Operation Silence, as the final action by security forces against the Lal Masjid brigade on July 11 was apparently titled, appears to have silenced only a very small number of extremists, as a violent backlash is being witnessed across the country. Daily Times reviews the sound and fury that has erupted since.
On July 12: Eight paramilitary personnel are wounded in a rocket attack on a Bajaur Scouts fort in Bajaur Agency.
On July 13: Local Taliban threaten suicide attacks in retaliation against the Lal Masjid operation. Four policemen and three militants are killed in a suicide blast in Takhtabad, Swat. Troops surround Khabal town in Swat amid fears of a military operation, and one person is wounded in a blast near Khabal police station in the same locality. Three suicide bombers are arrested in Dera Ismail Khan, explosive-strapped belts are seized.
On July 14: Militants target a military convoy with a remote-controlled device, wounding two soldiers in Bannu. Militants ram an explosives-laden car into a military convoy in the Dosall area near Miranshah, killing 24 paramilitary personnel and injuring several others. Local Taliban launch a Shariah implementation drive in Bajaur Agency. Militants fire two rockets at a makeshift security forces camp in Malakand University, wounding two security officials. Nine people are killed in clashes between supporters of two radical clerics in Khyber Agencys Bara Tehsil. Police recover two anti-tank mines from a car in Peshawar. Militants attack a Frontier Constabulary vehicle in Turbat, Balochistan, killing one and injuring another.
July 15: Twenty-five people are killed in a suicide attack on a police recruitment centre in Dera Ismail Khan. Eleven security personnel are killed in a suicide attack on a military convoy in Swat. Local Taliban withdraw a peace accord, agreed with the authorities in September, reacting to the redeployment of troops in North Waziristan. A tribal jirga in Swat strongly opposes military operations in Malakand.
July 16: The NWFP government announces that its opposition to military operations in Swat after a 100-member jirga meets with Chief Minister Akram Khan Durrani to express their opposition to the use of force in Malakand Agency.
July 17: At least ten people are killed in a suicide attack and an armed clash in the Khyber and North Waziristan Agencies, respectively. A lawyers rally which the suspended chief justice of Pakistan is about to address is hit by a suicide bomber, killing at least 13 and injuring more than 43 in Islamabad, as the wave of violence moves from the remote northwest to the symbolic centre of the country, its capital. Meanwhile, the backlash shows no signs of abating in the periphery as militants hurl rockets at a security convoy in Miranshah, killing 17 soldiers and wounding several others.
And it was me who went about asking another members caste eh ?
