by Waseem Altaf
As for Muslims, they were to associate themselves with the Arabian Peninsula and not the subcontinent, with Mohammad Bin Qasim and not Raja Dahir, with Mecca and Medina and not Moenjodaro and Harappa. The relationship with the soil and the soul of the subcontinent was buried forever.
Although the Two-Nation theory did suit the interests of some, it was a total negation of the concept of pluralism and mutual coexistence. …
Read more → ViewPoint
WASHINGTON / ISLAMABAD: The US is rejecting demands from Pakistan that American personnel abandon a military base used by the CIA to stage drone strikes against militants, US officials told Reuters.
US personnel have not left the Shamsi air base and there is no plan for them to do so, said a US official familiar with the matter. “That base is neither vacated nor being vacated,” the official said. The information was confirmed by a second US official.
On Wednesday, federal Minister for Defence Chaudhry Ahmed Mukhtar said that US had been asked to stop using the base for drone strikes and vacate it. ….
Read more → DAWN.COM
– Time to change: ‘Iman, Taqwa, Jihad fi Sabilillah’
by Shiraz Paracha
Excerpt:
India centric mindset of the Pakistan military is one of the root causes of Pakistan’s problems. From generals to soldiers most men in the armed forces are paranoid about India and some have racist tendencies, too. …
…. Some young officers of the Pakistan armed forces are genuinely embarrassed by the growing criticism of the armed forces. One major general of the Pakistan Army asked me recently, “We want to build a soft image of Pakistan”.
I responded to the soft-spoken and cultured gentleman by saying: “Please, replace ‘Iman, Taqwa, Jihad fi Sabilillah’ as your motto. A change of motto would be a symbol of a wider change of mind and perception.
To read complete article → LUBP
The language of the discussion is urdu (Hindi).
Courtesy: ARY NEWS TV (Program “Pakistan Tonight with Fahad Hussain” – 29th June 2011 -1 )
Excerpt:
…. If the US stops drone attacks, can Imran Khan give the guarantee that the Taliban — ardent adherents of an anti-democratic political system — will stop coercing society into theocratic chaos? If he deliberates for a few moments on this prospect, he will be as silent as he has been about religious terrorism. So, does it mean that he is ready to turn Pakistan into a theocratic state? Probably yes, whether he knows/acknowledges it or not. In private conversations he has been an admirer of the tribal jirga system, which shows that the idealisation of tribal institutions has been part of his mindset.
Besides opposing the US intervention, his political campaigns have been criticising and exposing the ruling political elite. Again, we know what he does not want but we do not know what he wants the Pakistani socio-political system to be. Mysteriously, he has not been very vocal about the role of the Pakistani military in the disaster-ridden evolution of Pakistan. He has not articulated the genesis of the socio-political ills that have proliferated under military rule. ….
To read complete article → Wichaar
– If Afghanistan has not become a modern functioning state after 10 years of American-led presence in the country, it should not be taken as a sign of the US’s defeat in our neighbourhood.
President Barack Obama has announced the drawdown plan whereby the US will gradually withdraw its combat forces from Afghanistan. The announcement comes almost 10 years after the American-led forces landed in Afghanistan in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Such is the nature of warfare now that the battle is seldom between easily identifiable entities nor are its results a cut and dried victory for one side and a defeat for the other. Truth, as the old cliché goes, still remains the first casualty of warfare and different sides will claim victory in the mess that is Afghanistan now.
Here I will mention and put into perspective a version of the truth that will come from the self-congratulating triumphal camp within Pakistan who will portray the Obama announcement as an American defeat in Afghanistan. They will tell you the following things: the US, like the Soviet Union, has been defeated in Afghanistan. The Soviets had to pull out the last of their soldiers in little over 10 years and the Americans have started their withdrawal in the same timeframe. No matter how superior American military power, it is no match for the soldiers of Islam. And, if you need any proof, this is the victory of the Islamists against a decadent west. The American decision to gradually withdraw and approve negotiations with the Taliban is a vindication of the Pakistani establishment’s long-held view. That Islamabad has always maintained that the Taliban are a political force in Afghanistan and there can be no stable Afghanistan without the Taliban having a significant say in its political system. Finally, that time is on the Taliban and Pakistani side and ultimately any future political setup in Kabul will have to accommodate Islamabad’s genuine interests.
Before you accept this version of the truth, keep the following in mind: 10 years of the US’s presence had an identifiable beginning and the drawdown announcement is part of an undefined endgame. The Americans have had failures in the process but they can claim some salient victories. Pakistani analysts need to keep those victories in mind when issuing verdicts about the American ‘defeat’ in Afghanistan. Pakistan has not gained much by its strategic choices of the past 10 years and its current policy of running with the hare and hunting with the hounds does not portend well for the country.
The US mounted the attack on Afghanistan’s Taliban regime because it considered the Taliban as the providers of safe havens to the forces that had attacked the US mainland in September 2001. It managed to have all its NATO allies be part of the US-led mission. Step one of the US’s policy was to punish the Taliban regime, and this they did quite successfully by dismantling it. The second step was to go after al Qaeda in this part of the world. This culminated in the killing of Osama bin Laden in May 2011 in Abbottabad, Pakistan. In the past 10 years, if one goes by the US’s account, it has greatly eliminated the al Qaeda’s leadership base in Afghanistan.
As a result, in these 10 years, there has not been any major attack on the US mainland, and the likelihood of any such attack coordinated from the Af-Pak corridor is quite slim. From the US’s vantage point, 10 years of engagement started with the successful dismantling of the Taliban regime, and now the killing of bin Laden will serve as the beginning of a long end.
In the meantime, American politicians tried to, simultaneously, put in place the state and nation building project in Afghanistan. Many sensible analysts had all along, and rightly so, maintained that it was a doomed project and not in the US’s best interests. If Afghanistan has not become a modern functioning state after 10 years of American-led presence in the country, it should not be taken as a sign of the US’s defeat in our neighbourhood.
What about Pakistan in all of this? It is at a crossroads. From now on, if it exclusively backs the Taliban in Afghanistan, it will be supporting forces that are determined to tear apart the fabric of the Pakistani state. If it wants to have a diverse political portfolio in Afghanistan then time may be fast running out. One hopes that the policymakers in Rawalpindi and Islamabad, unlike the ghairat (honour) brigade of the small screen, do not read the Obama announcement as an unmitigated victory for Pakistan. Pakistan’s security policy choices have isolated the country and adopting a triumphal tone will not change that fact.
The writer teaches political science at the University of British Columbia, Canada. He can be reached at hnizamani@hotmail.com
Courtesy: → Daily Times
Former Chief of Army Staff, General (R) Mirza Aslam Beg’s interview with Dr. Danish on ARY NEWS TV. The language of the interview is urdu (Hindi).
Courtesy: ARY NEWS TV (Program “Sawal Yeh Hai“, 26th June 2011-1), YouTube
– The Double Game
The unintended consequences of American funding in Pakistan.
by Lawrence Wright
Excerpt:
…. India has become the state that we tried to create in Pakistan. It is a rising economic star, militarily powerful and democratic, and it shares American interests. Pakistan, however, is one of the most anti-American countries in the world, and a covert sponsor of terrorism. Politically and economically, it verges on being a failed state. And, despite Pakistani avowals to the contrary, America’s worst enemy, Osama bin Laden, had been hiding there for years—in strikingly comfortable circumstances—before U.S. commandos finally tracked him down and killed him, on May 2nd.
American aid is hardly the only factor that led these two countries to such disparate outcomes. But, at this pivotal moment, it would be a mistake not to examine the degree to which U.S. dollars have undermined our strategic relationship with Pakistan—and created monstrous contradictions within Pakistan itself. …
… Within the I.S.I., there is a secret organization known as the S Wing, which is largely composed of supposedly retired military and I.S.I. officers. “It doesn’t exist on paper,” a source close to the I.S.I. told me. The S Wing handles relations with radical elements. “If something happens, then they have deniability,” the source explained. If any group within the Pakistani military helped hide bin Laden, it was likely S Wing.
Eight days before Osama bin Laden was killed, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the head of the Pakistani Army, went to the Kakul military academy in Abbottabad, less than a mile from the villa where bin Laden was living. “General Kayani told the cadets, ‘We have broken the backbone of the militants,’ ” Pir Zubair Shah, the reporter, told me. “But the backbone was right there.” Perhaps with a touch of theatre, Hamid Gul, the former I.S.I. chief, publicly expressed wonder that bin Laden was living in a city with three army regiments, less than a mile from an élite military academy, in a house that appeared to have been built expressly to protect him. Aside from the military, Gul told the Associated Press, “there is the local police, the Intelligence Bureau, Military Intelligence, the I.S.I. They all had a presence there.”
To read complete article : ♦ The New Yorker
→ http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/05/16/110516fa_fact_wright#ixzz1QU3ZbWsw
by Eric Margolis
Far-called our navies melt away—
On dune and headland sinks the fire—
Lo, all our pomp of yesterday
Is one with Nineveh and Tyre!
Rudyard Kipling “Recessional”
NEW YORK – War is waged to achieve political objectives, not to kill enemies. In this sense, the United States has lost the ten-year Afghan conflict, its longest war. Afghanistan remains the “graveyard of empires.”
The US has failed to install an obedient regime in Kabul that controls Afghanistan. It has made foes of the Pashtun majority, and, in pursuing this war, gravely undermined Pakistan. Claims that US forces were in Afghanistan to hunt the late Osama bin Laden were widely disbelieved.
Last Wednesday, President Barack Obama bowed to public opinion, approaching elections, military reality and financial woes by announcing he would withdraw a third of the 100,000 US troops from Afghanistan by the end of next summer. Pentagon brass growled open opposition.
US allies France and Germany announced similar troops reductions. All foreign troops are supposed to quit Afghanistan by the end of 2014.
Washington currently spends at least $10 billion monthly on the Afghan war, not counting “black” payments, CIA and NSA operations. The US has poured $18.8 billion in development aid into Afghanistan since 2001 with nothing to show for the effort. Pakistan has been given $20 billion to support the Afghan War.
The US deficit is heading over $1.4 trillion. The national debt, when unfunded pensions and benefits are added, is likely $100 trillion, according to the chief of PIMCO, the world’s largest bond trader.
Forty-four million Americans now receive food stamps; the national infrastructure of roads, airports, bridges and schools is crumbling from neglect. Unemployment, officially at 9.5%, is probably closer to 20%.
The cry is being heard: “Rebuild America, not Afghanistan.”
In spite of intense pro-war propaganda, over half of Americans now oppose the Afghan War. Even US-installed Afghan president Hamid Karzai calls it, “ineffective, apart from causing civilian casualties.”
So will the US really pull out of Afghanistan? That remains to be seen. There are contradictory signs.
Mid-level talks between the US and Taliban are under way. The US will probably keep some of its remaining 66,000 soldiers in Afghanistan after 2014, rebranding them training troops. The huge US bases at Kandahar and Bagram will be retained.
Billions more will be spent on the Afghan government army and police. They have so far proved ineffective because most are composed of Tajik and Uzbek mercenaries who are hated and distrusted by the Pashtun.
A similar process is underway in Iraq where “withdrawal” means keeping renamed US combat brigades in Iraq, thousands of mercenaries, and US combat forces in neighboring Kuwait and the Gulf. New US embassies in Baghdad and Kabul– huge, fortified complexes with their own mercenary combat forces– will be the world’s biggest. Kabul will have a staff of 1,000 US personnel. Bin Laden called them “crusader fortresses.”
In addition, the US will still arm and finance allied Tajik and Uzbek militias in Afghanistan. Financing Pakistan’s US-backed regime and Uzbekistan must also continue at around $3 billion yearly.
The US appears to be going and staying at the same time. By contrast, Taliban’s position is clear and simple: it will continue fighting until all foreign troops are withdrawn. US special forces, drones and hit squads have been unable to assassinate enough Taliban commanders to make the mujahidin stop fighting.
Americans never study history, not even their own. They don’t recall founding father, the great Benjamin Franklin, who said, “there is no good war, and no bad peace.” Or that the Pashtun Taliban and its allies are fierce, dedicated, undefeated warriors. I’ve been in combat with them and remain in awe of their courage and love of combat. The Pashtun mujahidin will keep fighting as always, as long as their ammunition lasts.
America, for all its B-1 heavy bombers, strike fighters, missiles, helicopter gunships and drones, armor, super electronics, spies in the sky and all the other high tech weapons of modern war has failed to defeat some 30,000 tribal fighters with nothing more than small arms and legendary valor.
The US has lost the all important military initiative in Afghanistan. It may linger there, but it cannot win.
Courtesy: → ericmargolis
http://www.ericmargolis.com/political_commentaries/a-real-pullout-or-a-shell-game.aspx
KABUL, Afghanistan — Afghan President Hamid Karzai accuses Pakistan of firing 470 rockets into two of its eastern border provinces in a three-week barrage.
Afghan security forces said Sunday that 36 people have died in the barrages, which hit civilians in areas where NATO forces have withdrawn. After the civilians fled, Pakistani Taliban came in and occupied the cleared areas, Afghan border officials said. …
Read more: → HuffingtonPost
– BY MIRA SETHI
Two months after Salman Taseer, the governor of Pakistan’s Punjab province, was assassinated by his own bodyguard for criticizing the country’s blasphemy law, the only Christian member of the Pakistani cabinet, Minorities Minister Shahbaz Bhatti, was killed for doing his job—advocating protection of the country’s two million Christians.
Taseer’s assassination prompted a debate: Was the blasphemy law, introduced by Gen. Zia ul-Haq in the 1980s in his bid to “Islamize” Pakistan, being exploited for mundane interests? Was it leading to witch hunts? Bhatti’s death should prompt Pakistanis to ask themselves an equally disquieting question: Does Pakistan have a future as …
Read more: → THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
– Seized Phone Offers Clues to Bin Laden’s Pakistani Links
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — The cellphone of Osama bin Laden’s trusted courier, which was recovered in the raid that killed both men in Pakistan last month, contained contacts to a militant group that is a longtime asset of Pakistan’s intelligence agency, senior American officials who have been briefed on the findings say.
The discovery indicates that Bin Laden used the group, Harakat-ul-Mujahedeen, as part of his support network inside the country, the officials and others said. But it also raised tantalizing questions about whether the group and others like it helped shelter and support Bin Laden on behalf of Pakistan’s spy agency, given that it had mentored Harakat and allowed it to operate in Pakistan for at least 20 years, the officials and analysts said.
In tracing the calls on the cellphone, American analysts have determined that Harakat commanders had called Pakistani intelligence officials, the senior American officials said. ….
Read more: The New York Times
– – – – – –
More details: BBC urdu
Q. Have you ever been approached by political or other groups for support?
A. [Abdul Sattar Edhi] Once, I was approached by General Hamid Gul, Imran Khan and few others, mostly military and intelligence officials, who were conspiring to overthrow Benazir Bhutto`s second government and wanted me to get involved. I declined because I am a social worker and not a politician. I also did not want to tarnish the credibility of my organisation by getting embroiled in something that obviously seemed quite disturbing. Eventually, I was made to feel threatened enough to temporarily leave the country. http://archives.dawn.com/archives/66970
Courtesy: Express News TV– YouTube
– This presence of Osama bin Laden led to an extraordinary event of US SEAL military officers “invading” Pakistan, violating its air space, carrying out a military operation for 40 minutes and killing the most wanted terrorist and flying back to Afghanistan.
From drone attacks to constant admonishing by the Obama administration, to a weak economy, an insurgency and target-killing of the non-Baloch in Balochistan, and a weekly dose of suicide attacks on common people, all support a perception that Pakistan is collapsing. However, this conventional understanding may not be accurate. What these events suggest is that there is a growing crisis and contradiction within and between the institutions of the state in Pakistan and these crises and contradictions, evaluated differently, might offer a completely divergent narrative. What may be collapsing is the political settlement that has existed for many decades and this may be a positive development. Democractic forces have an opportunity now to end the military’s domination of Pakistan. …
Read more: View Point
By Fareed Zakaria
Excerpt:
Pakistan’s military has traditionally been seen as a secular and disciplined organization. But the evidence is now overwhelming that it has been infiltrated at all levels by violent Islamists, including Taliban and al-Qaeda sympathizers.
There is also strong evidence of a basic shift in the attitude of the Pakistani military. Last month, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, Husain Haqqani, was invited to speak at the country’s National Defense University. Addressing a large gathering of officers, Haqqani asked the audience, “What is the principal national security threat to Pakistan?” He offered three categories: “from within [Pakistan],” “India,” and, “the United States.” A plurality voted for the third option. …..
….. Pakistan is drifting into a strategic black hole. Does the country really think its best path forward is as an adversary of the United States, currying favor with militants and becoming a vassal of China? Are its role models North Korea and Burma? Or does it want to crush the jihadist movements that are destroying the country, join the global economy, reform its society and become a real democracy? These are the questions Pakistan has to ask itself. The United States, for its part, having disbursed $20 billion in aid to Pakistan in the past decade — most of it to the military — needs to ask some questions of its own.
To read complete article: The Washington Post
ISLAMABAD – The arrest of Brigadier Ali Khan, a senior officer of the Pakistan army, for his alleged ties to Hizbul Tehrir (HuT), a banned Islamic militant group believed to be working in tandem with al-Qaeda under the garb of pan-Islamism, has brought into the open conflicting Islamists and reformists ideologies that have split the military’s rank and file for a decade.
Pakistani armed forces spokesman Major General Athar Abbas confirmed Khan has been arrested due to his links to the HuT and was being interrogated by the Special Investigation Branch of the Military Intelligence. The brigadier, who had been posted at the General Headquarters (GHQ) of the army in the garrison town of Rawalpindi, was taken into custody on May 6, hardly three days after the May 2 killing of al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden in a US military raid in Abbottabad. …
Read more:→ ASIA TIMES ONLINE
By Issam Ahmed
Lahore, Pakistan: The Pakistani Army is interrogating four army majors in connection with a brigadier who was arrested last month for links to the global Islamist party Hizb-ut-Tahrir, highlighting mounting pressure on the military to expel extremists within its ranks.
“They are being questioned in relation to the brigadier case,” Military spokesman Major Gen. Athar Abbas told Reuters, referring to the arrest of Brigadier Ali Khan, who worked at the Army’s General Headquarters in Rawalpindi and was detained on May 6, four days after the Osama bin Laden raid.
According to security analyst and retired brigadier Shaukat Qadir, purging officers with Islamist leanings is nothing new in the Army, though the attack upon a Naval base last month, as well as US suspicions that some within Pakistan’s military establishment helped hide Mr. bin Laden, have added fresh impetus to the process. …
Read more: CSMONITOR.COM
`Maulvi` Nawaz`s mindset being defeated: Zardari
NAUDERO: The thinking of “Maulvi” Nawaz Sharif is being defeated, said President Asif Ali Zardari while addressing a public meeting here on Tuesday to mark Benazir Bhutto’s birth anniversary.
He asked who is Maulvi Nawaz Sharif to hate generals and love soldiers? He said this is the thinking of a blacksmith/ [Iron-smith]. “Learn from me, meet me in private or make me your teacher,” Zardari advised Nawaz. About Nawaz, the president further said, “he is pitting us against the military, but we will not fight. Today he is criticising the Army.” ….
Read more: PAK TRIBUNE
adopted from facebook
Concerns about growing religious extremism in the neighbouring Islamic republic have been growing since 2001
By Aakar Patel
How is Pakistan seen by India’s Muslims? Since 2001, the view has turned increasingly negative. Let’s have a look at such views in three very different Indian publications. One is the conservative Urdu daily Inquilab, read almost exclusively by Muslims. The second, the liberal online paper New Age Islam, published in Urdu and English. Lastly, the Hindu extremist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh’s organ Panchjanya, published in Hindi and read almost exclusively by Hindus.
In India’s biggest Urdu newspaper Inquilab, Khalid Sheikh wrote under the headline ‘ Pakistan ka kya hoga?’ He felt Pakistan’s current problems were the result of its own doing (” jaisi karni waisi bharni“). The nation should have known the consequences of using terror to combat India, he said. The world was not unaware of its breeding of Al Qaeda and the Taliban (” sanpolon ko doodh pilaya“). Now the snakes were poised to swallow Pakistan (” nigalne ke dar pe hain“).
Pakistan’s leaders were unconcerned (” kaanon par joon tak nahin rengi“). But the world was watching it. The ease with which the Taliban had attacked and destroyed the P3C Orions in Karachi had worried America, Sheikh wrote. It was now concerned about how safe Pakistan’s atom bombs, which numbered between 70 and 120, were.
In 2001 Pakistan was viewed as a failed state (” nakaam riasat“). After Osama bin Laden’s killing, it won’t be long before it is seen as a rogue state (” badmaash riasat mein tabdeel hote dair nahin lagegi“).
At the time of Partition, it had been predicted by the wise (” sahib-e-baseerat“) that Pakistan would find it difficult to exist (” apna wajood rakhna dushwar hoga“). Sheikh quoted Maulana Azad as writing in ‘India Wins Freedom’ that Pakistan would be unable to find its bearings (” Pakistan kabhi paedar aur mustahkam na reh sakega“). Its foreign policy consisted of hating India (” Hindustan dushmani“) and pleasing America (” Amrika khushnudi“).
The writer thought Pakistan’s insistence that relations with India would improve if the Kashmir issue was settled was untrue (” dhakosla hai“). Pakistan was an unreliable neighbour (” ghair-mu’atbar padosi“) which was a master of creating tension. If Kashmir was resolved, something else would be conjured up.
Sheikh praised Nawaz Sharif’s statement that Pakistan had to stop hating India if it had to progress. US President Barack Obama had said the same thing and America ought to, as France had, terminate military assistance to Pakistan.
Answering the question he had first raised, Sheikh said it was difficult to say what would become of Pakistan because it seemed beyond redemption (” aise mulk ke bare mein kya kaha jaye jahan aawe ka aawa hi bigda hua hai“).
In New Age Islam, Dr Shabbir Ahmed wrote on the blasphemy law under the headline ‘ Pakistan mein tauhin-e-Rasul (PBUH) ka wahshiana qanoon‘. Ahmed said Pakistan was obsessed by this issue (“ hysteria mein jakda hua hai”). Narrow sectarianism had divided the nation, and every sect thought of others as faithless and hated them.
This frenzy was plunging Pakistan into a state of barbarism (” jahiliyat mein ghota zan hai“). Ahmed feared Pakistan might succumb to civil war (“ aisa na ho ke Pakistan khana jangi mein gharq ho jae“).
He said Pakistanis had divided Islam (” deen ko tukdon mein baant diya hai“), and quoted verses from the Holy Quran on the Romans (30:32) to support his argument. It was unfortunate that the majority of Pakistanis, including the educated, were in agreement with disagreeable mullahs. Even intellectuals and lawyers had signed on (” scholars aur wukla ne tauhin-e-Rasul (PBUH) qanoon ki puri himayat ki hai”).
People believed that punishing blasphemy with death was law in five out of 54 Islamic states, but when asked, only two could be named: Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. It was difficult to name other states with such harsh laws, though Afghanistan, Sudan and Iran came to mind.
Ahmed wrote that the Holy Quran prescribed no punishment for blasphemy. No one could be ignorant of the clarity of the ayat ” la ikraha fi ad-deen” (there is no compulsion in religion) because Allah had sent this message to all humanity. This principle was independent and absolute (” is usool mein kisi tarah ki ki riayyat bhi nahin hai“). With many examples, Ahmed pointed to the pardoning and gentle nature of Islam and of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), which he felt was being distorted by Pakistan’s law.
In Panchjanya, the RSS Hindi weekly, Muzaffar Hussain wrote on May 22 under the headline ” Adhikansh Pakistani Islami khilafat ke paksh mein” (A majority of Pakistanis favours khilafat).
He reported the findings of an opinion poll. The market research company MEMRB had surveyed Pakistanis to ask them what sort of government they wanted. Did they want khilafat as prescribed by Islam? They were also offered the option of tyranny (” anya vikalpon mein janta se poocha hai ke kya woh tanashahi pasand karenge?”). Hussain wrote that by this was meant martial law, and it was related to something found commonly in Muslim nations. This was the presence of sheikhs and kings (” Islami deshon mein aaj bhi raja aur sheikh hain”) who ruled through lineage for generations. The last option offered was democracy “as the world knew it”.
The results were unsurprising to Hussain. The majority of Pakistanis picked khilafat, for which the Taliban were also agitating. How was it possible, then, that anybody could defy the Taliban?
Neutral Pakistanis (” Tattastha log”) were merely being realistic in staying silent against extremism. Why should anyone endanger their life by opposing khilafat? (” Islami khilafat ka virodh karne ki himmat kaun kar sakta hai?”)
The survey was conducted in 30 cities and 60 villages. Those in favour of khilafat were 56%. These people said that Pakistan’s creation was rooted in religion and the state should therefore be Islamic. Those favouring dictatorship were 22%. They felt Pakistan had progressed only under military strongmen (” jo pragati hui hai woh keval sainik tanashahon ke karan hui hai“). Only 11% of Pakistanis preferred secular democracy. These figures did not vary significantly between urban respondents and those in villages, those who conducted the survey said. There was some difference however with respect to the residents of Karachi, Lahore, Rawalpindi and Islamabad. In these cities, 40% preferred martial law and 39% preferred khilafat. In Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, those who wanted khilafat were 60%. In Balochistan and Sindh, about 35% preferred martial law.
The survey did not vary much by age. Those between 16 and 60 preferred khilafat by 66%. Surprisingly, both the illiterate and the very literate approved of khilafat.
Hussain felt that the collapse of the Turkish caliphate had left Muslim nations in disarray (” Islami jagat titar-bitar ho gaya hai”). Both Bhutto and Gen Zia had wanted Saudi Arabia’s king to be crowned caliph of all Muslims.
Aakar Patel is a director with Hill Road Media, Mumbai.
Courtesy: → The Friday Times
By Shahbaz Rana
Excerp:
…. The German cabinet member appeared reluctant to commit to additional assistance for security. “We know that for our work we need a secure environment but we cannot make payments as much as you require,” he said. …
…. The German minister urged Pakistan to implement tax reforms. “For us as donors, a strong, big and proud country must do more than have revenues from only 1.5 million people out of a 180 million population as it is important for us to explain our taxpayers,” he added.
To read complete article: The Express Tribune
– The cold-blooded torture and murder of journalist Saleem Shahzad by “invisible agencies” roused the journalists of Pakistan to unite and demand an independent and credible commission of inquiry to unearth the facts and punish the perpetrators. A media “dharna” outside parliament in Islamabad was aimed at securing an independent supreme court judge to head the inquiry instead of Justice Agha Rafiq, the chief justice of the Federal Shariat Court, nominated by President Asif Zardari.
Two questions arose. First, why did the media unite in such an unprecedented manner in this case when it didn’t do so in the case of the sixteen journalists so far killed this year in Pakistan? What was so particularly frightening or significant about this murder that compelled the media to stand up and be counted? Second, why did President Zardari originally pick a “Zardari-loyalist” to head this commission? Was this aimed at shielding any slip up or criminality on the part of the PPP government? And if it wasn’t, who was President Zardari trying to shield and why?
The answers are straight forward enough. Saleem Shehzad had recorded his problems with the ISI and left a testament indicting it if he was harmed. He was writing a book exposing the inroads into the armed forces and ISI made by retired or serving officers sympathetic to Al Qaeda’s violent ideology. Such exposure was deemed irrevocably embarrassing to the national security establishment. It explained the lack of preparedness on the part of the military to defend and protect itself — as evidenced in Rawalpindi, Karachi and Abbottabad in recent times. It also confirmed the fears of the international community about the security of the nukes, triggering scenarios of pre-emptive action against them in the event of their seizure by rogues allied to Al Qaeda. When Saleem Shehzad went ahead and published his book, he had to be silenced.
That, at least, is the media’s perception of what happened to him and why. Thus the media banded together to demand accountability so that the same fate did not befall any other journalist. If this perception was wrong, an independent commission of inquiry should have been able to establish the innocence of the ISI and redeem its credibility. If it was right, the ISI had to be chastened and cleansed of such elements. What is wrong with this way of thinking? Indeed, when an attempt is made to hide the facts behind a stooge commission, such suspicions and perceptions take deep roots and protests are inclined to become more widespread and violent. If President Zardari hadn’t finally heeded the journalists’ threat and appointed Justice Saqib Nisar to head the commission instead of Mr Agha Rafiq, the media was all geared up to announce a blackout of all government news and military press statements and advice.
Much the same sort of trouble for the government and military may be forecast for another commission of inquiry pledged by parliament to uncover the truth behind the Abbottabad debacle. In this case, too, the military seems to have leaned on the weak PPP government to desist from seriously inquiring into the mishap because it would deeply embarrass the “national security establishment” and conceivably jeopardise its “strategic relationship” with its Pentagon counterpart in the United States.
In both instances, however, there is one critical factor that threatens to derail the unholy nexus between a weak government and an arrogant military that are clutching at each other for protection. That is the opposition lead by Nawaz Sharif. The PMLN stood solidly with the fearful media in the first instance and will back the outraged public in the second. No less significantly, the sympathies of the newly independent judiciary are with the media, opposition and public. This is an inherently unstable and precarious situation. Where do we go from here?
The military has no option but to press the strategic “Paradigm Reset” button. The media and judiciary have joined the stake holders’ club. The military must realize that it is no longer capable of “managing” or “manipulating” or “blackmailing” the twice-bitten opposition to do its bidding blindly. The media too has been empowered by a wave of “citizen-journalists” who cannot be repressed. There are 20 million internet users in Pakistan and 4 million Facebook freaks and Tweeters. This organic new species had defied the dictators of the Middle East and smashed their censors. It is destined to do the same in Pakistan.
The situation is fraught with dangers of unmanageable upheaval. The military must adjust its sights accordingly. If, for example, the US were to launch any new unilateral action that outraged the Pakistani media, opposition and public, the military would be caught in the eye of the storm. It won’t be able to resist the public pressure but it also wouldn’t like to be savaged by America. Thus it could be the biggest loser in the game. Forewarned is forearmed.
Courtesy: Friday Times
via Wichaar
The natives getting restless – by Mujahid Hussain
The anti-Army feelings among the influential political parties, religious and jihadist parties and outfits are increasing in the traditionally pro-Army province of Punjab. The failure of the Army and the Central Government in Balochistan is calamitous. The extremism in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has not been beaten
Recent events have caused the army and its intelligence wing to be exposed to criticism in a manner never seen before in this country. This estrangement does not apply to the religious right alone anymore, who were already angry because of their one dimensional view on the war on terror. Both the religious and the left wing parties have felt emotions of betrayal and anger towards the army for different reasons. The liberal intellectuals who support the army in the war on terror, have expressed concerns about the duplicity and the modus operandi of the intelligence agencies.
Usama Bin Ladin’s death in Abbottabad, Mehran Base Attack, successive drone attacks, and now the killing of a youth by the Rangers in Karachi in public, has caused the decibel levels to rise as never before.
The less than complimentary views about the army expressed by Asma Jahangir, President of the Supreme Court Bar Association and the torch bearer of Human Rights, has created a new situation. The reaction of the military top brass has been to rely on its carefully nurtured constituency in journalism, politics, establishment and other vocal segments of the society, to stick to the well rehearsed standard narrative, offering the usual rewards in return.
On the other hand, Nawaz Sharif intends to exploit this situation, for he knows full well that his rivals are weak and that internal and external factors may allow him to gain political ascendancy. There is no evidence coming to the fore that the army has grasped the significance of the change in the public mood and increasing disillusionment among its traditional supporters.
It does not seem that the army has yet decided to curtail its role in politics. History, however, is full of ironies. The coziness with the Army that was the preserve of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz Group [PML-N] is now enjoyed by the Pakistan Peoples’ Party [PPP], given expression through the statements of Rahman Malik, Babar Awan, and Firdous Ashiq Awan. All three are new PPP faces whereas the traditional party leaders have lost their pre-eminence. On the other hand, the PML-N members are moving towards the role played by the PPP workers during and following the Zia regime. Jamaat-e-Islami [JI] has lost favour and Imran Khan has stepped into its shoes.
Whereas the brittleness of the state has become obvious in these circumstance, its only stable institution, the Army, is also facing retreat and uncertainty. The situation in the tribal regions is a stalemate. The anti-Army feelings among the influential political parties, religious and jihadist parties and outfits are increasing in the traditionally pro-Army province of Punjab. The failure of the Army and the Central Government in Balochistan is calamitous. The extremism in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has not been beaten. In Sindh, the increasing unrest in cities is not a good omen for all unitary forces including the Army even though there is no prominent movement in the rural Sindh. …
Read more: ViewPoint
– By Dr. Muzaffar Iqbal
Pakistan has a strange history of strongly directed, self-centered, military rule followed by a democratic drift into an abyss; it is, once again, in the midst of a drift, like a ship without a captain. If logic dictates historical necessity, then the next military coup should not be too far. This is not a forecast, just a possible outcome of the current so-called democratic experiment, which is perhaps the greatest watershed in the political history of this unfortunate nation where genuine leadership has been as rare as the legendary huma bird.
One does not need to fortune tellers to see where the country is going; the drift itself is so obviously toward a certain chaos which will leave nothing in tact in an already fragmented polity. One can understand how the ruling party has led the country into this state, but it is hard to understand the impotency of the official as well as unofficial opposition. In more concrete terms, all that the country has is empty bombast, being issued from the frothy mouths of the entire spectrum of those who constitute “opposition”. …
Read more: REBELNEWS
by Hakim Hazik
The great sage and the poet-philosopher, Iqbal had dreamt of the unity of the Ummah from the Nile to Kashghar. Imam Kalashnikov helped us realize this dream.
Imam ul Ummat, the chosen of God and the leader of the faithful, Sheikh Mikhael Timofeyevich Kalashnikov was born in the sacred region of Altai, in the Vilayat of Russia in 1919. He saw action on the Western front, against the infidel Panzer division, which led to confusion and catastrophe in the legions of the Faith. He retired therefore to his Black Sea dacha to ponder over the grave challenges facing the Ummah. After deep reflection and intense meditation, he was led by the God Almighty to the path of success and salvation. He became the inventor of the AK 47 sub machine gun.
This epochal invention has become the most prized possession of the Ummah over the years. East of Urals, it has achieved an iconic status among countless believers in the Hindukush, Gandhara and Inuds sultanates where Fiqh Kalashankofia has replaced the older fiqhs to provide motivation, peace and comfort to its devotees.
When the blessed Red Army crossed the Oxus, the foundation was laid for an Islamic Renaissance in the region. General Mustache ul Haq was the emir of the Indus Vilayat. He has already established his reputation for piety and justice by executing blackguards who propagated satanic notions of democracy and the rule of law, to spread unrest and rift among the believers. Because of the essential unity of Ummah, he wanted to play his part in the unfolding saga and therefore established five thousand Kalashankofia seminaries across ….
Read more: ViewPoint
by Murtaza Ali Shah
LONDON: Baloch leader Nawabzada Hyrbyair Marri has held Interior Minister Rehman Malik for being behind the recent wave of “kill and dump policy” in Balochistan.
Marri said Rehman Malik has been openly threatening to “crush” Baloch political parties and student organizations.Marri told The News that Malik had become hostile after his repeated requests made to Mr Marri to endorse the government package failed.
Speaking at a public meeting here, Marri said the special committee to probe the gruesome killings of five Chechens in Kharotabad is a whitewash and there is no chance the culprits will be brought to justice.
Speaking at a public meeting here, Nawabzada Marri, who lives in exile in London, said the killing of unarmed foreigners by FC in Kharotabad, Quetta on May 17 was an act of barbarism on the part of law-enforcement agencies. He said the killings exposed once again how the rule of law had vanished from the Balochistan province, leading to human rights violations on daily basis.
“Those responsible for the killings of women and children, professionals and intellectuals and the local people act with impunity. They have no regard for the rule of law,” Marri said, adding that no commission was formed to probe the killing of Nawab Akbar Bugti and hundreds of Balochs killed so far. …
Read more: The News
By Stanley Kurtz
The Washington Post and New York Times today feature above-the-fold front-page articles about the deteriorating situation in Pakistan. Both pieces are disturbing, the Times account more so because it explicitly raises the prospect of an anti-American “colonels coup” against Pakistan’s army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani. With all the bad news coming out of this part of the world, and plenty of trouble here at home, it’s easy to ignore stories like this. Yet these two reports are among the most alarming and important we’ve seen in a long string of bad news from Pakistan and the Middle East.
Both articles make plain the extraordinary depth and breadth of anti-American sentiment among the commanders and the rank-and-file of Pakistan’s army. While America’s insistence on keeping the bin Laden raid secret, as well as our ability to pull it off without Pakistani interference, are the immediate causes of the anger, it’s obvious that a deeper anti-American sentiment as well as some level of sympathy for al-Qaeda are also at work.
Even now Pakistan’s army is forcing American operations out of the country. They have blocked the supply of food and water to our drone base, and are actively “strangling the alliance” by making things difficult for Americans in-country.
Unfortunately, it’s now time to at least begin thinking about what the United States should do in case of either an overt anti-American coup within Pakistan’s army, or in case Kayani himself is forced to effectively break relations. Although liberation from Pakistan’s double-game and reversion to honest hostility might come as a welcome relief to some, I see no good scenario here.
Should anti-American elements in Pakistan’s army displace Kayani, they would presumably hold our supply lines to Afghanistan hostage to a cessation of drone attacks. The step beyond that would be to cut off our Afghanistan supply lines altogether. Our minimum response to either of these moves would likely be a suspension of aid (on which Pakistan’s military is now dependent) and moves to provide India with technology that would give them major advantages over Pakistan. Pakistan may run eagerly into the arms of China at that point.
These developments would pose many further dangers and questions. Could we find new supply lines, and at what geo-strategic price? Should we strike terrorist refuges in Pakistan, perhaps clashing with Pakistan’s own forces as we do so? Would Pakistan actively join the Taliban to fight us in Afghanistan? In short, would the outcome of a break between America and Pakistan be war–whether low-level or outright?
There is no good or easy answer here. If there is any single spot it would be hardest for America to walk away from conflict, Pakistan is it. Bin Laden was not alone. Pakistan shelters our greatest terrorist enemies. An inability to strike them there would be intolerable, both in terms of the danger posed for terrorism here in the United States, and for the safety of our troops in Afghanistan.
Yet the fundamental problem remains Pakistan’s nuclear capacity, as well as the sympathy of many of its people with our enemies. Successful clashes with Pakistan’s military may only prompt sympathizers to hand nuclear material to al-Qaeda. The army is virtually the only thing holding Pakistan together. A military defeat and splintering of the army could bring an Islamist coup, or at least the fragmentation of the country, and consequent massive expansion of its lawless regions. These gloomy prospects probably explain why our defense officials keep counseling patience, even as the insults from Pakistan grow.
An important question here is just how Islamist the anti-American elements of Pakistan’s military now are. Is the current trouble primarily a matter of nationalist resentment at America’s killing of bin Laden, or is this a case of outright sympathy for al-Qaeda and the Taliban in much of the army?
The answer is probably a bit of both. The difficulty is that the precise balance may not matter that much. We’ve seen in Egypt that a secular the military is perfectly capable of striking up a cautious alliance with newly empowered Islamist forces. The same thing could happen in Pakistan in the advent of an anti-American military coup. Pakistan may not be ethnically Arab, but it’s continued deterioration may be the unhappy harbinger of the so-called Arab Spring’s outcome, I fear.
At any rate, it’s time to begin at least gaming out worst-case scenarios in Pakistan.
Courtesy: National Review Online
Via Wichaar
Pakistan is blocking food and water from reaching a remote base used by the US for its secret drones programme, severely hampering counter terrorism strategy, according to a senior American official.
By Rob Crilly, Islamabad
Both sides are now briefing against the other as hostility between the two countries grows more intense – and more open – day by day.
Pakistan’s military has not recovered from the humiliation of failing to detect an American raid last month that killed Osama bin Laden and has reduced or halted co-operation with the US in protest.
A senior American official told The New York Times that supplies had been choked off to the airbase and that they were gradually “strangling the alliance” by making things difficult for the Americans in Pakistan. …
Read more: Telegraph.co.uk
By Karen DeYoung and Griff Witte
The security relationship between the United States and Pakistan has sunk to its lowest level since the two countries agreed to cooperate after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, endangering counterterrorism programs that depend on the partnership, according to U.S. and Pakistani officials.
Both sides say further deterioration is likely as Pakistan’s military leadership comes under unprecedented pressure from within its ranks to reduce ties with the United States. The army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Kayani, was jeered last month by fellow officers who demanded in a town-hall-style meeting that he explain why Pakistan supports U.S. policy.
Kayani “is fighting to survive,” said one U.S. official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of current sensitivities. “His corps commanders are very strongly anti-U.S. right now, so he has to appease them.” …
Read more: The Washington Post
– In post-bin Laden Pakistan, a unique prospect exists for the civilian leadership to neutralise the establishment and literally reverse the power equation. Such a constellation of events does not happen often and the agents of the status quo are hard at work to quickly close this small window of opportunity
Wherever and whenever nation-states make the transition towards a democratic form of government, the question about civilian supremacy over the military is bound to come up. In stable western democracies, such as the US and Japan, both convention and the constitution provide well-established safeguards against the military’s encroachment on the civilian power to oversee and control it. But in budding democracies, and especially countries like Pakistan that go through praetorian autocracy and democracy in a cyclical fashion, the issue of civil-military balance of power remains highly complex, unresolved and pernicious.
It was this struggle for power that Samuel Adams — one of the US’s founding fathers — had warned against, in a letter to James Warren: “A standing army, however necessary it may be at some times, is always dangerous to the liberties of the people. Soldiers are apt to consider themselves as a body distinct from the rest of the citizens. They have their arms always in their hands…Such a power should be watched with a jealous eye.”
Standing armies have nonetheless become a norm and the citizens’ militias, looked upon favourably by Adams and the legendary Baloch leader Sher Muhammad Marri, as a bulwark against martial law, have survived just in theory. Since the Portuguese Carnation revolution of 1974, ironically led by the military, a series of new democratic dispensations — the so-called third wave democracies — have continued to grapple with the issue of consolidating civilian control over the military, as part of the overall cementing of democratic change. The quest for fledgling democracies has been not only to oust the military from power but also to prevent it from staging another outright coup d’état as well as an indirect intervention in or competition with civilian power.
In the political scenario evolving in Pakistan after the US took out Osama bin Laden, the security establishment has found its chokehold on power to be in mortal danger. The façade of the military’s organisation and invincibility, nay infallibility, has been lifted, tilting the balance of power against it internationally, but more importantly, domestically. It is this exposed domestic flank that is really worrisome for the establishment, as a potential civilian compact could emerge and dislodge it from the direct and indirect role of control over the state that it is accustomed to exercising. The Latin American and Southeast Asian models of the juntas defanged and sent packing by the united political elite are not completely lost on the Pakistani deep state. …
Read more: Daily Times
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