Kal Bhi Bhutto Zinda Tha,Ajj Bhi Bhutto Zinda Hai

Golden jubilee of Foundation Day of PPP will be celebrated with great enthusiasm and Jiyala fervor on November 30: Bilawal Bhutto

Chairman Pakistan Peoples Party Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has said that golden jubilee of Foundation Day (Youm-e-Tasees) of PPP will be celebrated with great enthusiasm and Jiyala fervor on November 30.

A meeting was held at Bilawal House today to discuss the programme and its preparations to observe the day, when Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had founded the PPP 50 years ago. Meeting was attended by Chaudhry Manzoor Ahmed, Senator Sherry Rehman and former Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly and General Secretary PPP Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Faisal Karim Kundi.

Bilawal Bhutto Zardari said that PPP leaders, workers and Jiyalas will reiterate their commitment, conviction and allegiance to the Party and its ideology for a peaceful, prosperous, egalitarian and democratic Pakistan on the golden jubilee celebrations.

https://mediacellppp.wordpress.com/2017/10/06/golden-jubilee-of-foundation-day-of-ppp-will-be-celebrated-with-great-enthusiasm-and-jiyala-fervor-on-november-30-bilawal-bhutto/

Afghanistan: US offers Pakistan yet another ‘last chance’

By Hussain Nadim

Following US President Donald Trump's address on Afghanistan policy in August, US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said in a Senate Armed Service Committee hearing that the US is willing to work with Pakistan 'one more time' in Afghanistan. In another hearing, General Joseph Dunford, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, alleged that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) maintains links with terrorist groups.

For Pakistan, neither calls for 'one last chance' nor allegations of ISI links with terrorist groups are anything new. As such, the same old US policy repackaged by a new administration is likely to get the same old response from Pakistan.

For US policymakers to get results with Pakistan, they must realise two things:

To fix Pakistan, the US must fix its approach to dealing with Pakistan, especially in terms of engaging the security establishment.

US threats are not seen as credible and are unlikely to work, given the safeguards Pakistan has against extreme measures from the US. Pakistan is likely to call the US bluff on its recent threats. From extensive interviews with the members of the security establishment in Pakistan, there are clear indicators that mounting US pressure is seen not as threat to isolate Pakistan, but an attempt to isolate the Pakistan Army in particular and upset the civil-military divide by characterising ISI as a rogue agency. The sense in the Pakistan Army and the ISI is that the US is playing up the civil-military divide in Pakistan to align Pakistan's national security policy with its own. This 'divide and conquer' approach has motivated Pakistan's security establishment to aggressively thwart any US attempts (especially via the civilian government) to change Pakistan's position on the Afghan Taliban and the Haqqani Network.

If the US is looking for security cooperation with Pakistan, it cannot extend an olive branch with one hand while holding a whip in the other. The US needs to find a way to restore trust and working relations with a security establishment that mistrusts not just US adventurism in the region and its negative role in Pakistan's domestic affairs, but also (and perhaps more so) the US approach to solving the Afghanistan issue.

Pakistan's security establishment continues to believe (rightly so, in some ways) that it is squashed between two enemy states in Afghanistan and India. Pakistan wants a peaceful solution in Afghanistan, but not one that compromises its national interest and sovereignty. This is a concern that US policymakers understand on the surface but do very little to resolve on the ground.

Over at least the past decade, Pakistan has become inured to US threats, and has established measures to ensure that the cost of translating those threats into action have increased substantially. With Trump's low global standing and US inability to intimidate North Korea, Pakistan's interest in backing off from its long-held position on Afghanistan is limited. Over the years, Pakistan has created its own safeguards, such as through accelerating the development of its nuclear and missile technology systems. The Pakistani security establishment believes that if it were not for nuclear weapons, Pakistan would have suffered the same fate as Iraq.

Nuclear weapons are not the only safeguard. Through the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a $46 billion infrastructure project with China, Pakistan has bolstered its security by allowing China to take major stakes in Pakistan. The US-Pakistan issue now is more of a US-Pakistan-China issue, providing Pakistan with another layer of protection.

After billions of dollars of US aid, anti-American sentiment in Pakistan is still abundant. Some of this ill will is America's own doing, but some is also orchestrated by the deep state. There are over 100 million Pakistanis under the age of 25, who often hold very negative opinions about US policies in Pakistan and the Islamic world at large. US attempts to pursue any particularly extreme measures against Pakistan would be a potential time bomb that could have catastrophic results in terms of growth in terrorism and instability in the region.

And then there are the Ground Lines of Communication (GLOCs) that go through Pakistan to provide supply to US troops in Afghanistan. In 2011, Pakistan briefly shut down the GLOCs after the Salala attack and the refusal of the US to apologise for killing Pakistani troops. With the US highly dependent on these GLOCs, Pakistan has some leverage to defy the US.

In a 16 year-long war, the US has gone through several rounds of 'last chances' with Pakistan, facing similar results each time. The problem is that in Afghanistan, the US is looking for a military solution to a problem that is essentially political in nature. With Pakistan, US policymakers expect to coerce a country to give up its long-held national interest for that of the US short-term interests, without any guarantees or assurances. Pakistan has a direct interest to work with the US to resolve the crisis in Afghanistan – but for that to happen the US has to first develop trust and credibility that it wants a long-term solution that works for everyone, not just for the US.

A good way for President Trump to start would be by not threatening its long-standing ally and frontline state in the war on terror, and end the Obama era strategy of 'fixing' the civil-military divide in Pakistan from the inside, in the hope that it serves US strategic interests.

https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/fix-pakistan-us-must-fix-its-approach

Pakistan’s duplicity must not be rewarded with US’ forgiveness

United States secretary of defence Jim Mattis’ tough words on Pakistan, especially on its adverse role in security in the subcontinent and stability in Afghanistan, is reassuring to India. However, these concerns must translate into action.

The security of the larger subcontinent as defined by the United States secretary of defence, Jim Mattis, is a perspective that should give India some comfort. The question is whether his testimony before the US Senate will necessarily translate into policy on the ground in the coming years.

The most important element of his testimony was his unequivocal belief that any US military withdrawal from Afghanistan would be inimical to his country’s security. Kabul must, at the very least, negotiate from a position of strength if it has to come to terms with the Taliban. This will come as music to India’s ears. New Delhi has long argued that any intemperate US withdrawal from Afghanistan would lead to a Taliban takeover — and potentially convert Afghanistan back into a terrorist hub as the Pakistani military had done in the past.

Mr Mattis had a more mixed message regarding Pakistan. While speaking of the double-faced policies of Islamabad — pretending to fight Islamicist terror even while secretly promoting and shielding some of its worst practitioners — he said he was prepared to give Pakistan one last chance. Indian eyes will roll at this, having experienced similar US admissions of Pakistani perfidy followed by a statement of limited forgiveness.

Pakistan is a past expert at exploiting such loopholes and it remains to be seen if the Trump administration will be wise enough to understand when it is being taken for a well-worn ride. He also spoke of how much better Pakistan would be economically if it focussed on trade and investment ties with India. This is an argument grounded in sound reason and economics but wholly irrelevant to the geopolitical drivers of the India-Pakistan relationship.

Mr Mattis also threw in support for India’s official argument against endorsing the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) by noting such projects needed to be sensitive to sovereignty issues. But New Delhi still awaits a more comprehensive statement by Washington accepting the larger Indian concern that the Belt Road Initiative, of which the CPEC is the flagship, is being used by Beijing to financially suborn smaller countries both economically and politically.

Nonetheless, this and similar statements by senior members of the Trump administration are reassuring in that they provide clarity to what remains an otherwise incoherent US strategic vision of the world. They also seem refreshingly politically incorrect in publicly stating what US officials would often admit about Pakistan in private. All that remains is for the words to be converted into deeds.

The U.S. says Pakistan must work with Afghanistan on terrorism. It won’t be easy.

By Pamela Constable

When Pakistan’s army chief visited the Afghan capital last Sunday, he did his best to disarm his hosts. He offered to train and equip Afghan troops, and he promised to cooperate in peace and counterterrorism efforts. Afghan officials, in turn, received him with a military honor guard and issued an upbeat statement heralding “a new season” in the troubled relationship.

But behind the diplomatic gestures, there was little to indicate that anything had changed. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, humiliated in previous attempts to mend fences and take Pakistani officials at their word, demanded coolly that monitoring teams and mechanisms be established to ensure all promises and deadlines were implemented.

And even before Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa’s plane departed, the barrage of criticism had begun. Afghan analysts, politicians and former officials pronounced his visit another attempt by Pakistan to “deceive” their country while secretly supporting anti-Afghan militants. Bajwa had come calling only out of desperation, they said, because of intense pressure from the Trump administration.

“Pakistan is trying to pretend it is changing, but after 16 years of double games, these are only tactical moves,” said Rahmatullah Nabil, a former Afghan intelligence chief. “Pakistan has been using terrorism as a tool of state policy for decades, and Afghanistan has been the victim of terrorism for decades. As long as Pakistan does not change this policy, no equilibrium can be established.”

Pakistan has reason to feel desperate. Faced with the threat of unprecedented U.S. sanctions and fresh accusations that it has not done enough to stop cross-border attacks into Afghanistan, its military has responded with a variety of tactics: indignant denials, aid offers, history lessons, helicopter tours of pacified border zones, condolence messages to Afghan bombing victims and high-profile efforts to build a wall along their 1,800-mile border.

But nothing seems to be working.

Last week in Washington, senior U.S. officials repeated charges that Pakistan is providing sanctuary for an aggressive Taliban faction known as the Haqqani network. Marine Corps Gen. James Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a congressional panel it was “clear” that Pakistan’s intelligence agency “has connections with terrorist groups.”

At a separate hearing, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said the Trump administration would try “one more time” to work with Pakistan on the Taliban issue, but that if it failed, “the president is prepared to take whatever steps are necessary.” He said that could include revoking Pakistan’s status as a major non-NATO ally, a harsh blow to the former Cold War partner.

Pakistan has consistently denied providing shelter to anti-Afghan militants. Its prime minister told the U.N. General Assembly recently it was “especially galling” to hear such criticism when Pakistan has suffered from years of terrorist attacks. Its foreign minister told another audience in New York this week that Washington had no right to condemn Pakistan for supporting militant leaders it had “wined and dined” during past conflicts.

Asked Thursday about the latest U.S. comments, Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry spokesman said that Pakistan has “successfully erased the footprint of terrorists from our soil” and that most insurgent activities, including attacks on Pakistan, emanate from “ungoverned spaces inside Afghanistan” rather than from Pakistani havens.

Despite their doubts, some Afghan officials say they believe Pakistan’s security establishment is being forced to pivot in its thinking on Afghanistan. They see Bajwa’s visit to Kabul as a sign of this shift — especially his one-on-one meeting with Ghani, which one Afghan diplomat described as unusually candid, “constructive and encouraging.”

Pakistan once backed Taliban rule in Kabul, and it has long sought to keep Afghanistan weak and dependent as a counterweight to India, its powerful neighbor and rival to the east. But now, Pakistan’s region

al partners and investors are echoing new U.S. demands that it help end the 16-year Afghan conflict, which they see as a threat to stability.

“From our past experience, no Afghan should be optimistic about Pakistan supporting our cause. But the new American strategy has created an opportunity that it should explore,” said Javed Faisal, a senior aide to Afghanistan’s chief executive, Abdullah Abdullah. He said Pakistan’s support for militants abroad had backfired.

“If they don’t change, they will face isolation from the world,” Faisal said. “We should work with them to build trust and tackle terrorism together.” Skeptical Afghans point to years of broken promises, failed meetings and peace initiatives that went nowhere. Former president Hamid Karzai made an unprecedented trip to Islamabad a decade ago, carrying a list of Taliban hideouts, and came back empty-handed. Ghani praised Pakistan in 2015 for hosting peace talks, only to be mortified when Pakistan suddenly revealed the death of former Taliban leader Mohammad Omar and canceled the talks.

Within Pakistan, there is also resistance to rapprochement or concessions. Last week, the new interior minister was reprimanded by Parliament for suggesting that the country should “put its own house in order” before seeking foreign support. Even Bajwa, the most powerful official in Pakistan, faced some pushback for his diplomatic foray. The military spokesman, while touting the initiative, noted that “there was some discomfort in security and civil quarters” about it.

Munir Akram, a former Pakistani diplomat with strong nationalist views, wrote recently that efforts to engage with the United States will prove fruitless and that President Trump’s new policy of sending more troops and putting pressure on Islamabad is not aimed at pacifying Afghanistan but at imposing a broad “Pax Indo-Americana” on the region.

“Pakistan should prepare itself to bear the pain of threatened U.S. sanctions. It should draw its own red lines,” Munir wrote in Dawn, a major daily newspaper in Pakistan. “Any sign of weakness will intensify, not ameliorate, US coercion.”

Even if it is in Pakistan’s urgent interest to smooth its relations with Afghanistan, some analysts said, the most intractable obstacle is the gulf between Afghan and Pakistani perceptions of regional reality. Afghans see the Taliban insurgency as the main threat to their security and Pakistan as its backer; Pakistan sees India as a permanent threat to its existence and its friendship with Afghanistan as an extension of that threat.

“For all the complimentary rhetoric on both sides now, there is a total disconnect between how they define the problem,” said Davood Moradian, president of the Afghan Institute for Strategic Studies. “They both face the threat of terrorism, and they have to come to an understanding, but it is not happening. At this point, I can see no positive outcome.”

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North Korean Nukes Could Kill 2.1 Million in Seoul, Tokyo - Report

If the standoff on the Korean Peninsula breaks out into war, a North Korean nuclear attack on Seoul and Tokyo could kill 2.1 million people, reports 38 North, a website dedicated to analyzing events involving North Korea.

The conclusion was based on North Korea's "current estimated weapon yields," author Michael J. Zugarek wrote in an October 4 post. The researcher says that a single 250-kiloton-yield warhead detonated over the two Asian cities would also result in approximately 7.7 million injuries.

The author assumes North Korea to have 25 nuclear weapons. The terminal high-altitude area defense (THAAD) system in South Korea would intercept some of them, the author seems to assume, while other missile defense features in Japan would also take down some of the incoming threats. Tokyo does not yet have an Aegis Ashore land-based missile defense system but is in the process of acquiring one, the report states.

The Lockheed Martin product is a version of the naval Aegis Combat System, "a sophisticated collection of phased-array radars, fire control directors, computers and missiles" according to the company's description, with elements typically mounted on guided missile cruisers.

Stanford University's Siegfried Hecker has estimated that North Korea's nuclear stockpile sits at about 25 warheads. Further, Hecker has projected that Pyongyang can add six or seven nukes to its cache per year, Sputnik reported.

All 25 million residents of North Korea, however, are easily reachable by America's roughly 6,800 nuclear weapons.

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Injustices in Balochistan Need the World’s Attention

BY HUSAIN HAQQANI

Balochistan is the cauldron of the worst human rights violations in Pakistan, which does not have a good track record of upholding human rights in general.

On September 22, 2017, Husain Haqqani, former Ambassador of Pakistan to the United States, addressed the Human Rights Commission Session at Geneva with the following words on Balochistan.

I come to this event as a Pakistani friend of Balochistan, in the belief that human rights are universal and their violation should not be ignored out of misplaced patriotism.

Europeans, Americans and Israelis who criticise the violation of human rights by their own governments show moral courage.

The world would be a better place if Indians spoke out when human rights are violated in Kashmir, Myanmar’s leaders speak up when their army deprives the Rohingya of their life and dignity, and Pakistanis recognise that injustices against the Baloch, Sindhis, Mohajirs and religious minorities must end.

I am a Pakistani and I want to see a civilian, democratic, politically stable and economically strong Pakistan that guarantees rights to all its component ethnicities and nationalities; a Pakistan that is at peace with itself and its neighbours.

It is tragic that those who advocate talks with globally recognised terrorists such as the Taliban, and speak out for the Muslims of Kashmir and Myanmar, have an intransigent position when it comes to engagement with the leaders and people of Balochistan. They choose to stay silent over the well documented atrocities against the Baloch people in Pakistan. I do not wish to be one of them.

I do not support foreign intervention nor am I an advocate of secession.

But I understand the sentiments of the Baloch, some of whom are now completely disillusioned with Pakistan and are asking for freedom. Instead of using force against the Baloch, it would be best to recognise the sentiments and aspirations of the Baloch people.

Last year, Pakistan’s federal minister for ports and shipping, Mir Hasil Bizenjo, acknowledged that “if a referendum were held in Balochistan today, the militants would win.” He added that there will be no referendum, implying that the status quo would prevail through force.

The transformation of erstwhile East Pakistan into Bangladesh should be a lesson in the limits of military power in building a nation or keeping a country together.

The Baloch and the East Pakistani Bengalis were among first to disagree with the West Pakistani security establishment. Starting from the 1970s, the Baloch have been fighting for more autonomy within Pakistan. Their struggle has been brutally suppressed by the Pakistani state.

Even now, Balochistan is geographically the largest of Pakistan’s four provinces, but it is the least developed.

According to the latest census, Pakistan’s population stands at 207,774,520 with Balochistan’s population at 12,344,408. Pakistan is urbanising quickly with 40% urbanisation, but 75% of Balochistan’s population remains rural. Pakistan’s overall literacy rate is 58% (69% for males, 45% for females), but Balochistan is 41% (24% female, 56% male). Literacy figures for ethnic Baloch are even worse.

According to a report on Pakistan’s Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI), compiled in 2016 with support from United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Pakistan and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI), University of Oxford, nearly 39% of Pakistanis live in multi-dimensional poverty, with the highest rates of poverty in Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and Balochistan.

The report found that over two-thirds of people in FATA (73%) and Balochistan (71%) live in multidimensional poverty. The report also found that the decrease in multi-dimensional poverty was slowest in Balochistan, while poverty levels had increased in several districts in Balochistan and Sindh during the past decade. Urban unemployment stands at 12.5% in Balochistan, compared to a country-wide average of 5.9% in 2015. Balochistan provides 40% of Pakistan’s energy needs and 36% of its gas production, along with minerals.

Yet, 46.6% of households in Balochistan have no electricity. Only 25% of villages have rural electrification.

On top of this, the Baloch are deprived of their political rights and are targeted with state violence and oppression. The latest US Department of State Human Rights Reports for 2015 and 2016 spoke of “politically motivated killings of Baloch nationalists in Balochistan.”

The State Department report quoted the testimony before the Senate of Pakistan Standing Committee on Human Rights by Balochistan’s Frontier Corps Deputy Inspector General for Investigations and Crime, who declared that 1,040 persons had been killed in Balochistan in 2015-16. Although he claimed there was “no evidence of security agency involvement in the killings”, most evidence pointed out otherwise.

The South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP) recorded that journalists, teachers, students and human rights defenders also were targeted by state and non-state actors in Balochistan. As of November 20, at least 244 civilians were killed in Balochistan in 2016, compared with 247 during 2015.

State Department’s Country Report on Human Rights in Pakistan for 2015 and 2016 stated, “There were kidnappings and forced disappearances of persons from various backgrounds in nearly all areas of the country. Some police and security forces reportedly held prisoners incommunicado and refused to disclose their location.”

Human rights organisations reported many Baloch nationalists as among the missing.

The International Voice for Baloch Missing Persons listed 156 individuals in its online database of missing persons who had been abducted during the year 2015 alone.

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) listed 107 individuals as victims of “enforced disappearances” in Balochistan in the first nine months of 2015.

The Voice of Baloch Missing Persons (VBMP) issued a report in August 2015, detailing the discovery of mutilated corpses in Noshki and Kalat districts of Balochistan and what VBMP termed the inadequate measures taken to preserve and identify the bodies, according to the State Department Report. It cited NGO statistics that the total number of persons who had disappeared could be greater than 19,000.

The report also noted that the Balochistan home ministry had officially acknowledged the detention of 8,326 “suspects” in the province between December 2014 and September 15, 2015.

According to the State Department report, “During the year, the VBMP claimed to have records of 157 mutilated bodies found in Balochistan and of 463 missing persons. Official home ministry of Balochistan figures indicated that authorities had recovered only 164 bodies in Balochistan during the year.”

According to a 2014 report by the Balochistan government’s home and tribal affairs department, over 800 bodies were found in the province over a period of three and a half years – 466 victims were identified as ethnic Baloch, 123 as Pashtuns and 107 from other ethnicities. Meanwhile, 107 bodies remained unidentified.

Of the 466 Baloch killed in the province, most were political workers while the remaining were killed in incidents of targeted killings and tribal disputes.

Human Rights Watch pointed out in 2015 that “security forces continued to unlawfully kill and forcibly disappear suspected Baloch militants and opposition activists.” Its report included the following observations:

“In January, 13 highly decomposed bodies of ethnic Baloch individuals were found in Khuzdar district.”

“The military muzzled dissenting and critical voices in nongovernmental organisations and media.”

“The military continued to exercise sway over the province of Balochistan, using torture and arbitrary detention as instruments of coercion.”

“The security forces engaged in extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances to counter political unrest in the province of Balochistan. Torture of suspects by the police remained rampant. Large numbers of journalists were killed or injured in attacks, most of which remain unresolved.”

“In April 2015, Sabeen Mahmud, a prominent Pakistani social and human rights activist, was shot dead shortly after hosting an event on Balochistan’s “disappeared people” in Karachi.”

“In June, Baloch journalist Zafarullah Jatak was gunned down in his home in Balochistan’s capital, Quetta.”

Amnesty International’s report on Pakistan for 2016-2017 was no different. It pointed out “significant levels of armed conflict and political violence….in particular in Balochistan.”

The report noted, “State and non-state actors continue to harass, threaten, detain and kill human rights defenders, especially in Balochistan, FATA and Karachi.”

The US Department of State Country Report on Human Rights Practices for 2015 and 2016 pointed out, “Pakistani authorities did not allow international organisations access to detention centers most affected by violence in KP, FATA, and Balochistan.”

While perpetrating enforced disappearances and extra-judicial killings, the government of Pakistan also tried hard to suppress any information about its actions coming out. In the Freedom in the World Report for 2016, Freedom House said that the Pakistan government blocked more than 400,000 websites that year.

The provincial government in Balochistan blocked access to a Baloch human rights blog run by journalists. The government blocked several Baloch websites, including the English-language website The Baloch Hal and the website of Daily Tawar, a Balochistan-based newspaper.

In a report in 2014, the International Crisis Group had pointed out that Pakistan’s policy in Balochistan has been one of brutally suppressing the Baluch insurgency, instead of trying to understand and accommodate demands for political and economic autonomy.

According to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, the last few years have seen a rise in civilian casualties in Balochistan because of operations by the security forces.

Balochistan comprises 43% of Pakistan’s land area and 6% of Pakistan’s population. But the representation of the Baluch in Pakistan’s institutions is not proportional to their number.

According to a report by Pakistan Institute for Peace Studies, as of 2005, there was not a single Baloch at the head of the top 200 businesses in Pakistan, not one Baloch Ambassador and only 502 Baloch were recruited in the army that year.

According to reports by Pakistani experts and by the International Crisis Group, as of 2006, there were only 15,000 Baloch in the 550,000-strong army (excluding paramilitary forces) or approximately 1.3%.

These injustices need the world’s attention.

Balochistan is the cauldron of the worst human rights violations in Pakistan, which does not have a good track record of upholding human rights in general. Its oppression of religious minorities – including Christians and Ahmadis – is widely recognised.

In recent years, Hazara Shias in Balochistan and Shias in Parachinar in the FATA have also come under attack and subjected to ethnic cleansing to facilitate militant operations in their traditional areas by Afghan Taliban and the notorious Haqqani network.

We should not let Balochistan become a battleground for rival external powers. The people of Balochistan deserve better than being oppressed by Rawalpindi and Islamabad or being used as pawns in international great games.

Instead of attacking and destroying the Baloch, Sindhis, Pashtun, or Muhajirs, the Pakistani military establishment should focus on eliminating safe havens for international terrorists like Al-Qaeda, ISIS and the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban.

I join all of you in recognising the sacrifice of the Baloch people. May the sacrifice of thousands of Baloch men and women – bear fruit and Balochistan get justice.

Pakistan - Christian and Hindu minors enmeshed in a blasphemy case

By  Madeeha Bakhsh

 

Two minors enmeshed in blasphemy case. Details emerged that two sweepers have been allegedly accused of committing blasphemy by burning sacred pages. A police case has been registered against them invoking the blasphemy law.

Social activist Shaan Taseer revealed that a blasphemy case has been registered against Vishal Tariq and Bhola Ram. Both of them have been accused of allegedly burning pages with Quranic verses on them. An FIR was registered on September 28, whereas the minors were charged under 295-B. Vishal and Bhola are emploed as cleaners at Civil Hospital, Dunga.

The case was registered at Dunga Police Station. The FIR states that the alleged blasphemy was committed at the Civil Hospital, Dunga, District Bahawalnagar. The complainant is a policeman who claims that he received a phone call from a local journalist who informed him that Vishal son of Tariq had burnt government record whilst some pages containing Quranic verses where also among them.

The complainant claims that the incident unfolded on September 27, 2017. After being informed, he arrived at the scene and witnessed a large crowd gathered who detailed the incident to him. He claims that the incident was also brought to the notice of a Doctor of the Civil Hospital who filed a complaint in the police station however, withheld the information about burning of Quranic verses.

Balochistan: Pakistani FC abduct three Baloch youth from Turbat, two killed in Dera Bugti

Pakistan Frontier Corps (FC) and secret agencies have abducted three Baloch youth from Gwak area of Mand in district Turbat and at least two people have been killed during military attacks in Dera Bugti Balochistan on Sunday.

According to details the FC and other security agencies have carried out a raid at the house of Shikari Murad Jan son of Gull Mohammad in Gwak are of Mand and violated the sanctity of his house during the unwarranted raid.

The Pakistani forces harassed and threaten women and children with dire consequences and looted valuables.

At least three Baloch youth named Attaullah son of Mayar, Haidar son of Shah Mir and Mando son of Saleem. All the abducted men have been shifted to an unknown location and their whereabouts remained unknown until the filing of this report.

Meanwhile, Sher Mohammad Bugti, the central spokesperson of the Baloch Republic Party, has said in a series of tweets that Pakistani army carried out offensives in Chabdar, Dera Bugti and different parts of Kohistan Marri.

He said the military was using gunship helicopters in civilian areas and at least two people named as Lal Mohammad Bugti and Taja Bugti were killed in shelling by Pakistani army gunship helicopters in Dera Bugti so far.

http://balochwarna.com/2017/10/02/balochistan-pakistani-fc-abduct-three-baloch-youth-from-turbat-two-killed-in-dera-bugti/

Pakistan: 'The War Within'

By Daud Khattak

The country’s war with itself is becoming more and more visible each day.

It was a year ago that a former Pakistani senator confided to me that the “country is at war with itself.” Bushra Gohar, a then-senator of the secular Awami National Party (ANP), was referring to the widening divide between the civilian government and the military establishment on issues ranging from the pro-Taliban policies to dispute resolution with neighbors and ties with the United States.

Pakistan’s war with itself is gradually becoming more visible with each passing day, particularly since the hastily-decided disqualification of the thrice-elected prime minister Nawaz Sharif on charges of hiding assets, in this case a salary that he never received, in July this year.

Since then, the hawks in Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League party seldom let an opportunity to express their angst go, using terms like “conspirators,” “secret hands,” and “invisible powers” to euphemistically reference the country’s powerful military establishment and intelligence services.

The party has also taken to including the top judiciary while continuing their complaints against the military. Opposition politicians, on the other hand, praise the army and the judges — giving an impression of an unseen war between the three powerful state institutions.

On October 2 during a court hearing where former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was appearing to face charges of corruption, Ahsan Iqbal, the interior minister, did not mince words in expressing his anger when stopped by the Rangers paramilitary force from attending the court proceedings.

“There will be one law here and one government… two states cannot function within one state,” an enraged Iqbal told media outside the court. He went on to ask “is this a banana republic or a constitutional republic?” And state, “I cannot be a puppet interior minister.”

Iqbal’s October 2 comments resonated with those of former Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, who delivered an angry speech in December 2011, saying “conspirators are planning to bring down the elected government but the people have the right to decide whether they want democracy or dictatorships.”

An otherwise soft-spoken Gilani was upset at rumors that his government was under threat after differences with the military generals in the aftermath of the killing of al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden close to the military garrison at Abbotabad by the United States.

“There can be no state within the state… no institution can say that it is not under the government.”, Gilani said. His statements were viewed as a finger pointed squarely at the army and intelligence services.

Hardly six months after his “state within state” remarks, Gilani was disqualified by the Supreme Court of Pakistan in June 2012, which some Pakistani commentators termed as “judicial dictatorship” and punishment for Gilani’s remarks.

Since his election in May 2013, Nawaz Sharif continued trespassing the undeclared but nevertheless well-defined “no go” zones for civilian leadership, elected or otherwise, and tried to assert the civilian writ in areas that the country’s strong military leadership sees as its private domain.

Some of Sharif’s actions, seen in the military circles as a challenge, included his visit to attend the oath-taking ceremony of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his statements supporting better trade ties with India and Afghanistan; his government’s move to get former military dictator Pervez Musharraf punished under the law for his “unconstitutional” steps; and his refusal to extend the service period of former chief of army staff Raheel Sharif.

The recent tensions in Islamabad is would seem to be between the top judiciary and the government led by Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League, but the pro-Sharif political leadership is also pointing accusing fingers at the country’s intelligence agencies and the military leadership without naming an individual or the specific institution.

The statements, mostly from Sharif side, are becoming more serious and stubborn. With each passing day the gap widens between the military and civilian leadership on key policy matters, be that the fight against militant groups, dispute resolution and trade with India and Afghanistan, or relations with the United States.

In a tit-for-tat response to Nawaz Sharif’s disqualification, which also disqualified him from leading the party, the party passed and signed into law the Election Act of 2017 on October 2 to enable the ousted prime minister to lead his party again. Sharif was elected president of the Muslim League unopposed the next day.

Addressing his party workers and leaders soon after his election as president of the Pakistan Muslim League party, Sharif said “we learned nothing from the fall of Dhaka,” an oft-repeated remark which refers to Pakistan’s dismemberment in 1971. Pakistani politicians blame the military leadership for the debacle that led to the loss of what is now Bangladesh.

Political gimmicks apart, the civilian and military leadership also disagree over the country’s approach towards the various militant groups believed to be operating in Pakistan.

A candidate of the banned Jamat-ud-Dawa (JuD), the second incarnation of the Lashkar-e-Tayeba (LeT), took part in a bi-election and ended up fourth in the contest where the wife of the ousted premier Nawaz Sharif was the lead candidate. Amjad Shuaib, a retired lieutenant general and a vocal supporter of the armed forces against the politicians, said during a television talk show last month that the military had presented a plan to mainstream the militant outfits but the civilian authorities (i.e. then-Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif) had turned it down.

The banned JuD was launched into politics under the banner of Milli Muslim League (MML) with a nod from the security establishment despite opposition from civilian authorities. Of course, one of Nawaz Sharif’s points of discord with the security establishment was the policy of “good” and “bad” Taliban.

Foreign Minister Khwaja Asif, who is believed to be one of the closest confidantes of the ex-premier, termed Hafiz Saeed of the JuD a “liability,” a comment that infuriated many in the security circles. Saeed is wanted in India for the 2008 terrorist attacks in Mumbai and also by the United States, carrying a bounty of $10 million.

Speaking at the Asia Society in New York last month, Asif said, “It is very easy to say that Pakistan is supporting Haqqanis and Hafiz Saeed and Lashkar-e-Tayeba. They are liabilities. I accept that they are liabilities.”

Although Pakistan has walked a long and tricky road since the last military coup d’état in October 1999, the country has yet to see or expect civilian supremacy in its true sense. Incompetence, corruption, patronage and dynastic politics with opportunistic approaches among political parties and their leadership are a few of the major hindrances in achieving the goal of real civilian supremacy.

“The military has a history of involvement in Pakistan [politics]. Their role [in politics] is not something new. Political interference is always there, but that does not mean the military is responsible for every wrong,” Senator Saleem Mandviwalla of the Pakistan People’s Party told me on October 3.

Ironically, it was not long ago when the People’s Party co-chairman and former president Asif Ali Zardari lashed out at the military establishment for their “interference” in political matters.

“If you do not stop, I will come out with a list of accused generals since Pakistan’s creation,” he said in the hard-hitting speech in June 2015.

Pakistan’s political temperature is reaching a high, with the warring sides the state’s key organs. These developments do not inspire an optimistic outlook for country still struggling to eliminate the scourge of violent extremism and terrorism.

Pakistan army says plan in place to integrate militant-linked groups

By Asif Shahzad

The Pakistani army on Thursday confirmed that a plan was in place to try to integrate militant-linked groups into the mainstream of the country’s politics.

Milli Muslim League (MML), a new militant party controlled by Islamist Hafiz Saeed, backed a candidate in the September by-election for a seat vacated by ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in the eastern city of Lahore. The United States has offered a $10 million bounty for Saeed’s capture.

Reuters reported last month that the foray into politics by MML and other Islamists groups followed the integration plan. Three of Sharif’s confidants and a retired army general said it had been presented by Inter Services Intelligence to Sharif last year, but the then premier had rejected it.

Army spokesman Major-General Asif Ghafoor told a news conference in Islamabad the plan was aimed at developing a constructive role for them.

Asked about the MML party loyal to Hafiz Saeed, whom the United States and India accuse of masterminding the 2008 Mumbai attacks that killed 166 people, the army spokesman said it was part of “a process that has started”.

“It is in my knowledge that the government has started some discussion over it, that, how do we mainstream them, so that they could do constructive contribution,” Ghafoor said.

A government spokesman did not respond to calls.

HOUSE ARREST

Pakistan’s interior ministry has asked the country’s electoral commission not to register Saeed’s party, but hasn’t taken any other steps to stop it. Another militant party is campaigning for a by-election later in October.

It remains unclear whether the army or the ISI went ahead with its plan despite Sharif’s rejection, or if the military and the civilian government have recently agreed on the idea.

Another Islamist designated a terrorist by the United States, Fazlur Rehman Khalil, told Reuters he too planned to form his own party soon.

Within two weeks of Sharif’s ouster, the MML party was announced. It later got the backing of Saeed and his lieutenants in the by-election to secure five per cent of the vote.

The other hardline party, Tehrik-e-Labaik Pakistan, gained over six per cent of votes by riding on the back of a blasphemy killer Mumtaz Qadri whom it called a hero and a martyr.

Saeed has been under house arrest since January in the eastern city of Lahore.

MML is the political wing of Saeed’s charity Jamaat-ud-Dawa, JuD. JuD and Khalil’s Ansar ul-Umma organization are both seen by the United States as fronts for militant groups the army has been accused of sponsoring against neighbors, arch-foe India and Afghanistan - a charge the army denies.

Reports of the plan to bring militant-linked groups into the political mainstream have stirred debate at home and abroad.

“Now, how to take it further - that, the time to come will tell,” Ghafoor, the army spokesman’ said, “For that, the government will take a decision.”

DEMONSTRATION IN KARACHI FOR RELEASE OF ILLEGALLY DETAINED SHIA MUSLIMS

Shia Muslims staged a rally outside Imam Bargah Shohda-e-Karbala Incholi in Karachi to protest against the enforced disappearance of many Shia notables, youths on Wednesday night.

Carrying banners, placards and portraits of the illegally detained Shia Muslims, the protesters including their heirs and relatives, condemned the unlawful action of self-claimed law enforcement agencies cops. They said it was against constitutional and legal right of citizens of Pakistan that he is taken into custody without any case against them. 

The protesters demanded that innocent Shia Muslims be released forthwith or they must be produced in courts and their heirs must be apprised of their whereabouts.

Khalid Rao, the rights activists and a close-aide of martyr Khurram Zaki, spoke to the protesters. He expressed support to the Fill the Jails Movement for the release of the missing Shias.

http://www.shiitenews.org/index.php/pakistan/item/30870-demonstration-in-karachi-for-release-of-illegally-detained-shia-muslims

Suicide bomber strikes Shiite shrine in Pakistan, killing 20

BY ABDUL SATTAR

A suicide bomber struck a Shiite shrine packed with worshippers in a remote village in southwestern Pakistan on Thursday, killing 20 people and leaving at least 25 wounded in an apparent sectarian attack, a provincial government spokesman and the police said.

The attacker detonated his explosives vest when he was stopped for a routine search by a police officer guarding the shrine in the village of Jhal Masgi, about 400 kilometers (240 miles) east of Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan province.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack. Anwarul Haq Kakar, spokesman for the provincial government, said the death toll could rise as some of the wounded were in critical condition.

Mohammad Iqbal, a district police chief, said five children, a woman and one police officer were among those 20 people killed in the bombing.

He said they found body parts of the attacker and investigators were trying to determine who was behind the bombing. Sarfraz Bugto, the provincial home minister, said "terrorists have shown their inhumaneness by attacking innocent civilians" at the shrine.

Hundreds of devotees were present at the shrine for a monthly gathering when the bomber hit. Local TV footage showed people crying for help in the immediate aftermath of the attack.

Just hours earlier, Pakistani army spokesman Maj. Gen. Asif Ghafoor said the military had received credible reports of upcoming terror attacks. Ghafoor told a news conference in the garrison city of Rawalpindi that the government has been alerted about possible attacks.

Though no one claimed responsibility for Thursday's bombing, Sunni extremists have carried out many such attacks in the past, targeting minority Shiite Muslims in Baluchistan and elsewhere in the country. Sunni extremists perceive Shiites as apostates who should be killed.

Pakistani Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi condemned the attack.

In a statement, he said that "terrorists have no religion" and that his government will act against militants with full might.

In June, at least 75 Shiite Muslims were killed in twin bombings at a market in Parachinar in the country's northwest. At the time, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, a sectarian Sunni extremist group, claimed the bombings in Parachinar, which is a majority Shiite town.

In February, an Islamic State suicide bomber struck inside a famed Sufi shrine in southern Sindh province, killing 88 worshippers as they performed a devotional dance known as "dhamal."

Baluchistan, which shares a border with Sindh province, has also been the scene of a low-level insurgency by Baluch nationalists and separatists demanding more autonomy and a greater share in the region's natural resources such as gas and oil. However, Islamic militants have also carried out scores of attacks in the province.

Pakistan Is Inviting Its Favorite Jihadis Into Parliament

BY MEMPHIS BARKER

It might seem like the Pakistani military is trying to defang its ostensible adversaries. It's really trying to empower them.

The notorious jihadi Hafiz Saeed has apparently had a change of heart. Like many extremists in Pakistan, the 67-year-old firebrand used to rage against democracy. But earlier this month a new political party, controlled in all but name by Saeed — the leader of the militant organization Lashkar-e-Taiba, and the alleged mastermind of a string of horrific massacres in India, including the killing of 166 people in Mumbai nine years ago — peacefully contested its first by-election for national parliament.

Bearded party workers from the Milli Muslim League wandered the streets of Lahore in hi-visibility jackets. Posters of Saeed were plastered across the city, in direct contravention of a ruling by the Election Commission, which does not recognize the MML as a party. The candidate backed by the MML, Yaqoob Sheikh, himself designated a terrorist by the U.S. Treasury in 2012, notched up an unexpectedly high 5 percent of the vote for the former National Assembly seat of recently ousted prime minister, Nawaz Sharif. (A further 6 percent went to another new Islamist party, the Tehreek-e-Labaik Pakistan, founded to cherish the legacy of a man who was hanged for the murder of a senator campaigning for reform of the country’s strict blasphemy laws.)

Why have bloodthirsty, anti-democratic groups suddenly chosen to enter the world of politics — and how have they been allowed to operate so openly? For the answer, look to Pakistan’s army. Earlier this year, according to Muhammad Amir Rana of the Pakistan Institute for Peace Studies, the military held successful talks with several “banned organizations” over a deradicalization strategy that would, in theory, see them drop their AK-47s and pick up clipboards.

Well-meaning supporters of the strategy argue that not all extremists can be killed or locked up. Some point to the IRA in Ireland or Islamist radicals in Indonesia as proof that political engagement can defang terrorist groups. Others ask why the political transition now seen as the inevitable path of the Afghan Taliban should not also apply to Pakistan’s own jihadis.

But deradicalization is tricky at the best of times, and the conditions that made it work elsewhere in the past simply don’t apply to Pakistan today. Most of all, it needs a state willing to threaten nonstate actors with something they would rather avoid (a military offensive) while proffering the reward of something they want (political influence). In Pakistan, neither condition is fulfilled. In fact, the “mainstreaming” project appears just as likely to strengthen jihadi militants as quell them — and you don’t have to be a conspiracy theorist to wonder whether that isn’t really the point.

By global standards, the Pakistani army is large, well equipped, and well disciplined. But it’s next door to India, a foe three times its size, which has beaten it soundly in every conflict the two have ever had. That leaves the military willing to resort to the darkest methods to even the score.

The army has been chasing the possibility of a “good Taliban” for decades — starting with the Afghan Taliban itself, sponsored and supported by Pakistan’s intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence. The main reason that Lashkar-e-Taiba and its charitable front, Jamaat-ud-Dawa, survive under Hafiz Saeed’s leadership is that as far as the military is concerned, they’re the good jihadis.

Lashkar-e-Taiba has never carried out an attack within Pakistan — at least one that’s made the press. Rather, it has served as a proxy for the military in its asymmetric war with India, particularly in the disputed territory of Kashmir. According to David Headley, one of the Lashkar-e-Taiba members involved in the 2008 attack on Mumbai, the ISI provided “financial, military, and moral” support for the operation. The army proved how effective it can be in a recent sustained assault on the jihadis it doesn’t like — those who carry out attacks within the nation. A crackdown in the northeastern tribal areas came as a furious reply to the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan’s 2014 massacre at a school in Peshawar. Deaths from terrorism have since fallen by two-thirds.

But none of the circumstances that have historically shielded Lashkar-e-Taiba from a similar military crackdown have changed — in fact, some of them have become more entrenched. The belligerent tone of Narendra Modi, India’s prime minister, has fuelled the military’s hard-wired belief that it must retain all its assets in the 70-year-old conflict.

Meanwhile, the ever-expanding charitable works of Jamaat-ud-Dawa, which the armed forces have supported by granting it permission to work in parts of the country that international nongovernmental organizations and other local organizations cannot reach, have softened public opinion. A popular actor congratulated Hafiz Saeed after the Lahore by-election, praising him as a “righteous man.” While much of Pakistan’s civilian elite share the condemnatory line of its English-language newspapers, read by 2 percent of the population, the broader public tends to a less harsh view. Just 36 percent of the population holds an unfavorable opinion of Lashkar-e-Taiba, compared to 60 percent for the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, according to a 2015 Pew survey.

If the army has no clear incentive to wholly “deradicalize” Lashkar-e-Taiba at this point in time, it has more than enough to present its old strategic asset as newly defanged in order to ward off international pressure. America has reduced its aid to Pakistan for housing, in the words of U.S. President Donald Trump, “the very terrorists who we are fighting.” Allies closer to home have recently shown signs of losing patience with its tolerance of favored jihadi groups.

At last month’s BRICS summit among five of the world’s most rapidly developing nations, a statement was issued condemning — for the first time — Lashkar-e-Taiba and its affiliates by name as a threat to regional stability. Pakistan’s civilian government daringly echoed the criticism. It cannot lift a finger against Saeed, given the military’s stranglehold over counterterrorism and foreign policy. But the sum effect of such glancing blows, and the potential diplomatic isolation that would result from maintaining the status quo, may have convinced elements of the military to make a show of “politically deradicalizing” its historic playmates.

The transformation might, moreover, yield strategic fruit. The army is known to loathe the recently ousted Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who favored peace with India.

And the reduced margin of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s victory in Lahore last week, compared to the general election in 2013, owed much to the rise of the MML and its fellow religious party, which split the right-wing vote. The new parties’ street power alone might sway the future course of the country’s politics.

At large MML rallies, supporters chanted “Long live the Pakistan Army!” and — by coincidence or not — the party’s main goal is said to be opposing repeal of the broad, Islam-based articles of the constitution that the Supreme Court used to justify Sharif’s removal. It would take a brave politician to speak out in favor of reform when Jamaat-ud-Dawa and the MML control huge and boisterous vote banks.

Pakistan’s Ministry of Interior has so far resisted granting the Milli Muslim League the status of a political party — hence the need for MML to support its nominally independent candidate at arm’s length. But it may not be able to hold out much longer. One challenge the civilian government faces in dealing with Saeed’s organizations is the smoothness with which they adapt to rules. Jamaat-ud-Dawa, his charity, works zealously across the country. Its members carry out disaster relief, run around 200 schools, and have deliberately offered support to minorities — such as Hindus and Shiites — to win more public sympathy. The country’s former military dictator, Pervez Musharraf, referred to Jamaat-ud-Dawa as a “very fine NGO” in an interview earlier this year. Military officials point out that if the MML submits to the requirements of Pakistan’s Constitution, whether they “wear beards or not, they would not be stopped [from forming a party] anywhere in the world.”

That runs a little wide of the truth, and, of course, operating a political party with one hand doesn’t prevent fostering jihad, covertly, with the other. Consider Hezbollah, for example. To date, Saeed’s outfits have played a similar double game as the Lebanese organization, which grew its militant wing alongside a burgeoning political front.

Jamaat-ud-Dawa, funded by charitable donations, operates from a sprawling base outside Lahore. Yet it was on the large lake inside those headquarters that Lashkar-e-Taiba militants reportedly prepared for their amphibious assault on Mumbai. If Saeed slips into the political mainstream, such practices suggest he will merely funnel some of the financial rewards to terrorist activities, while instructing his henchmen to smile for election officials.

The Pakistan army may find that its strategy backfires in another way. The whole point of using militants against India is to maintain a facade of plausible deniability. But bringing Saeed into the system puts all that at risk. After Lashkar-e-Taiba militants shot up the Indian parliament in 2001, 800,000 troops massed the border as India and Pakistan — two nuclear-armed nations — nearly went to war. The Pakistani state denied it had anything to do with the attack. That excuse was thin at the time. Repeating it now would wear it to vanishing point.

http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/10/04/pakistan-is-inviting-its-favorite-jihadis-into-parliament/