tribal regions

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Pakistan Mindful of Indian Involvement in Afghanistan

January 27, 2010 in Afghanistan, Foreign Aid, India, Interview, Pakistan, Terrorism | 1 comment

I spoke with former Pakistani Foreign Secretary Najmuddin Shaikh, and he says that Pakistan does not think a military strategy can achieve peace in Afghanistan.  Instead, he says Pakistanis believe that they should help promote a political resolution.  Watch the story below:

We also discussed a point that Shaikh says international debates are not covering enough: the Pakistan-India dynamic.

The two nuclear powers have fought three wars against each other over the years.  Now, India is a major donor in Afghanistan, and Shaikh says Pakistani officials suspect India has strengthened its influence in the war-torn country.

The former foreign secretary also says Pakistanis worry that there is a shortage of troops on their eastern border.

A large number of the Pakistani army’s fighting force is now concentrated in the country’s western regions battling Taliban militants.  Shaikh says that if the United States had its way, more Pakistani troops would battle along that border, especially in the North Waziristan tribal area where Jalaluddin Haqqani’s Taliban network is centered.

Coalition commanders say the Haqqani network is a major cause of instability in eastern Afghanistan.  These Taliban fighters fled Afghanistan following the U.S.-led invasion, and now operate largely with impunity from the Pakistani military.

I asked Shaikh if Pakistan views the Haqqani network as a strategic asset in Afghanistan in order to counterbalance India’s influence.

Shaikh replied that Jalaluddin Haqqani was “the most capable commander by my reckoning in the resistance against the Soviets and was certainly someone that the Americans talked to in the aftermath of 9/11.”  He added that the fighting situation could make for “strange bedfellows” if the future of the Haqqani network remains at the forefront of Pakistan’s relationships with Afghanistan and the United States.

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Pakistan’s PM: South Waziristan Offensive is Over UPDATE

December 12, 2009 in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Terrorism, Violence | 3 comments

UPDATE:  Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani has backtracked on his earlier comments.  Click here for the story.

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Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani says the military operation targeting Taliban militants in the South Wazirstan tribal region is over.

Pahari Sahib, Wikimedia Commons

Pahari Sahib, Wikimedia Commons

Mr. Gilani told reporters that Pakistan’s military is now focusing on the Orakzai tribal region in an effort to chase the Pakistani Taliban leadership that is believed to have fled there from South Waziristan.  Once fully launched, the operation in Orakzai will be the third major offensive against the Pakistani Taliban this year.

Here is a breakdown of the situation:

Part 1 –  How has Pakistan’s offensive against the Taliban evolved in 2009?

Part 2 — How successful has the military been?

Part 3 — How have the militants responded?

Part 4 — How is the public responding to the offensive?

U.S. officials have commended the Pakistani government for launching the South Waziristan operation.  But as the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan strengthens, Washington continues to urge Islamabad to expand its operations to take on the Afghan Taliban and al-Qaida agents believed to be based in Pakistan’s North Waziristan tribal region.

The former security chief of the tribal regions, retired Brigadier-General Mahmood Shah, tells me that the United States’ priorities are very different than Pakistan’s.  The United States wants Pakistan to focus on militants that are part of a global network of terrorists.  But Shah says Pakistan wants to focus on its immediate threat: militants it believes have launched a series of high-profile attacks across the country.  Since the beginning of October, these attacks have killed more than 500 people.

If you click the map above, you can see that North Waziristan is between South Waziristan and the Orakzai tribal regions.  I told Shah it appears the militants escaped from South Waziristan through its northern neighbor — where the United States wants Pakistan to focus its forces.

Shah says the militants Pakistan is targeting have always had a presence in Orakzai.  He says the military chose to attack the Pakistani Taliban’s base in South Waziristan before broadening its campaign.  He says that he believes his country will be in a better position to help the United States and its allies once it takes care of its domestic insurgency.

Click here for the story.

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A Look at Fighting Voter Fraud in Afghanistan

October 21, 2009 in Afghanistan, Elections, Pakistan, Terrorism, Violence | No comments

Election officials in Afghanistan have a lot to consider about how to eliminate — or at the very least minimize — voter fraud in the country’s November 7th presidential runoff.

AndrewRT, Wikimedia Commons

AndrewRT, Wikimedia Commons

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a television interview that the United Nations wants to replace more than half of the country’s 380 district election heads as one way to make the second round more credible.

But the U.N. spokesman in Afghanistan told me today that staffing is just one of the many things Afghan election officials have to consider in the coming weeks.

Click here for the story.

Meanwhile in Pakistan, authorities closed many schools a day after two suicide bombers attacked the International Islamic University in Islamabad, killing four people at a faculty building and a women’s cafeteria.

Separately, surveillance video footage from one of last week’s attacks in Lahore made its rounds on local media channels.  The attack was on the country’s Federal Investigation Agency, which is similar to the Federal Bureau of Investigation in the United States.

Also, Pakistani helicopter gunships attacked Taliban strongholds near the Afghan border on the fifth day of an offensive in the tribal region of South Waziristan.

Officials say troops are facing fierce resistance as they fight to gain control of Kotkai, the hometown of the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, Hakimullah Mehsud.

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