The Dilemma of ‘Free Speech’, ‘Hate Speech’, and ‘Threatening Speech’

MQM seems to be in the limelight of national and international media, recently. Over the past few months, the London-based Metropolitan Police and Scotland Yard have expedited the investigations of the murder of Dr.Imran Farooq, incitement to violence by MQM leader, Altaf Hussain, and a related money laundering case that also involved Serious and Organized Crime Agency (SOCA), one of the UK’s major policing organisations. It is too early to predict the outcome of these investigations, of course, but this entire episode has created serious difficulties to the second-tier MQM leadership based in Karachi. On one hand, they have to take a careful stance on the investigation underway against their leader, and on the other hand, they have to defend a series of rather ‘irresponsible’ statements made by Mr.Altaf Hussain.

Mr. Hussain set up a new trend in the Pakistan’s political arena when he started addressing his thousands of workers and supporters in Karachi not from a political podium, but over the telephone – after he fled the country to the UK in 1992. His controversial telephonic addresses contain a mix of light entertainment (he sings songs, re-enacts movie dialogue, and so on), as well as discussion around some serious national issues. Mr. Hussain has been rather careless during his telephonic addresses and live interviews on the media – it is clear that he misses the difference between what constitutes free speech and hate speech.

Following the recent election in May 2013, Mr. Hussain surprised the whole world by his blatant and violent threats to the peaceful protestors against the election’s result. On 16 May 2013, he broadcast a live call to almost every TV channel in Pakistan. The BBC quoted his threats in these words:

‘Those people who are protesting – and grandstanding – near Three Swords – I don’t want to fight or quarrel, but if I order my supporters now, they will go to Three Swords and turn them into a reality.’

It seems that people may have listened to him, as well, although of course we should not suggest that there is a direct link: a senior political figure of the rival political party was assassinated in Karachi soon after these threats. This was not the first time that Mr. Hussain has irresponsibly engaged his ‘free speech’ in this way. Towards the end of last year, he directly threatened the judges of Pakistan, as reported by GEO News:

“The Judges and the bench who gave the remark against MQM (for voters verification and delimitation), I (Altaf Hussain) warn them that they will be eliminated if they don’t take back their remarks.”

The above statements are only a small sample of a long, long, pattern in Hussain’s rhetoric, one which has crossed a number of mediums which he frequently used various mediums to promote his hateful narratives. He even went one step further, letting down millions of Pakistanis around the world when on an event in India, he suggested cried out loud saying that ‘ the creation of “Pakistan was the biggest blunder in the history of mankind ..”

Whenever the MQM leadership is asked about to explain the origins of these rather provocative statements by their leader, they usually reply that his remarks are taken ‘out of context’. In order to understand what he truly meant, they claim, the critic needs to try to listen to the entire speech, and appreciate the background in which he had to take that aggressive stance to put across the message. Perhaps this might have been convincing the first few times, but it is an argument that is beginning to wear fairly thin..

Most recently, the UK Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg has commented that the UK needs to analyse the borderline between free speech and hate speech very carefully before taking any action on the statements of Mr. Hussain. Britain does indeed specific laws in place against hate speech and ‘public order offences’, that may incite violence against an individual or group, but at the same the country tries to ensure that everyone enjoys the same freedom of expression, and liberty to express their thoughts.

As far as the matter of Mr. Altaf Hussain is concerned, this is up to the judgment of the relevant authorities. It is their call to analyse whether or not he has crossed the line of free speech or not. To an ordinary bystander, however, it is not very difficult to see that some of the statements of Mr. Hussain are fairly vile screeds that clearly incite violence, encouraging his supporters to attack rival political groups, and generally promote narratives of hatred. Given the contemporary circumstances of Karachi – where targeted killing of common people by party-affiliated militia is a routine occurrence -, such irresponsible statements from the head of a political party are certainly not helpful – no matter what the context of those statements are …

Pakistan's superhero Burka Avenger becomes a role model for female empowerment

Cartoon fans in Pakistan have been excited by the arrival of the country's first caped crusader, in the form of a female superherowho flies through the air, battling villains using pens and books. 

The heroine, Burka Avenger, is certainly an unusual role model for female empowerment in Pakistan: a woman who uses martial arts to battle colourful villains such as Baba Bandooq, a Taliban-esque figure who tries to shut down her school, and Vadero Pajero, a corrupt politician. 

But the cartoon, in which a demure schoolteacher, Jiya, transforms into the action heroine by donning a burqa, or traditional cloak, has also triggered an awkward debate about her costume. "Is it right to take the burqa and make it look 'cool' for children, to brainwash girls into thinking that a burqa gives you power instead of taking it away from you?" asked the novelist and commentator Bina Shah in a blog post. 

The criticism has not overshadowed the broader welcome that Burka Avenger has received. With slick computer animation, fast-paced action and flashes of humour that even adults can appreciate, the character could offer Pakistanis a new cultural icon akin to Wonder Womanin the US. 

The burqa debate centres on whether her use of the all-covering cloak - albeit a more streamlined version of the one usually seen in Pakistani villages - is subverting a traditional symbol of segregation and oppression or reinforcing it. 

Sherry Rehman, a former Pakistani ambassador to the US, said she also disliked the use of the burqa in a children's show. "A dupatta could have done the job," she said on Twitter, referring to the head scarf that some women wear in Pakistan. 

The show's maker, Aaron Haroon Rashid, said the criticism was misplaced because the heroine uses a burqa only when in disguise. (As Jiya, she does not wear a head scarf). "She wears it to hide her identity," he said. 

While most Pakistanis have little difficulty relating to burqas, he said, he understood they were controversial in the West. "Sometimes there are extremes when the authorities ban hijab in public or in schools," he said, referring to efforts to restrict Islamic head scarves in some European countries. "That does not make sense to people in Pakistan." 

The Burka Avenger character has obvious parallels with Malala Yousufzai, the 16-year-old Pakistani schoolgirl who was shot by Taliban gunmen last year for advocating education for girls and who recently addressed a seminar at the UN headquarters in New York

Pakistan elects new President today

ISLAMABAD, July 30 (KUNA) -- The presidential elections are to be held on Tuesday between Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) and Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI) candidates, while many other parties have boycotted the elections. According to Article 41(3) of the constitution, the electoral college of 706 lawmakers with 104 senators and 342 members of the National Assembly and 260 of the provincial assemblies will elect the president of Pakistan. The PML-N candidate, Mamnoon Hussain, is likely to win the presidential election as they have majority representation, and Mutahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) has also declared support for PML-N candidate. PTI candidate, Justice (retired) Wajihuddin Ahmed, is contesting the election against the PML-N candidate independently. Pakistan People's Party (PPP), Pakistan Muslim League Quaid (PML-Q), Awami National Party (ANP), Balochistan National Party (BNP-A), and Awami Muslim League (AML) have boycotted the presidential elections. The PPP announced boycott of the elections over the Supreme Court orders to change the date of elections from August 6 to July 30. The winning candidate requires 263 votes to win out of 520 expected votes. The voting will take place simultaneously at a joint sitting of the two houses of parliament in Islamabad and in the provincial assemblies in Lahore, Karachi, Quetta, and Peshawar. According to the Election Commission of Pakistan, the voters would not be allowed to carry mobile phones or cameras in order to maintain secrecy. It said that after receiving the ballot paper, the voter was required to proceed to the place reserved for marking the ballot paper with a cross-mark against the name of a candidate and then drop it in a box immediately. Any person who fails to obey any lawful order of the presiding officer may immediately, by order of the presiding officer, be removed from the place of poll and the person so removed shall not, without the permission of the presiding officer, re-enter such place, an ECP official also pointed out.(end) sbk.wsa KUNA 301048 Jul 13NNNN

Police backup arrived four hours late at D.I. Khan jailbreak: Report

PESHAWAR: The initial report of the Dera Ismail Khan jailbreak has been sent to Khyber Pkahtunkhwa Chief Minister Pervez Khattak.

he report prepared by the advisor for prisons and Inspector General (IG) prisons states that police backup arrived four hours late and intelligence agencies had informed of the attack three days prior. According to the report, weapons of guards at the prison were old.

Earlier, Chief Minister Khattck had called the jailbreak a failure of intelligence agencies and directed concerned authorities to launch a probe into the incident.

As many as 243 prisoners escaped as militants carrying heavy weapons stormed Dera Ismail Khan’s Central Jail. The attack on the hundred-year-old detention facility was blamed on weak security arrangements where inmates belonging to various banned organizations were held.

Nine people including six policemen were killed and 14 others injured in the audacious attack while four prisoners were also killed by security forces.

Was the Afghan war wrong from the start?

In “An Enemy We Created,” authors Alex Strick van Linschoten and Felix Kuehn described assumptions about a supposedly unbreakable link between the Taliban and al Qaeda as “the principal strategic blunder of the war in Afghanistan.” Al Qaeda’s leadership, they wrote, relied on and coordinated closely with Jalaluddin Haqqani rather than the younger and less experienced Kandahari Taliban who ruled Afghanistan from 1996-2001.

Their contention – that with more political will and insight war might even have been avoided altogether – has been disputed by those who say Washington did try and fail to engage the Taliban in serious talks ahead of the Sept 11 attacks. Yet in a week where the United States has gone through a bout of soul-searching about the Iraq war, history matters. Were the assumptions that led to the Afghan war also wrong from the start?

A new book by Vahid Brown and Don Rassler, “Fountainhead of Jihad, The Haqqani Nexus: 1973 to 2012” adds to that history by focusing on the Afghan group that actually did have the closest ties to al Qaeda – the so-called Haqqani network.

As I wrote here, the book has unearthed primary sources to show that the patriarch of the Haqqani network, Jalaluddin Haqqani, had as much influence on al Qaeda as the Arab fighters had on him – providing them with support and an Afghan safe haven during the jihad against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan from 1979 to 1989.

The first Afghan Islamist known to have actively recruited Arab fighters into his ranks, Jalaluddin Haqqani was also the first to declare the Afghan jihad a duty for Muslims worldwide – preceding by at least four years the Palestinian scholar Abdullah Azzam whose 1984 writings are usually credited with being the foundation of modern global jihad.

But the book is about more than the relationship between the Haqqanis and al Qaeda. It is a treasure trove of history and footnotes about the role played by Pakistan in nourishing the ideology of al Qaeda – which emerged out of the Afghan jihad as a lethal mix of 20th century Arab and South Asian insecurities.

Take for example the earliest days of Pakistan after independence in 1947, when it faced a hostile Afghanistan which to this day refuses to recognise the border, and which for years supported then-breakaway Pashtun nationalists on the Pakistan side. In response, Pakistan relied on religion to suppress ethnic nationalism and hold the country together.

“Pakistan’s ‘Islam over tribe’ approach became a pillar of its policies on the frontier and has characterised its deep involvement in Afghanistan’s conflicts over the last thirty years, including its support for the Haqqani network,” the authors assert.

Much of the story after that is well known: from U.S. support for the mujahideen in the anti-Soviet jihad, to Pakistan’s use of Islamist militants to counter Afghanistan’s claims on Pashtun nationalism on its fragile western frontiers and India’s claim to Kashmir in the east.

By the 1990s, even after the Soviet Union withdrew from Afghanistan and the United States lost interest, the idea of global jihad had found fertile ground in Pakistan, particularly in its heartland Punjab province where international Muslim causes remain popular. Domestically, Pakistan – and especially its army – had come to rely on a particularly militant interpretation of Sunni Islam to override disparate ethnic identities; one which is now cannibalising the country by feeding in on its religious minorities, including Shiites.

At the time of the Sept 11 attacks, only some of al Qaeda’s leadership was in Afghanistan. Others – along with the environment that allowed its ideology to flourish – were in Pakistan.

It should always have been clear that the real challenge facing the United States in 2001 was in weaning Pakistan away from that ideology. Instead it turned to Pakistan, then under military rule after a 1999 coup by General Pervez Musharraf, as its main ally in the war.

Its focus was on the Taliban, who, however brutal their rule, had grown up in rural southern Afghanistan, isolated from world events.  Unlike Jalaluddin Haqqani, many of them were too young to have played a big role in the anti-Soviet jihad; they had no real ties with al Qaeda until after they took power – with Pakistan’s help – in 1996.

There are many reasons why the Afghan war went wrong. The lessons of the failed Russian and British invasions should have made it clear from the beginning that it was going to be difficult to manage Afghanistan. The United States might have succeeded had it not chosen to be distracted by the Iraq war in 2003. Perhaps Pakistan might have been won over to the U.S. side had the Bush administration not signed a nuclear deal with India in 2005, which in the eyes of the Pakistan army decisively tipped the balance in favour of its bigger neighbour. More recently, both Vali Nasrand Sara Chayes have, in different ways, blamed a lack of coherence inside the Obama administration on its approach to Afghanistan.

But read through the history of the Haqqanis for a reminder of what happened in the years before the Afghan war. And if you have not asked this question before, you will be left wondering why the United States was so confident in 2001 that it could turn Pakistan around while simultaneously fighting a war which put the two countries’  interests significantly at odds.

As Washington has discovered over the years, the alleged threat made in 2001 to bomb Pakistan back into the stone-age if it did not cooperate was only ever going to be enough to win acquiescence rather than support, passive resistance rather than overt defiance.

It is probably too much to assert that the Afghan war was lost before it started. The Sept. 11 attacks had such an impact on the United States that politically it would have been nearly impossible for it not to act – and, unlike Iraq, it did so with the support of the international community.  But it is not too late to ask about the systemic failures that meant it went into the Afghan war with such little insight.

In Pakistan, Egypt can find some pointers on democracy

In all the casting-about for comparisons to the confusing events in Egypt, three come easily: Pakistan, where coups were celebrated and later regretted; Algeria,    where a cancelled election led to a vicious civil war; and Turkey, where the army repeatedly intervened to nudge along multi-party democracy while retaining power behind the scenes.

None are particularly apt, not just because of national differences but also because of changes across time – Egypt’s was the world’s first coup to unfold live on Twitter, connecting people in ways that would have been unthinkable in the days when army interventions were imposed on bewildered populations.

And the choice of parallel is essentially political. Optimists might prefer the Turkish model, where the army ousted governments which had lost popular support over corruption, polarising politics or violence – and then forced early elections to retain at least a facade of democracy which was eventually allowed to take root.

Their optimism, though, hardly translates to Egypt. For a start, Turkey’s aspirations to join the European Union anchored its democratic reforms. Moreover, it was never colonised, unlike Egypt, Pakistan and Algeria, where armies inherited power structures set up for the benefit of a foreign elite rather than the people, making transitions to democracy all the harder.

Pessimists point to Algeria, where an estimated 200,000 people died in the civil war which erupted after the military in 1992 suppressed an election Islamists were poised to win.

The comparison makes little sense on paper – unlike Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, the Algerian Islamists enjoyed popular support but were never allowed to govern. A country with a far smaller population than Egypt relative to its size, Algeria also had a tradition of insurgency from its 1954-1962 independence war against France. Its civil war was largely ignored by outside powers, unlike Egypt whose strategic location guarantees international involvement. And its violence was exacerbated by the return of Algerians who had fought the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan.

But Algeria nonetheless has resonance for propaganda purposes, playing into the idea promoted particularly by al Qaeda and its jihadi allies that political Islam can never succeed in a democracy. Alluding to that idea, Egyptian President Muhamed Mursi’s National Security Adviser Essam El-Haddad wrote in a farewell Facebook post that, “the message will resonate throughout the Muslim World loud and clear: democracy is not for Muslims”.

Pakistan offers a comparison for neither optimists nor pessimists. Under repeated attack by the Pakistani Taliban, it is regarded with suspicion by much of the outside world because of its army’s role in nurturing Islamist militants in the past. Yet this year for the first time in its history, a Pakistani government completed its term and handed power this year to another elected government. And therein lie some possible lessons for Egypt.

Both Pakistan and Egypt are large Muslim countries with powerful armies whose critics accuse them of acting to protect their own economic and political interests in the guise of defending the nation. Both try to balance the need for U.S. aid with conservative populations who have more sympathy for political Islam than secular western values. And as was the case in Egypt, all of Pakistan’s coups – the most recent was in 1999 – were popular initially.

In the chorus of international commentary on Twitter about Egypt, few were more vociferous than Pakistanis in warning Egyptians against supporting military intervention. “As a Pakistani, I can safely say to the people of Egypt: Been there, done that – and it was definitely the wrong choice/ path taken,” tweeted Pakistani journalist Omar Quraishi.

For Pakistan, building the foundations of a democracy has been a long haul. It made many mistakes along the way. Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, for example, tried to shore up his support with the religious right by overseeing the declaration in 1974 of Ahmadis as non-Muslims – a precedent which paved the way for broader persecution of minorities and led ultimately to the entrenchment of a frequently abused blasphemy law. His attempt at religious populism, which also included banning drinking and gambling, failed: he was overthrown in a 1977 coup and hanged in 1979.

In the 1990s, repeated quarrels and Machiavellian manoeuvres among Pakistani politicians made it easier for the army to manipulate and bring down governments. When Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif showed early signs of authoritarianism, his overthrow in the 1999 coup by General Pervez Musharraf was celebrated with the distribution of sweets.

But then the politicians learned: if they were to claw power away from the army, they had to set the rules of the game among themselves. A chastened Sharif, exiled to Saudi Arabia, signed with the opposition Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) a Charter of Democracy laying out the ground rules in London in 2006.

At the time, the Charter received little international attention. Musharraf was still comfortably in power – the mass protests led by lawyers that eventually forced him out were a year away. But after elections were held in 2008 bringing in a PPP-led government, the Charter helped the democratic project stay the course.

As leader of the opposition, and scarred by the coup which had deposed him, Sharif rarely attacked the PPP-led government to the extent it might become vulnerable to military intervention. PPP leader and Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari – a man whose unpopularity rivalled that of Mursi – worked to build up the institutions of democracy, for example devolving power to the provinces, rather than concentrating purely on his own party’s power base. Come this year’s elections, Sharif’s patience was rewarded with a resounding mandate.

Pakistan’s democracy remains fragile. The army continues to dominate foreign and security policy. Like Egypt, Pakistan faces an economic crisis – both need an IMF bailout; both have to confront myriad governance problems, a burgeoning youth population, and loud demands from armed and unarmed Islamists for the introduction of a stricter interpretation of sharia. Like Egypt, Pakistan lies on a geopolitical faultline, making it both strategically useful and vulnerable to manipulation by outside powers.  Yet it managed to pull off the first full democratic transition in its history this year at a time when it faced chilly relations with India to the east and the fall-out of the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan to the west.

All countries are different; there is no reason to assume Egypt will follow the same trajectory as Pakistan.  But the approach taken by Pakistan’s politicians is well worth studying; not least for their understanding that armies do not hand over power easily; and that building a democracy requires years of consensus-building among rival politicians to agree how to set the rules.

Pakistan: Now or Never?

In Pakistan, Kashmir becomes a new rallying cry

To understand the second-order effects in Pakistan of violence in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir, look no further than the Twitter feed of Lashkar-e-Taiba founder Hafez Saeed.

After last week’s killing of four protesters by Indian security forces in the Jammu-region town of Gool, he tweeted that “there can be no friendship, trade whatsoever” with India until the Kashmir issue is resolved. Addressing Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif – who says he wants better relations with India – he demanded that his PML-N government take a clear stance, and insisted that “strong decisions on Kashmir will strengthen and unify Pakistan”.

The comments of a man suspected of involvement in the 2008 attack on Mumbai – an allegation he denies – would be greeted in India with irritation, at best. In Kashmir itself, many ordinary people would regard with dread the prospect of a revival of the Kashmir jihad in which tens of thousands died at the hands of both Indian security forces and Pakistan-backed militants.

But in Pakistan, his condemnation of Indian security forces would resonate. The idea that fellow Muslims in Kashmir must be liberated has become so mainstream that few stop to ask whether Pakistan’s own motivations are really that different from those of India – controlling the region rather than supporting its independence or autonomy.

After the protesters were killed, Pakistan’s foreign ministry issued a statement expressing deep concern. Cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan tweeted that “Am shocked at the silence of PMLN Govt on this latest violence against Kashmiris.”

The outrage comes within a context – a time when Pakistan is trying to decide how to tackle Islamist militants, once nurtured by the army to counter India in Kashmir and Afghanistan, and now increasingly turning their guns on people at home.

It also coincides with a willingness in Pakistan to believe allegations made this month that an Indian police official had suggested the Mumbai attack was a false flag operation conducted by India against itself – a line that played into a penchant for conspiracy theories and a tendency to blame violence in Pakistan on “outside forces”.

The problem, both with these conspiracy theories and the more generalised sympathy for the goals of militant groups – be it the liberation of Kashmir or the quest for influence in Afghanistan – is that it makes it all the harder for Pakistan to come up with a coherent anti-terrorism policy.

The point here is not to say who is right or wrong about Kashmir – both inside and outside the disputed region you can find multiple versions of nearly every detail of its past and present. The point is that the dispute, which in recent years had been put on the backburner, is once again becoming increasingly corrosive inside Pakistan itself.

That should be a cause for worry for everyone, for Pakistanis; for the people of Jammu and Kashmir; for Indians facing a radicalising Pakistan on its border; and for western countries hoping that Pakistan will tackle militancy as part of efforts to stabilise Afghanistan before the withdrawal of most foreign combat troops at the end of 2014.

SKEWED HISTORIES

The Kashmir dispute is unlikely to be resolved soon. With Indian elections due next year it would be nearly impossible for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to take risks on Pakistan policy without opening up his ruling Congress party to attack from the right-wing opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

But that does not mean the region’s future should not be debated – including with those who live there – to prevent the hardening of a narrative which sees Pakistan as the outraged victim only able to defend itself (and Kashmir) through the use of non-state actors and India as the alleged brutal face of occupation.

That may in turn require a debate on its history.

In a carefully researched book published last year, “The Untold Story of the People of Azad Kashmir”, writer Christopher Snedden studied the Pakistan-controlled side of Kashmir to show why Indians and Pakistanis have such very different views of the region’s history.

He argues that the former kingdom of Jammu and Kashmir – now divided between the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir (Ladakh, the Kashmir Valley and Jammu) and Pakistan-controlled territories (Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Jammu and Kashmir) – was never deliverable as a single entity even in 1947.

Significantly, he demonstrates how going beyond the propaganda, Indians and Pakistanis actually experienced history quite differently.

According to the Indian version, the Kashmir dispute was triggered when Pashtun tribesman from Pakistan invaded the Kashmir Valley in October 1947, forcing the hand of the Hindu maharajah who pledged the entirety of his kingdom to India in return for support from Indian troops.

Since the Indian version relates to the Valley, the focus was on Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, then its most popular politician. Snedden notes that Abdullah was deeply suspicious of the principles underlying the creation of Pakistan, seeing it as “an emotional Muslim reaction to Hindu communalism”. “Abdullah and his colleagues, many of whom were Muslims, also perceived (correctly) that Pakistan would be dominated by feudal elements, as well as being a society in which Kashmiris and their reform agenda would have little power,” he writes.

The Pakistani version is very different. Far from the Kashmir Valley, the people of Gilgit rebelled against the maharajah and declared for Pakistan.

The people of Poonch, in the Jammu region, rebelled against the maharajah and also took up arms in response to the killing of Muslims during the revenge slaughter that accompanied Partition. Notably, in contrast to the Indian version, Snedden documents how the Poonch rebellion began before the Pashtun invasion of the Kashmir Valley. Moreover, it was fuelled by Partition violence sweeping across Punjab, whereas the more remote Kashmir Valley was largely spared the communal bloodletting at the time.

Significantly, many of those people who rebelled in the Jammu region would later end up either in Azad Jammu and Kashmir or in Pakistani Punjab – where the “Kashmir cause” continues to resonate.

Thus we have two different versions – one in India that focuses on the Kashmir Valley; one in Pakistan whose view is informed largely by events in Jammu. There are many other variations depending on whose experience you chose to highlight; the important point is that the Indian and Pakistani versions spring from a different geography.

It is unlikely the history will ever be agreed. But the differences in the versions can be narrowed.

PEACE ROADMAP

A few years before he was forced out of office in 2008, former Pakistan president Pervez Musharraf had agreed with Indian Prime Minister Singh a draft roadmap for peace in Kashmir. The plan would have effectively disaggregated the old kingdom of Jammu and Kashmir, formalising the division that has existed since 1947.

While there would be no exchange of territory, both countries would seek to make borders irrelevant and find ways of cooperating across the region through an unspecified “joint mechanism”.

Whether the roadmap would have worked or not has never been put to the test. It was never discussed in public, neither with the people of India and Pakistan, nor with the peoples of the different regions which once belonged to the former kingdom.

The Mumbai attack put paid to any real hopes of reviving the plan in the short-term, and the Indian and Pakistani governments subsequently focused instead on slow, steady moves to build  relations incrementally, including through trying to increase trade ties.

But with the “quiet” phase -  whereby the Kashmir dispute was set to one side in favour of tackling less intractable issues – now apparently drawing to a close, it might be time to dust off the roadmap and give it a public airing.  An agreement may not be in sight in the near future, but at least it offers an alternative narrative to those who see no diplomatic solution to the Kashmir dispute, not now, not ever.

Viewed from Pakistan, America’s war on terror is not yet over

In some countries drones are the only face of American foreign policy, writes Ahmed Rashid

©Reuters

President Barack Obama’s speech last week on counterterrorism may have proposed the end of one open-ended war for the US but it also signalled the start of a new war – albeit more restrictive and contained. The use of drones in the first got out of hand, but there is no guarantee yet that they will not do so in the new one.

Nonetheless, his first term will probably be defined by the widespread use of drone warfare against terrorists – not a legacy the liberal lawyer-turned-president would appreciate. “America is at a crossroads,” he said this month in Washington. “This war, like all wars, must end.” He went on to outline a range of restrictions in the drone campaign to make their use more legitimate in the eyes of the US public, the legal fraternity and the world; and to introduce oversight of who is targeted and why.To his credit, Mr Obama’s speech disentangled him from the drone era and the criticism that flowed at home and abroad. He has finally opened the door to enabling the US tentatively to embrace a broader counterterrorism policy.

This would – according to the many US pundits who praised the speech – help us forget the image of the US president at breakfast ticking names off a list of terrorists needing to be taken out that morning. Instead, we now have a layered process for the selection of targets, with Mr Obama saying the threat from al-Qaeda has diminished, justifying new criteria and guidelines for deploying drones against those who pose a “continuing imminent threat” to the US.

So the era of open war against terrorists everywhere, begun under George W. Bush, is over – officially, at least. If only this speech had been made before drones raised such constitutional conundrums and created such widespread anti-Americanism in the Muslim world.

For the rest of the world, the issue is not the use of drones per se but what they signify about US policy. Can the White House honestly claim it has spent as much time furthering diplomatic efforts to end war in Afghanistan, or enlisting global support for rebuilding failing states, or providing aid and expertise to crumbling societies – all of which would show the world that it had a grand counterterrorism strategy not represented by a piece of machinery – as it has spent finding targets for drones?

The real tragedy of the war against terrorism, which Mr Obama has merely redefined and which will continue, is that he has yet to spell out a strategy, a series of steps to counter and combat the causes of burgeoning militancy in the Islamic world and increasingly among a small minority of Muslims in Europe.

Drones will not help America deal with the symptoms of terrorism nor teach societies how to eradicate those symptoms and move on. These newfangled lethal toys, in some countries, are the only face of US foreign policy. As Mr Obama said in his speech, they will now be used not in a boundless “global war on terror” but “rather as a series of persistent, targeted efforts to dismantle specific networks”.

Mr Bush never intended to become involved in years of nation-building abroad. He reluctantly accepted it as a consequence of the wars he fought in Afghanistan and Iraq. Mr Obama has not until now even considered nation-building, or dealing with the symptoms of terrorism, a subject worthy of a speech. The excellent speech he delivered in Cairo at the start of his first term, about reaching out to the Muslim world, is long forgotten.

Yet the president’s latest words do offer tantalising glimpses of a return to the Cairo approach, which could mean that he will offer measures of economic, social and political support to countries beset with terrorism – and a wider strategy to combat terrorism. He needs to do so if he wants to build a better legacy than he has so far.

What concerns the president most of all is overcoming the legal and constitutional morass that the drones have created for the US, and to offer plausible legal logic for their continued use. Mr Obama’s speech constituted a significant effort to do that. He has reduced the burden for himself at home but he has yet to chart a new course for the world.

And what about the rest of us, who have to live under the shadow of the drones (I reside in Pakistan, for example); and, worse still, under the drone-based propaganda and anti-western and anti-democratic sentiment that both extremists and moderates now use in Muslim societies to whip up public frenzy?

For us, at the bottom of the pile as far as the White House is concerned, we will have to wait for another presidential speech that offers a wider strategy to counter extremism than just pounding it with missiles.

The writer is an author of several books including ‘Descent into Chaos’ and ‘Pakistan on the Brink’

Taliban & Taliban Apologists: Birds of a feather flock together

Taliban & Taliban Apologists: Birds of a feather flock together

There are some elements within our ranks, who constantly try to defend the barbaric messengers of hate, the Taliban. From torturing women in Afghanistan to slitting throats of everyone who doesn’t agree to their frame of thought Taliban have over the years tried to portray a twisted version of Islam, the religion of peace.

Growing up I saw banners of the call for Afghan and Kashmir jihad in the streets of Pakistan, and I always wondered if this short-sighted policy of using Islamic militias, training them and providing unconditional moral/material/emotional support can haunt our streets and our citizens. The fear saw its realization when Musharraf’s regime took a U-turn policy from glorifying them as “heroes” to labeling them as “terrorists”. I still remember the fear within, when top Taliban commanders of Pakistan declared war on Pakistan. The fault was intrinsically OURS. Zia ul Haq’s vision of making an army of guerilla mujahideen, providing a regular supply of twisted Wahhabi brainwashed barbarians ready to blow themselves up in the name of Allah and Musharraf’s short sighted-preferring-foreign-agendas-over-peace-within notion meant chaos. Only in last year, 3000 have died due to suicide attacks in Pakistan. Losses to army and security forces far surpass the damage done in 65, 71 and Kargil.

We are in the state of war, a war that wasn’t initially ours but like history repeats itself, we are masters of fighting someone’s war in our land. They have killed our countrymen, and now the war is ours – whether we like it or not. The blood shed by these monsters will not go in vain and we shall fight them. Remain disillusioned or pretend to be in a state of denial, WE HAVE TO FIGHT THEM.

We have to say no to Taliban, we have to denounce foreign help to these home grown monsters and we have to condemn Taliban apologists who constantly bombard our media with their utopian “conspiracy theories”

I came across this news, that a famous right-wing political party leader declared Baitullah Mehsud a “shaheed”. The same mullahs, who once gave Fatwa’s on Quaid and Iqbal, are still busy trying to be the self-proclaimed caretakers of this wonderful religion of peace that we all follow.

As far as foreign support is concerned, it is nearly impossible to stop it, for we did the same when we exported terrorism from our land around the world. Every act of terror had a link to Pakistan, this was not an evil “hindu-zionist” agenda of undermining Pakistan as our time-tested friend China saw support of Pakistan based groups to insurgency in her province, recently Iran yelled with similar allegations. The seeds that were sowed by the mighty tyrant Zia had to nourish into evil cactuses. No one is able to stop foreign support to traitors in your home; if within your ranks people are sold. Realizing the faults within is a prelimary step to the final redemption and resurrection. We have to make examples out of those who hurt Pakistan, whose short-sighted policies ended up in killing thousands of Pakistanis and disrupting peace in our land. We also have to identify the Taliban apologists who distract masses and de-motivate our valiant jawans fighting to make sure we sleep safe in our homes.

Baitullah Mehsud, the famous (READ-THIS) “HOME-GROWN” militant is a veteran of the anti-Soviet ‘jihad’ , which the man lying in Jabra Chowk, Zia ul Haq engineered with his intelligence agencies to cement his rule in the 80’s. Baitullah emerged to become the top Taliban commander in Pakistan during the recent Taliban uprising in the Frontier.  He several times claimed to enjoy ‘good relationship’ with the Afghan Taliban’s top most commander Mullah Omar. In addition to directly controlling sizeable militias who have waged overt war with Pakistani security forces in Waziristan, Baitullah has also been blamed for a number of terrorist attacks in the rest of the country, including the assassination of former Pakistani premier Benazir Bhutto.

As a young madrassa student, Baitullah would often travel into Afghanistan to assist the Taliban in its implementation of Sharia, ‘their’ version of it. He emerged as a major tribal leader soon after the 2004 death of Nek Mohammad, another militant who was responsible for many terrorist activities within and outside Pakistan.
 
In a ceremony attended by five leading Taliban commanders, including Mullah Dadullah, Baitullah was appointed Mullah Omar’s governor of the Mehsud area.
 
By 2006, Baitullah Mehsud’s growing influence in South Waziristan led terrorism analysts to label him as “South Waziristan’s Unofficial Amir” – The Amir of mass genocide, murder of humanity and the hub of suicide bombers in Pakistan.
 
An official in the Northwest Frontier Constabulary described his army: Baitullah’s lashkar (army) is very organized. He has divided it into various units and assigned particular tasks to each unit. One of the units been tasked to kill people who are pro-government and pro-US or who support the US occupation of Afghanistan. The last person to be killed was Malik Arsallah Khan, chief of the Khuniakhel Wazir tribe, who was killed on 22 February in Wana (in South Waziristan).
 
A September 2007 report from the United Nations attributed almost 80% of suicide bombings in Pakistan to Baitullah. Pakistani officials traced an estimated 90% of suicide and militant attacks within Pakistan throughout the 2007–2009 period to his South Waziristan stronghold. He led an army of some say, 10000 militants ready to blow themselves up in the name of God, forgetting what God had ordained upon them about killing innocents:
 
On 28 December 2007 the Pakistan government claimed that it had strong evidence regarding Baitullah Mehsud as the man behind the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on 27 December 2007.
 
In telephone interviews with famous media groups, Mehsud claimed responsibility for the 30 March 2009 attack on the police training academy in Lahore. In the other interviews Mehsud claimed two other attacks: a March 25 attack on an Islamabad police station and a 30 March suicide attack on a military convoy near Bannu were also originated from him and his brutal army, who claimed being “Muslims” but did not live up to being called “humans”

Pakistan’s security forces launched a massive operation to apprehend the criminal, who challenged the writ of the state, committed hideous crimes against humanity and was single-handedly responsible for numerous terrorist activities in Pakistan and abroad which led to the death of hundreds of innocents.

He was said to be killed as a result US Drone strike. Intelligence officials reconfirmed that the TTP chief was among those killed in the missile strike.

I have chosen my side, you can chose yours!

Like always, “ derive your conclusions yourself “

Yours truly,

Ready, Steady, Go! : Re-visiting the Indo-Pak arms race

In a world of shrinking economies and rising deficits, it is still interesting to see India spike its defense budget by17%. It is reportedly investing in air, naval and ground facilities like fighter planes, aircraft carriers, missiles, submarines and helicopters.

Indian generals would support this move for various reasons. Indigenous ordnance projects for manufacturing tanks and aircrafts have been unsuccessful causing the armed forces to rely heavily on antiquated Russian artillery and weapons. As a rising Asian power, India has to compete with neighboring powers for a share in the global market and at the same time guard itself from hostile forces.  Its economy has been prospering and with a strong democratic setup, India can afford to boost its defense capabilities.

Domestic defense industries in India are outdated and some even date back to the Colonial era. High cost and obsolete machineries have resulted in poor quality goods which at times have been known to cause accidents during use. The situation is so bad that these industries are even unable to produce good quality gear for army personnel. Burdened by unions, the government has failed to improve production. The private sector is equally ineffectual in the face of strong government restrictions; FDI in private defense manufacturing is limited to a meager 26% which in turn  discourages foreign companies from sharing technology with India. In addition, vague requirements put forth by the armed forces and lack of qualified personnel in the procurement department have unnecessarily prolonged bids by manufacturing companies.

The Ministry of Defense has been reacting slowly to the outdated artillery of the Indian Army, partly  due to bureaucratic interference. Many attempts to diversify local arms production to include advance weapons and machinery have met a sorry fate. It took the MoD two decades to approve a contract for artillery guns. Earlier this year it made headlines for agreeing to allocate Rs 150 billion for the modernization of its ordinance factories.

It is thus no surprise that India was declared the world’s largest arms importer this year. In fact it is said that 75 %of Indian weapon purchases during 2007-2011 were from imports. The ratio of imports to indigenous production is estimated to be over 50%  perhaps even 70%. India has largely relied on Russia to supply defense equipment but over the years, lags in deliveries, repairs and disagreements over deals have forced it to broaden its suppliers to include Britain, France, Israel and United States. Like the recent French Rafale fighter jet deal, Indian forces are actively working to improve their missile delivery system for both cruise and ballistic missiles and acquiring anti-missile defense technology.

New  Defense suppliers are however not the only change taking place in India Defense. Former Vice Chief of Indian Army, Lt Gen (retired) Moti Dar attests to the gradual shift in Indian defense strategy from land to maritime strategy. Understanding India’s reasons for this change are a no-brainer; its geographical position in Asia requires it to hold cordial relations with South Asian, East Asian, Central Asian and Middle Eastern nations. Regional instability therefore has a direct impact on India’s internal security. Furthermore, India conducts heavy trade through the Indian Ocean especially energy imports most of which it acquires from the Gulf countries. Neighboring nations also use this sea route for trade purposes. Maritime security is thus essential to safeguard cargoes from pirates and smugglers.

If Indian Defense is sensitive to global powers dynamics, then so are other regional powers about India’s changing tune. This is especially true for Pakistan which obsesses over the capabilities and strategies of the Indian Armed Forces.  With a painful and violent past, the two countries are known for engaging in an arms race that is not only a threat to the safety of the residents of each nation but also one that jeopardizes regional security.

At the moment, Pakistan is said to possess 90-120 nuclear warheads and a growing supply of plutonium from 2 Chinese-established nuclear reactors as compared to India’s 80-100 warheads. At this rate, experts believePakistan may become the world’s third largest nuclear power within a decade. India’s launch of the long range Agni V missile in April 2012 was followed by five missile tests by Pakistan. A report found that not only is Pakistan increasing fissile material production it is also deploying more delivery vehicles. Pakistan has a plutonium production reactor at Khushab and maybe constructing 3 more heavy water reactors and even reprocessing facilities. It is showing great interest in developing tactical nuclear weapons. Just this week the Pakistan Air Force test fired Haft V Ghauri missile capable of carrying nuclear warheads. This was the eighth missile test conducted since the beginning of this year.  So far Pakistan has refused to sign the Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty because it does not include verification of existing stocks. The overall picture regarding Pakistan’s intensions hence seems unclear and risky.

The growing multi faceted asymmetry between India and Pakistan creates resource problems for Pakistan. India’s thriving economy gives it the ability to spend much more on defense. The US-India Civil Nuclear Technology Agreement has created further problems by giving India access to nuclear trade. Pakistan’s strategy is to live with an acceptable level of conventional imbalance and focus on a defensive and deterrent strategy. Although nuclear stock piles of India and Pakistan are not at par with those of US and Soviet Union during the Cold War, there may be reasons to believe the new arms race is more dangerous.  Unlike the latter, Pakistan and India are in close proximity and have a history of three wars and some unresolved issues.

Control over the nuclear program in each country is also an important indicator for potential engagement. In India, the civilian government has successfully kept military powers in check. Pakistan too claims its nuclear program to be under the control of the National Command Authority supervised by the Prime Minister. But the military’s transgression of its boundaries, through numerous coups, gives enough reason to doubt the real command and control structure in Pakistan.

The north and north western areas of Pakistan suffer from political instability where the writ of the government is often unrecognized. This delicate state of affairs together with rising number of insurgents puts the safety of nuclear weapons in question. Insurgents residing in these areas have been traced to terrorist attacks in India like the Mumbai attacks of 2008. Pakistani authorities counter this doubt by quoting the improvements in security at civilian and nuclear facilities, export control laws and security personnel.

While this arms race is cited to be the top security concern for Indo-Pak peace, recent trends prove otherwise. Areport by Toby Dalton and Jaclyn Tandler shows discrepancies in the arms race between the two nations.  Using indicators like timing of missile tests, range of missiles,  number of nukes and military expenditures, they claim that the “opponents are matched neither in size, ability, nor perceptions of the nature and scope of the competition.”

In other words, the dynamics of an arms race have changed. India does not necessarily react to Pakistan’s attempts to boost its arsenal and cites China as the driver behind the arms race in spite of the growing India-China trade. China does not react while the US looks to India as part of its containment and “Pacific Pivot” strategy. Pakistan, on the other hand, takes every increment on the Indian side as a possible threat escalation and reacts by increasing its capabilities. Although beefing up nuclear capabilities is not too difficult for India, Pakistan is at a great disadvantage. It can only afford to make selective qualitative improvements and rely on China and US to supplement its arms supplies. Unfortunately, conventional capability is insufficient to rely on in case of a war with India. This is why Pakistan needs to use nuclear weapons as a deterrence strategy. Just how much  qualifies as  “minimum credible deterrence” is unknown. Since China has emerged as a new player in this Indo-Pak race, maybe a India-Pakistan-China trilateral  dialogue could alleviate some of the regional tension around a nuclear arms race.

Militant group says it attacked Kashmir police camp, killing 5

                                                            

The Hizbul Mujahedeen militant group has claimed responsibility for the Wednesday morning attack on an Indian paramilitary camp in Srinagar in Kashmir province.

Five Indian officers died at the police training camp, authorities said.

It was the first attack in the city of Srinagar in at least three years, CNN’s sister network IBN reported.

A Hizbul Mujahedeen spokesman told a local news agency that two militants carried out “the guerrilla attack” and warned that “the outfit will carry on such attacks in (the) future also.”

The attack comes a month after the execution in India of a Kashmir militant who led an attack on the nation’s parliament in 2001. Nine people were killed in that incident.

Since Mohammed Afzal Guru’s execution, his supporters in Srinagar have demanded through protest that his body be returned.

Authorities in India have accused Pakistan of backing Guru’s attack, which led to a massive mobilization of troops by the two nuclear neighbors along their tense borders. Pakistan denied involvement.

Indian Home Secretary R.K. Singh — who said three civilians and five police officers also were injured in the Srinagar attack — said Wednesday he believes the attackers came from Pakistan. They “appeared … to be not local, but from across the border,” he said in New Delhi.

But Pakistan’s Foreign Office dismissed India’s charge.

“Pakistan strongly rejects any allegations made about its involvement in the incident in Kashmir on Wednesday,” spokesman Moazzam Ahmed Khan said.

That stance was repeated in a Pakistani government press release, which added, “We feel that this trend of making irresponsible statements and knee-jerk reactions by senior Indian government functionaries have the potential of undermining the efforts made by both sides to normalize relation between the two countries.”

Kashmir has been disputed territory between India and Pakistan since the two countries separated in 1947 after a costly war.

Militants supporting Pakistan have been fighting for more than 20 years against Indian rule in the parts controlled by that country, which has a mostly Muslim population.

The insurgency has killed more than 43,000 people, but some human rights groups and nongovernmental organizations put the death toll at twice that.

The two attackers in the Wednesday incident were killed, said Omar Abdullah, the chief minister of the Indian-administered Kashmir.