The Hindu Business Line : Pakistan under jihadi threat

India will likely remain a target of Pakistan-based terrorism, says G. PARTHASARATHY, quoting a report that says the country should understand the costs of “not responding” to terrorist outrages sponsored from across its borders.

Pakistan’s politicians appear to learn nothing from their past history, when political uncertainty and lack of respect for democratic and constitutional norms and institutions inevitably led to military takeovers. Whether it was the coup staged by Generals Iskandar Mirza and Ayub Khan within a decade of independence, the ouster of Bhutto after allegations of rigging national elections, or the 1999 Musharraf takeover — the political class had so thoroughly discr edited itself that not a voice was raised, whenever the Army’s infamous 111 Brigade moved to take over the country.

Is Pakistan moving in this direction again, as President Asif Ali Zardari and Nawaz Sharif are locked in confrontation? Where is Pakistan headed after Zardari’s refusal to restore the former Chief Justice of Pakistan, Iftikhar Chaudhury, and the decision of a Supreme Court headed by a Chief Justice beholden to Gen Musharraf and Zardari, to declare Nawaz Sharif and his brother Shahbaz ineligible to stand for elections and hold high office?

Nawaz Sharif himself can have no great claims to being a stickler for constitutional propriety, press freedoms or the independence of the judiciary. Following the ouster of Benazir Bhutto in 1990 in a constitutional coup staged by then President, Ghulam Ishaq Khan, and Army Chief Mirza Aslam Beg, Sharif led an alliance of right-wing parties, duly bankrolled by the ISI, to become Prime Minister.

During Sharif’s second term as Prime Minister, goons from his ruling Pakistan Muslim League, led by his Political Secretary Mushtaq Tahir Kheli, stormed the Supreme Court premises on November 28, 1997, during a growing confrontation with then Chief Justice, Sajjad Ali Shah. His claims of “respect” for constitutional proprieties and independence of the judiciary are primarily motivated by his belief that, if restored, former Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhury will declare Musharraf’s actions illegal and even seek punitive action against Musharraf.

Squabbling politicians

Zardari believes that if this happens, even the immunity granted to him by Musharraf on cases of corruption could well be revoked. Pakistan’s squabbling and feudal politicians have still to learn that in political life, compromise is a far better option than vendetta. The Zardari-Sharif feud is being played out in Islamabad and in Lahore, the capital of Pakistan’s populous Punjab province, where Sharif enjoys widespread support. This battle is being carried into Islamabad by lawyers across the country demanding the restoration of Iftikhar Chaudhury. They are determined to converge in large numbers on the capital.

Zardari’s coalition partners are uneasy over the looming confrontation and his authoritarian style of functioning is leading to tensions and differences within the ruling Pakistan People’s Party and particularly with his handpicked Prime Minister, Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani.

With Gilani appearing determined to trim the President’s powers by actions like seeking to disband the National Security Council, which the President presides over, Pakistan could well see a Government hamstrung by internal rivalries and challenged by a confrontational opposition. In such a situation, the army, which has recognised that years of misrule by it has resulted in public disenchantment, will remain the dominant player in shaping national security policies, while gleefully allowing the politicians to discredit themselves.

No prospect of justice

These developments have led to American and international recognition that outside powers and visiting VIPs have to deal directly with Army Chief, Ashfaq Pervez Kiyani, while paying lip service to support for democracy in Pakistan.

For India, this also means that the ability of Pakistan’s civilian interlocutors to deliver results on issues like terrorism is very limited.

This becomes important now because, for the first time, evidence corroborated by the FBI has emerged that the Pakistan army-controlled Special Communications Organisation was involved in developing communications facilities for the Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists who executed the 26/11 Mumbai carnage and their handlers in Pakistan.

It also means that, given the links of senior Lashkar functionaries such as operations chief Zakiur Rahman Lakhvi and Communications Chief and ISI liaison man Zarar Shah with the ISI and other elements in the Pakistan army, there is little prospect of a comprehensive investigation, or transparent trial, of the real perpetrators of the carnage.

All this is taking place even as noted American commentators like journalist David Sanger have exposed the duplicity of the Pakistan military establishment, led earlier by Gen Musharraf and now by Gen Kiyani, in providing assistance and haven to Taliban leaders and even informing Taliban fighters of impending American military operations.

Sanger has revealed that the CIA had monitored a conversation where Gen Kiyani described the top Taliban military commander Jalaluddin Haqqani as a “strategic asset”. Sanger has also described the ISI involvement in the bombing of the Indian Embassy in Kabul in July 2008.

It is now established that while the Taliban’s cadres in Afghanistan are primarily Afghans nationals, a substantial number of suicide bombers in Afghanistan are from militant groups drawn from Pakistan’s Punjab province, like the Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed, which enjoy ISI backing.

Effective Taliban rule

Pakistan has paid a high price for its duplicity and the policies of successive army chiefs of seeking “strategic depth” in Afghanistan and “bleeding India with a thousand cuts,” utilising radical Islamic groups.

These groups have joined hands and created a situation, wherein the entire Northwest Frontier Province including the picturesque Swat Valley, located barely 100 miles from the capital Islamabad, is now under effective Taliban rule.

Moreover, in real terms, the disputed border along the Durand Line between Pakistan and Afghanistan has virtually ceased to exist, with armed Taliban and Jihadis crossing it at will. American Special Envoy Richard Holbrooke has even described the Durand Line as a “soft border”.

Rather than gaining “strategic depth” for Pakistan within Afghanistan, all that the Pakistan army has ended up doing, is in giving “strategic depth” to the Taliban in Pakistan! In this volatile situation, New Delhi cannot rule out the possibility of even more terrorist strikes in coming months.

America’s prestigious Rand Corporation has carried out a detailed study authored, among others, by former US envoy to India Robert Blackwill and strategic analyst Ashley Tellis. The report notes that the objective of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, which is dedicated to destroying what it calls a “Crusader, Zionist, Hindu Alliance”, is not merely “liberating” Kashmir, but breaking up India and promoting Hindu-Muslim tensions.

The Report is critical of the absence of effective co-ordination between agencies like the Intelligence Bureau, the R&AW and State police forces, while noting that police forces across India lack the equipment and training to meet serious terrorist threats.

While the Home Minister, Mr P. Chidambaram, has moved swiftly to deal with the mismanagement and inefficiency that his predecessor promoted in the country’s security set-up, it would be a serious mistake to underestimate the challenges India still faces from jihadi terrorism emanating from across its borders and from radicalised youth within the country.

The Rand Corporation Report notes that: “For the foreseeable future India is likely to remain a target of Pakistan based terrorism”. More importantly, it notes that while India understands the “costs of military action” it should clearly understand the costs of “not responding” to terrorist outrages sponsored from across its borders.

(The author is a former High Commissioner to Pakistan. blfeedback@thehindu.co.in. This article was written before the terrorist attack on the Sri Lanka cricket team in Lahore on March 3. )

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