy spokesman Dawlat Waziri told TOLOnews. "All the equipment available to us is American, only our officers and soldiers have travelled to India for training, but we need this equipment," he added.

Some analysts have said the rescinding of the arms deal request is part of a broader effort by the national unity government to improve Kabul's ties with Islamabad, which have been strained for years.

"Without considering the political balance while forging relations with regional countries and the world, particularly India, as an ally and strategic partner and one of the major donors to Afghanistan and funding source of big projects, this could lead Afghanistan to crisis and deadlock," military analyst Jawed Kohistani said.

Afghanistan and India have enjoyed increasing close relations in spheres such as the economy, trade and military cooperation. India is one of the top five donor countries to Afghanistan.

Blasts kill 6 policemen in Pakistan

At least six soldiers were killed on Tuesday in two separate roadside bomb blasts in Pakistan's restive northwestern tribal region. 

Pakistan Taliban claimed responsibility for the attacks. The first remote-controlled improvised explosive device blast occurred in Mansehra district, killing two policemen this morning. 

A few hours later, second blast hit a police vehicle and claimed the lives of four cops in Urmagai area of central Kurram Agency bordering Afghanistan, officials said, adding that security forces cordoned off the area and launched a search operation. 

Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan, meanwhile in a statement, said that it has carried out both the attacks. 

Kurram is one of the most sensitive tribal areas as it borders three Afghan provinces. It is adjacent to North Waziristan region where security forces have launched an offensive againsgt the Taliban. 

Pakistan - Writing on the wall

The recent wave of imambargah bombings is consistent with Daesh’s modus operandi in Iraq during the days of the US invasion.

While the Pakistan army tackles  militants in North Waziristan and FATA, it seems that Pakistan’s troubles with terrorism are about to get a lot worse. After the Peshawar incident, banned terrorist outfits have been on the back foot in the wake of the counterterrorist response but if the recent attacks on imambargahs are any indication, we might have to face a very different kind of monster quite soon.

The Islamic State (IS)/Daesh, born from the power vacuum and sectarian undertones in Iraq, continues to garner the world’s attention through its ever barbaric antics and even though the Kurdish fighters have been able to control Daesh’s advance towards Kobani with the help of other allies, the organisation now controls vast territories in the Middle East and counts among its recruits members from various countries, including some European states as well. When the organisation’s chief, the self-proclaimed Caliph Abubakr al-Baghdadi, rose to fame last year, rightful concerns were raised about the possible implications of such an organisation towards Pakistan’s security landscape. At that point, Daesh was too busy in Syria and Iraq, and did not seem to have any plans to advance eastwards, so the concerns were brushed aside. More recently, no less than the country’s advisor on foreign affairs and national security, Sartaj Aziz, has publicly avowed that IS is not a ‘major’ threat for Pakistan. However, the situation has changed dramatically since last year and neglecting the IS threat any further will harm us in the long run.

First of all, warped understandings of Pakistan’s security situation have already cost us too much in terms of the hydra-headed militancy in Pakistan. We were too late to realise the threat posed by terrorist networks and we seem to have learnt nothing from our failure. IS now controls vast territories in the Middle East and it has already made its presence felt in Pakistan as well. Starting from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, a series of wall-chalkings were followed by pamphlets that made their way towards other parts of the country later on.

And, just last month, Daesh announced its organisational structure for the ‘Khorasan’ province, comprising of Pakistani and Afghan territories. Furthermore, Abubakr al-Baghdadi has received implicit and explicit allegiances from banned outfits in Pakistan such as Jundullah. Lastly, a former leader of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Hafiz Saeed Khan was given the responsibility of overseeing all Deash operations in the region, whereas a former Afghan Taliban leader, Mullah Abdul Rauf Khadim, was made his deputy.

In the wake of all this, our state of denial about Daesh’s presence is worrisome since it hampers our ability to foresee the extent of the problem and devise suitable measures. Contrary to the official stance taken, there are multiple reasons why Daesh is going to be a major issue for Pakistan in the coming days.

Firstly, Pakistan will prove to be fertile breeding ground for Deash’s ideology because of its violent sectarian history. While the adherents of the Salafi brand of Islam remain far and few in the Islamic Republic, we as a nation are nonetheless growing extremely intolerant towards minorities, religious or otherwise. This particular aspect of our national psyche, combined with our history of violent sectarianism, is going to play well into the hands of IS and allow them inroads into Pakistani society. There are multiple ways the Sunni-Shia divide can be exploited by IS and, as a matter of fact, the recent wave of imambargah bombings is consistent with Daesh’s modus operandi in Iraq during the days of the US invasion.

Secondly, the local militancy movement is going to be looking for a much stronger umbrella organisation after being forced to lay low due to the counterinsurgency operation by the Pakistan army. Not only can Deash offer ideological harmony, it also has access to state-of-the-art weaponry and training, which the militants here will be attracted towards. Furthermore, finding sources of funding is not going to be an issue for all those that come under Daesh’s command since the organisation’s pockets run deeper than any other similar group.

That being said, Daesh’s inroads towards Pakistan and Afghanistan are not going to be a walk in the park. The army’s ongoing operation has proved to be a bane for the terrorist organisations, and it will effectively curb any new players from making forays into the region. However, apart from that, the existent Taliban and al Qaeda affiliates will not be too happy to jump onto the IS bandwagon from the very start. In fact, Deash might have to engage in fierce turf wars to claim any sort of command over South Asian territories, which in turn could prove to be a crucial blow to its avowed mandate; internecine conflict, after all, has been the cause of many an empire’s decline. However, such caveats should not be taken as ironclad guarantees that will protect us in the days to come. Truth be told, post Peshawar Pakistan is already looking a lot like its pre Peshawar self and, in such a situation, we can continue to ignore the writing on the wall only at our own peril.

Pakistan - Plea against acting governor : LHC issues fresh notice to federal government

Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah of the Lahore High Court on Monday issued a fresh notice to the federal government for submitting its reply till February 13 on a petition challenging the appointment of Punjab Assembly Speaker Rana Iqbal as acting governor.

The judge had earlier sought a reply from the federal government but it was not submitted.

An advocate, Munir Ahmad, filed this petition. Counsel for the petitioner Muhammad Azhar Siddique submitted that after resignation of governor Ch Sarwar, the speaker Punjab Assembly was appointed the caretaker governor, which was against the constitution. He said that either the working governor will resume his office if the circumstances provided in the constitution arise or a new governor be appointed, but a middle-way governor or caretaker governor may not be appointed. He submitted that after the resignation of the ex-governor, appointment of a caretaker governor was not only in conflict with the provision of the constitution but also against the basic nomenclature, scheme and structure of the constitution.

He also said that the appointment of caretaker governor was not only an act of illegal nature but violation of mandatory provisions of the constitution as well.

He said that the Article 199(1)(b)(ii) lays down the powers to LHC to require the person who holds a public office to show under what authority of law he claims to hold that office. He requested that acting governor should be removed from his office and direction may be given to the respondents concerned for appointment of the governor who fulfils the criteria and requirements as laid down in the Constitution of Pakistan, 1973.