A divided nation | Peace or War with Taliban?

[Zarvan]

I think the point @Zarvan you are making is probably. 'their strategy is guerrilla warfare where they avoid confronting the full might of PA and later carry out hit and run attacks. a proven fact is that guerrilla warfare cannot be defeated, unless entire population of an area is wiped out (an impossible task), or turn against guerrillas ( impossible to achieve with military action)?" Am I right?

In addition,@all members, I wonder how do people discuss military victories against the tribal groups with pride? it is only hilarious to compare Pakistan Military (PM) might with these rogue elements. PM has been prepared for taking on against one of the biggest military in the world; even Afghan regular forces should not be any match to PM, otherwise, all our national money would go down the drain.

Finally some one got my point and they have lot of support among Pakistanis Mr because of the reason our Army entered Tribal areas and killed them on USA orders when it was led by traitor Musharraf and they will keep getting support what we need to do is get rid of USA in Afghanistan by helping Afghan Taliban and when USA leaves than take help of Mullah Omar to teach these TTP guys some sense

 

[F86 Saber]

Very well written article...... I am not opposed to peace talks however my only concern is exactly what has been written in the article that how much are we willing to sacrifice for peace? If peace means burning down of women's educational institutions, closing down of barber shops and enforcement of a misinterpreted and twisted Islam than i rather have war. Even if we do go ahead with peace talks i have serious doubt that the peace, even if implemented, will last because as far as i am concerned, it is impossible to domesticate a Wild Boar.

 

[niaz]

Very well written article...... I am not opposed to peace talks however my only concern is exactly what has been written in the article that how much are we willing to sacrifice for peace? If peace means burning down of women's educational institutions, closing down of barber shops and enforcement of a misinterpreted and twisted Islam than i rather have war. Even if we do go ahead with peace talks i have serious doubt that the peace, even if implemented, will last because as far as i am concerned, it is impossible to domesticate a Wild Boar.

No sane man is opposed to peace. What would be to better than to go about your daily chores without worrying about being blown up or being shot at. However in any dialogue or discussion there has to be give and take.

Here Pakistan State is begging Taliban to come to the negotiating table without any preconditions. Taliban insist that before they consider it, they want army out of FATA; all their prisoners released and blood compensation given to families of terrorists killed. Until this happens, Taliban boldly state that they killed PA Div Commander and that their attacks on Pak Army etc. will go on.

Accepting TTP demands as precondition for talks tantamount to surrendering Pakistan to Taliban, but naive lovers of these butchers fail to realise this writing on the wall. This is exactly what anti state parties such as JUI, JI and Taliban supporters of this forum want.

Taliban don’t accept Pakistan constitution. They believe democracy is a ‘KUFR’. They bomb mosques, churches and places of worship. They believe in slaughtering Pakistani Army Jawans. Has anyone asked Taliban if they would pay ‘Diyyaat’ /blood money for the 50,000 Pakistani killed by their nefarious actions? Perhaps Taliban lovers don't consider blood of Pakistanis killed by TTP thugs has any value.

Relatives of the Christians were right in blaming Imran Khan & Pervez Khattak for conspiring to kill them. The way PTI leadership has been bending over backwards to TTP means implicit approval of Taliban actions. Did Pakistanis vote PTI & PML-N in power so that Taliban butchers can takeover Pakistan without even a struggle?

It is wrong to say that we have been fighting Taliban for 12 years without winning. Wherever Pakistan Army has taken fully committed action such as in Swat, Dir & Bajour, they have won. Reason why TTP are able to engineer jailbreaks and attacks on GHQ, PNS Mehran & PAF Kamra is because anti Pakistani Political parties and traitors to Pakistani state will not let Army take a determined action against these scums of the earth.

Since APC has resolved to start dialogue, let it run its course. Mark my words, Taliban will not give an inch because their aim is to destroy Pakistan and install a pan Islamic khilafat in her place. Any peace if it is achieved will mean turning Pakistan into a Wahhabi hell hole.

I pray to Allah to save my beloved country from her treacherous sons.

 

[schadenfreude]

We already are at war anyway. What more do we need to give it another look of war? As for negotiation V operation clean-up, I would prefer the latter.

PS: I don't know why I couldn't vote in this poll.

 

[jaibi]

@F86 Saber , thank you for reading and commenting. I suppose that the argument has broiled down to: Let's give peace a chance and I wish to ask my brothers who want that option, have we not already done so? Are we so weak as a state that a militant group is telling us about the conditions for negotiations? What will we achieve? I heard an argument over a newspaper article that the USA will leave Afghanistan and will not support us so how will we fight the war? Are we begging to fight? Didn't we achieve making a nuclear bomb on our own? Did we not fight India twice on our own? What makes these guys so strong? I do not know why we are ignoring how weak it is making us look.
@niaz , sir, you are right on the mark again. The only explanation that I can come up with is that there are elements in the PTI and PML-N that do not necessarily see the long term Taliban goals as bad. I know that for a fact that most rightist parties have sided with the Talibs starting from the MMA. Mayhaps they wish to sustain the status-quo of the Talibs contesting Pakistan's control of the FATA and that is just appalling. What about the tribes and people who sided with the government against the Talibs? Won't they be left to their mercy? Is that how we reward patriotism? I pray with you, sir, that we wake up. This is our war and each of us has a part to play.

We already are at war anyway. What more do we need to give it another look of war? As for negotiation V operation clean-up, I would prefer the latter.

PS: I don't know why I couldn't vote in this poll.

Maybe you need to post some more, try again.

 

[schadenfreude]

Maybe you need to post some more, try again.

Got it wrong. Maybe you are right!

 

[W.11]

 

[niaz]

PAKISTAN IS NOT NEGOTIABLE and anyone who contemplates doing so is a TRAITOR. PTT leader has no mandate to hand over any part of Pakistan to Taliban and accepting TTP demands as precondition for talks tantamount to leaving FATA for Taliban to rule. Does Naya Pakistan mean a truncated Pakistan?

TTP did not ask for an office and ANP leader is correct in stressing that TTP don’t need an office; Imran Khan is a spokesman for TTP.

I quote a good analysis of the situation.



Ground realities

Aasim Zafar Khan
Saturday, September 28, 2013


Negotiations start from the impossible to attain positions on both sides. And slowly, if the intent is true, both parties give way, to eventually reach a mutually acceptable position.

To summarise, the militants want ‘their interpretation of the Shariah’ enforced in the country, a complete redrafting of Pakistan’s foreign policy, moving away from the partnership with the United States, and a complete cessation of military operations against them. The state doesn’t want anything at all in return. A ceasefire, laying down of arms, and respecting the constitution of the land would be par for the course, but even that’s not on the table. Still, let’s assume that these are the state’s demands.

Let’s also assume that both sides agree to the other’s demands. What happens then? What is the logical end of the negotiating process?

Does the state agree to hand over a portion of Fata/KP to the militants, to rule as they please? What about the will of the people? Does that even matter in such a situation? Are they up for public floggings, executions and burkas? Are they okay, with not having their daughters get an education? Does every male want to carry a beard, and wear shalwar kameez suits two sizes too short?

Okay, so let’s say this isn’t a logical end. What other options do we have? Do we invite the terrorists into the political process, encourage them to open offices, hold rallies, and run for office? Imran Khan’s said the same, but then again, he’s also voiced most of the Taliban’s rhetoric anyway. Second, to bring the militants into the political process, amendments will need to be made to our constitution: as things stand, the law doesn’t allow murderers and butchers to hold public offices. And besides, we already have one political party with blood on its hands, and some good it’s done us.

The truth is that there is no logical middle ground for negotiations. Both parties are coming to it, with selfish reasons, and with absolutely no plans on being true. The militants are buoyed by what their Afghan brethren have managed to do across the border and see themselves as future stakeholders in the country. However, there are stark differences between what the Afghan Taliban have been doing in their neck of the woods (and the reasons behind it), and what the TTP thinks it can achieve here.

The state, on the other hand, in the absence of courage, is safeguarding itself in consensus. It is banking on the militants’ history of breaking all peace agreements with the state or one of its institutions. The PML-N has no real option but to take the fight to the militants. To safeguard itself from public backlash when the inevitable military operation happens, it has wrapped itself in the political consensus garb. What the PML-N must understand is that there is never full consensus amongst the people about war/military operations. There will always be people against such actions. And thay are the ones who don’t matter.

On the sideline lies the National Counter-Terrorism and Extremism Policy (NCTEP) 2013. Through August it was the talk of the town; we were moments away from what was the need of the hour. But, as is often the case in Pakistan, the moment never arrived. While this policy is inevitable sooner or later, there remains a major fault line in Pakistan’s position on terrorism, visible in both the NCTEP and the government’s current stance of negotiations: who exactly is the enemy? Or, to put it differently, which of the terrorists aren’t enemies?

In Pakistan’s definition, a terrorist is someone who is operating against the state. This definition effectively excludes groups such as the Haqqani network, Al-Qaeda and the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), who do not directly attack targets within Pakistan. However, the decentralised nature of terrorism is such that groups such as the ones mentioned above, while not directly attacking the state, are involved in aiding and abetting others who are.

As long as this support system exists, terrorism cannot be effectively combated, because anti-state terrorists will be able to retreat into areas controlled by these pro-Pakistan groups, regroup, and resume attacks. Regardless of whether the way forward is a military operation or negotiations, these non-Pakistan attacking groups must be engaged along the lines of: for status quo to be maintained, any and all support to anti-Pakistan groups must end immediately.

The status quo bit must seem like a bitter pill to swallow. But that’s how it is. Expecting the state to do an about turn on groups it has nurtured and used for strategic gains for decades is unrealistic. There are certain ground realities one must accept with regard to terrorism in Pakistan. A) As long as terrorists are compartmentalised in accordance with what they do, and what they don’t do, terrorism cannot be defeated. B) Accepting the first point, the best solution in the current situation, is terror management.

The fallout of these two ground realities is that one cannot rule out the emergence of ‘splinter cells’ from pro-Pakistan groups, unhappy with the state’s pressure on what’s allowed and what isn’t. Sounds like a lose-lose situation, doesn’t it. It’s more like choosing a lesser, perhaps necessary, evil over another. There is an outside chance, if Pakistan were to explore this path, to effectively cripple anti state terrorist groups and maintain regional influence.

Is having such regional influence a good idea? One cannot say yay or nay, since nearly every country in the world is up to some tricks of its own, the only problem is, theirs don’t get found out.

The writer is a media consultant and trainer.

He tweets @aasimzkhan

Email: aasimzk@**********

Ground realities - Aasim Zafar Khan

 

[jaibi]

@niaz , sir, a good piece that you have posted. Personally, I think that the Talibs are going for a Hezbollah like power where they can cloak themselves in political legitimacy and effectively evade all state held accountability. They can then use Pakistan as a shield. We really must leave the philosophy that some terrorists are enemies, others are not. They're all our enemies.

 

[niaz]

An excellent article on the Revenge argument:

The revenge argument

BABAR SATTAR


IN 2004 Corps Commander XI Corps decided to meet Nek Mohammad to seal a peace deal. The political agent responsible for South Waziristan warned against the enterprise.

He argued that there existed a civil administration in Fata and an established manner in which the state dealt with recalcitrant tribesmen. And that even if the corps commander wished to conclude a deal with the militant leader there was a way to go about it.

The political agent would have his naib tehsildar arrest and lock up Nek Mohammad for a few days before offering him a peace deal that could be formalised in the corps commander’s presence. He warned that if the state took the unprecedented step of a general showing up at Nek Mohammad’s place, it would embolden rebellious tribesmen, render the political agent’s office dysfunctional and wipe out the vestige of state authority in the tribal belt.

The political agent wrote this in a letter to the governor. The governor and the corps commander disagreed and the matter was referred to GHQ. Gen Musharraf apparently decided that he would let the corps commander run the show. The corps commander met Nek Mohammad and concluded the infamous Shakai peace deal in April 2004. (The political agent refused to accompany the corps commander and was transferred out.)

The very next day Nek Mohammad reiterated his commitment to Al Qaeda and Taliban in a media interview. The peace deal was dead in the water. On June 18, Nek Mohammad was killed in what was then claimed as a missile strike. Reportedly it was the first US drone strike in Pakistan killing an anti-state militant leader.

The political agent’s counsel was prophetic. It wasn’t the use of the drone that marked the end of civilian authority in the tribal belt, but the elevation of Nek Mohammad to an equal of a high state functionary such as the corps commander. We have had to rely on use of force to maintain peace in the tribal areas not because structures of political and social authority never existed there but because they were obliterated by flawed policies and not rebuilt.

Do the generals then have any justification to chide lack of resolve amongst politicos to fight terror? The only thing that the all-party conference — and the inane resolution it produced — established was that the civil and military leaders are indeed on the same page: they share confusion and pusillanimity in dealing with terror.

The argument that drones primarily ignite the sense of revenge within Pakhtuns, which then manifests itself in the form of suicide attacks within mosques and churches, schools and funerals targeting innocent civilians and state officials alike is mindless. That drones comprise a pre-emptive execution programme that is unjustifiable in view of basic rule of law and due process requirements is a separate issue.

But citing revenge as the prime cause of terror in Pakistan is obtuse and reckless. Have more Pakhtuns died at the hands of TTP-led band of terrorists or in drone attacks? Do drones contain a special collateral agent that triggers the sense of revenge within the victims’ survivors that suicide attacks lack? Do 15-year-olds blow themselves up along with others because they are mad at the state’s foreign policy?

The roots of terror have to be traced to the ‘Good Jihad’ of the 1980s and not the ‘Bad Jihad’ post-9/11 when national security was mixed with religion. The state created non-state actors, armed them with weapons and an ideology of hate inspired by the misuse of religious dogma, and employed them in pursuit of a national security policy. The non-state actors turned on the state in the post-9/11 phase when the state’s national security interests came in conflict with their worldview.

And what did the state do? Nothing. It didn’t abandon the use of non-state actors as a ‘safeguard’ — a back up plan — in its national security thinking. It didn’t shut down madressahs set up to infect impressionable minds with a religion-inspired ideology of hate. It didn’t shut down militant camps where non-state actors were trained as militants. So it neither admitted the design fault in the ****** project nor shut down the assembly line. Instead, it drew an arbitrary line in sand: if non-state actors attack the state they will become an enemy. The flaw in this thinking (now adopted by pro-talks politicos) is that armed non-state actors coexisting and sharing the state’s monopoly over violence can be acceptable, and lasting peace can be built with the state negotiating a mutually acceptable code of conduct that will take away not the capacity of militants but their will to kill. Once a militant elite has grabbed and tasted power, will it give it up voluntarily just because the state is being nice?

Problems grow bigger if allowed to fester. The right time to clean up North Waziristan was after the Swat and South Waziristan operations. Lack of gravitas of the civilian set-up aside, the decision not to launch the operation in 2011-12 was that of Gen Kayani. The decision not to reclaim the TTP emirate was ultimately driven by the old desire to preserve whatever leverage the state believed it had with the Taliban to ‘safeguard’ Pakistan’s interests in post 2014 Afghanistan.

Now our ruling civilian leaders have bought into this mindset of giving up what we have in a bid to preserve what we don’t. Imran Khan’s suggestion of helping the TTP establish an office and recognise a terror outfit as a legitimate stakeholder reflects this blinkered thinking. Lionising terrorists as angry zealots, projecting surrender as restraint and labeling calls to defend foundational principles of polity as revenge or conspiracy is bad statesmanship even if not bad politics.

Integrity and good intentions define gentlemen; vision and judgement define leaders. Imran Khan is singularly deflating the resolve of this nation to stand up against vile terrorists. Our misfortune is that in facing an existential crisis our self-proclaimed agent of change suffers from warped judgement and everyone else lacks the vision or ability to challenge his noxious narrative.

The revenge argument - DAWN.COM

 

[TalibanSwatter]

Ejaz Haider


Let me try and explain again for those who just can’t seem to get it. 1) The current war that Pakistan finds itself in is a product not just of external developments (the US-led, UN-mandated attack on the Taliban in Afghanistan) but also of two other, very important factors, both indigenous to us: a policy that sub-let the country’s security to non-state actors and a state policy to ensure all Pakistanis became ‘good’ Muslims.

Corollary 1: this war’s enabling environment preceded America’s arrival in West and South Asia. Corollary 2: it will not end with America’s departure.

2) The two policies of Islamisation and sub-letting security meant that we were allowing and encouraging groups and individuals, even if unwittingly, to develop supra-state agendas. And while these policies emerged independently of each other, in the long run it was inevitable for them to complement each other, the extremism begotten of one informing the millenarianism of the other.



Corollary 1: all state theorists are agreed that the dilution of state writ is the beginning of the unravelling of a state. Corollary 2: the religio-political groups began by sacralising the state and when the state tried to check their supra-state activities, they started to attack the state’s interests.



3) Pakistan did not get into a US war. It was obliged, as a member of the United Nations, to abide by the legal regime on terrorism, which also mandated the use of force under Chapter VII of the UN Charter. No power, including China, vetoed that war.

Corollary: the war in Afghanistan, led by the US, has/had a completely different legal basis than the US invasion of Iraq which, to wit, remains a legally untenable war.



4) The UN-mandated action in Afghanistan gave India the opportunity to isolate Pakistan on the issue of terrorism. The problem for Pakistan was not just to save a situation gone bad in Afghanistan but also to avoid a strategically impossible situation on the eastern front. [NB: the debate on whether we exercised the options well is a separate one.]

5) The legal basis of the war is conveniently avoided in the debates in Pakistan. Most people tend to conflate the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Of course, there are those who also reject the UN but that is an absurd position in a world where the UN is a reality despite its weaknesses, which also find expression in International Law. The same people, however, will want the state to invoke the UN on the question of violation of sovereignty and the Kashmir dispute.

6) The US-led invasion of Afghanistan created a situation for Pakistan: it drove al Qaeda and Taliban fighters into Pakistan’s tribal areas, a natural sanctuary for them not just for reasons of geography but also because of the environment the state had created over three decades ago when these areas were used as sanctuaries and launching pads for the ‘mujahideen’.



7) The local tribes began giving sanctuaries to al Qaeda fighters and the Afghan Taliban. The war created an insurgency economy. The local social dynamics, which had been undergoing change since the first commanders had made their appearance during the war against the Soviet Union, saw new individuals emerging as powerful warlords and dictating terms. Their objective was to keep the state at bay and support elements that were wanted by the world.

8) It is a myth that Pakistan sent the army into the tribal areas for the first time. For details on military deployment, read my article, “More on talks with the TTP” (May 29).



9) The war was not started by the army. The state had to ensure that its territory is not used against another state. The supra-state mindset of extremist groups and their sympathisers does not accept that.



10) The effort to establish the writ of the state, any state worth its name, is not someone else’s war. While the presence of foreign forces in Afghanistan has acted as a catalyst, it did not create the extremist mindset that challenges the state today. That has been our doing.



11) The US drone campaign is a problem at various levels and I have discussed it many times in this space. But to argue that the Pakistani Taliban and their affiliates are attacking Pakistan only because of US drone strikes is at best naive, at worst, pure dissembling. It also begs the question of why the TTP stresses these strikes when most of those taken out have been top al Qaeda leaders. Reason: the TTP and its affiliates are closely linked to al Qaeda and have lost many heavy lifters in these strikes. Does Pakistan support al Qaeda?



Now to some finer points. If we accept the state as the organising principle, then we have to establish certain parameters. One cannot, like Ansar Abbasi, say that we accept the state’s framework and then turn around and also support supra-state activities by certain individuals because doing so is, according to their understanding, in line with Islam; or worse, that such activities are to be condoned because the state is not Islamic enough.

Second, as I have pointed out repeatedly, the statement that we should talk to terrorists because we have never talked to them before is an outright lie. Nor are fighting and talking necessarily mutually exclusive. Even if the state is talking, that does not — and it should not — preclude it from ensuring its writ. Capturing the perpetrators of recent terrorist attacks is a case in point.



Third, we are in this for the long haul. There are no easy and final solutions. This fact must be drilled into naive minds. Also, while the state has been conducting military operations, it hasn’t done too well on the counter-terrorism front.

Fourth, it’s time we focused on the funding to these groups, especially the charities, domestic and foreign, that siphon off money for insurgency. One of the most important CT measures is for the state to control resources. This is a neglected front.

Finally, formulate whatever strategy you might, it mustn’t do two things: it must not signal weakness and it must not lose the gains. The current mood threatens to do both.



Those who still don’t get it don’t need facts and logic; they need lobotomy.

 

[W.11]

 

[niaz]

A sane opinion on Peshawar blasts.

Quote

A hostage nation

ZAHID HUSSAIN

2013-10-08 07:04:35

ONE wonders how many more deaths and how much more destruction will it take to arouse our national leadership from its slumber. Neither the mutilated bodies of 18 members of a family killed in the recent Peshawar market bombing nor the carnage of Christian worshippers at the All Saints Church has shaken them yet.

More than 200 people were killed in terrorist strikes in one week in Peshawar alone, but no one stirred beyond issuing routine messages of condolence.

Instead, the prime minister appreciated the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan for not claiming responsibility for those attacks and blamed a ‘foreign hand’ for subverting peace talks.

Ironically, days later a spokesman for the TTP justified the church attack saying it was in accordance with the Sharia, and was carried out by one of its subsidiaries. While militants continue with their macabre game of death, a spineless and frightened leadership keeps begging for Taliban mercy.

Such a meek and apologetic response from the prime minister is in marked contrast to the tough resolve shown by leaders of other nations when confronted with terrorist threats.

Take, for example, the comments of Kenya’s president Uhuru Kenyatta after the four-day bloody siege at a shopping mall in Nairobi last month.

“These cowards will meet justice, as will their accomplices and patrons, wherever they are,” vowed Mr Kenyatta who himself oversaw the operation against the attackers.

“I promise that we shall have full accountability for the mindless destruction, death, pain, loss and suffering we all have undergone as a national family,” he declared.

Meanwhile, David Cameron, the British prime minister, rushed back home cutting short his official foreign visit because there were several British nationals among the hostages in the Nairobi mall.

But the blood of poor Pakistanis comes cheap. It certainly does not matter to our rulers even when hundreds of Pakistanis are slaughtered. As the death toll of the church attacks was being calculated, Imran Khan went one step further in placating the militants by suggesting that the TTP be allowed to open an office. He ignored the fact that the militant network is outlawed and allowing it to operate openly would legitimise terrorism.

When a bus full of provincial government employees was blown up, the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf chief was calling for taking confidence-building measures to create a “conducive environment” for peace talks with the Taliban. His defence of the TTP has become more vociferous with each bloodbath.

In an article published recently in a national daily, Imran Khan equated the presence of the troops in KP and Fata to military action in former East Pakistan and the TTP to the Viet Cong who fought against the US forces in Vietnam. Such assertions cannot be dismissed as mere naivety; they are a reflection of a twisted mindset.

While our leaders were commending the TTP for distancing itself from the last two major terrorist strikes in Peshawar, the group released a gruesome videotape of the explosion in Dir that killed Maj-Gen Sanaullah Niazi along with two others. It declared the killing of the officers as a great victory in the war against Pakistani forces.

Even that blatant claim by the TTP of the attack on Pakistani forces did not move the federal and KP governments. Nothing can derail peace efforts was the response of the PTI and PML-N leaders.

It has been a month since the all-party conference mandated the federal government to initiate peace negotiations with the Taliban. But there has not been any success yet in getting the militants to the negotiating table. The reason is obvious. The three preconditions set by the TTP — the release of detained militants, withdrawal of troops from the tribal areas and a halt to US drone attacks — are hard to comply with. The prevailing ambivalence has already begun to cost the nation dearly.

It is apparent that the peace talks with the militants are a non- starter. But the government is still stuck to the mantra that talks are the only option. This dithering has already given a new lifeline to the Taliban who were on the retreat from most of the tribal agencies and Malakand, which they once controlled.

The TTP lost many of its senior commanders like Waliur Rehman and the network was fragmented into various factions. But now, the militants have found a new stridency, taking advantage of the weakness of the state. So fearful is the government that it has put on hold the execution of three convicted militants including the mastermind of the 2009 GHQ attack after threats from the Taliban.

Not only has the state failed to protect the lives of its citizens, it has also conceded to the extremist ideology on many policy issues. It is a disturbing reality that radical Islamic elements have as much if not more power over Pakistani society than the state. While the state has failed to develop a national narrative against militancy, an obscurantist ideology holds sway.

With the growing violence against religious minorities, vigilantism seems to have become an acceptable norm. The country has now become hostage to non-state actors forcing their way in through the barrel of the gun.

The authority of the state seems to have all but collapsed. It is not surprising that the courts free more than 90pc of militants allegedly involved in terrorism due to ‘lack of evidence’. It is mainly because the judges and witnesses are threatened and do not want to put their own and their family’s lives at risk when they know the state cannot protect them.

A culture of fear grips the nation as the state has abdicated all responsibility, leaving the people at the mercy of the terrorists. It gives the people little faith when their political leaders surrender to the militant narrative. n

The writer is an author and journalist.

zhussain100@**********

Twitter: @hidhussain

A hostage nation - DAWN.COM

Unquote.

Unlike Kenya, Pakistan has the misfortune of having SPINELESS leaders such as Nawaz Sharif & Imran Khan who couldn't care less about the blood of innocent Pakistani victims.

 

[Partharjun]

More than spineless political leaders, this state of affairs is evidence that the philosophy pf TTP finds support in a substantial part of citizenry and the security forces. Political leaders are subdued simply because they know that a large part of the electorate, maybe even the majority, supports the aims of the "terrorists".

 

[niaz]

Here is the editorial in the Dawn of today:

A chilling vision: TTP’s fatwa
FROM THE NEWSPAPER

Published 2013-10-27 07:10:17

SARTAJ Aziz’s recent statement on talks with the Taliban and the latter’s fatwa threatening journalists with death are a study in contrast. The TTP’s decree is dogmatic and cold-blooded; the government stance is characterised by lack of direction and pusillanimity. While the democratic government prepares to open talks, as stated by the foreign affairs’ adviser, the TTP flaunts its anti-democracy credo by decreeing death for journalists who stand for democracy. By implication, all those who believe in democracy, including those preparing to talk to the militants, deserve death. The fatwa is well-timed. Reissued after a year, it informs the government that the TTP considers a wide variety of journalists deserving of death — the media personnel range from those who believe in the four freedoms and differ with the Taliban on their theory and practice of Islam to those who conduct TV talk shows where the Taliban come under criticism. The Taliban have also focused their anger on women journalists. According to them, they too are deserving of death for appearing on television.

Last month, the all-party conference unanimously called for talks with the militants — without naming them — but the government has still not been able to come up with a framework for dialogue. What will the talks aim at? Will they be just about ending the insurgency? Will the peace hold if the Taliban do not agree to be disbanded? According to the Constitution, only the state can have armed forces. Will the TTP — having tasted power and terrorised the people and government — surrender to the state and agree to enter the mainstream? Will they accept the supremacy of the Constitution? If democracy is unpalatable to them, what precisely is the alternative — an unelected theocracy run by religious police? These are questions that the politicians must carefully consider as they prepare for talks.

The Taliban’s 20-page decree gives us a frightening picture of the sort of state they envisage for Pakistani citizens. And their bloody deeds since the APC was convened have indicated that they will talk only on their own terms. In issuing the fatwa and continuing their actions, the Taliban have been clear enough about the kind of dispensation they are aiming for. What has the government done so far to make it equally clear that it has a different perception of what Pakistan is and should be, and that the Taliban must accept the constitutional vision of a democratic state? The Taliban continue to be one step ahead, and the state would do well to catch up.
http://dawn.com/news/1052082/a-chilling-vision-ttps-fatwa