Five Myths That Need To Be Buried For Good By Raza Rumi: New Age Islam's Selection, 03 July 2017
New
Age Islam Edit Bureau
03 July 2017
• Five Myths That Need To Be Buried For Good
By Raza Rumi
• Death Of Indian Secularism Is Sure!
By Kuldip Nayar
• Islamic State and Baloch Militants
By Dr Raza Khan
• Qatar in the Crosshairs
By I Hussain
• It’s China’s Turn
By Muhammad Amir Rana
• The Strangest Plot
By Cyril Almeida
• Parachinar Pains
By Asad Rahim Khan
• Setback to Peace
By S. Mudassir Ali Shah
Compiled By New Age Islam Edit Bureau
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Five Myths That Need To Be Buried For Good
By Raza Rumi
July 2, 2017
Popular narratives in Pakistan regurgitated by civil and military leadership with the support of mainstream media suggest that certain things have changed over the past few years. Be it our domestic politics, the conduct of elected and non-elected institutions of the state, we like to create make-believe stories to delude ourselves. Nation states like to peddle national myths often at the expense of history, facts and diversity. Pakistan is no exception. The list of delusions is long but let’s names a few here.
Since the ‘historic’ lawyers’ and judges’ movement, we have been hearing that doctrine of necessity has been buried. Proud pronouncements from the Supreme Court of Pakistan often repeated by analysts and politicians do their rounds. While the courts certainly are far freer than they were before, the doctrine of necessity is very much alive and kicking. Take the example of military courts. The apex court ratified military courts established after the 2014 terror attack in Peshawar that killed children and teachers in an army school. The court upheld them and many outspoken lawyers and ostensibly independent analysts also supported these courts. In March of this year, the National Assembly passed 28th Constitutional Amendment Bill that revived the military courts after the initial two-year period was over. It requires no rocket science to note that that such courts are violative of citizens’ rights to fair trial, legal counsel, etc. as guaranteed by the Constitution. There are countless instances where the courts have passed verdicts that fall into the ambit of doctrine of necessity -initially used in 1950s to uphold a constitutional subversion - without naming it. Sixty years later, it remains pretty much a convenient ploy to justify the power arrangements in the country.
One wonders if there is an Ummah then why is it so divided and why are we even imagining ourselves as its leader when we have clearly sided with one sectarian, albeit majoritarian, bloc.
Another myth pertains to the burial of the ‘strategic depth’ doctrine famously propounded by former Army Chief Mirza Aslam Beg. The gist of this doctrine was that Pakistan sought to exert influence in Kabul through a friendly government, which in times of hostilities with India would provide Pakistan a safe fallback option. It is a separate matter that after three decades the doctrine has reversed and we have turned into the ‘depth’ for others and a target of groups that call themselves the Pakistani Taliban. Now they have found sanctuaries in the badlands of Afghanistan and we keep on complaining about that to the world. Who would have thought that this day would arrive and why have we not learnt from the misfire of this flawed doctrine. But has it been given up? Not really.
Assuming that India, with the support of United States, is playing an anti-Pakistan game in Afghanistan — can we not find other allies in the wide range of political spectrum in our neighbouring countries? Even if the Taliban succeed with the support of Pakistan, China and Russia to gain full or partial power have we forgotten that they allowed the sectarian militias to operate from their soil when the state of Pakistan launched a crackdown in 1990s? Our view of Afghanistan has not changed, as it remains an extension of battle with India.
Another idea that has been conveniently drummed into the public mind is that all states use proxies to achieve their strategic goals. The United States and its spy agency Central Intelligence Agency are mentioned as the key examples. India’s role in 1971 and its alleged support to Baloch separatists and Pakistani Taliban are oft-cited examples. In short, Pakistan only follows what others do in warfare, say the pundits. There is a little but significant difference. Few, almost none, of these cases actually allow non-state militias to operate and prosper on their soil. But that is not even the issue here. Which state allows its proxies to influence public minds and build popular support? Whether it is anti-Shia hate speech by militant groups and calls for violent jihad, young Pakistanis have been influenced by such faux narratives. Pick up a random copy of any Urdu newspaper from 1980s onwards and glorification of Taliban, the necessity to counter India through jihad has been recurrent theme. I doubt if other countries have allowed that. Let’s be clear about it.
Since we were young, we were told that there was an Ummah that we cherish and belong to. We heard Bhutto wanted to be the leader of the Ummah and he was killed so that the dream could not be fulfilled. Now with nuclear prowess and our professional armed forces, we are the leader of Islamic world. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Last month when our PM went to Saudi Arabia to attend a moot of other Muslim countries he was not even asked to speak. Our former Army Chief heads a Saudi alliance which is clearly sectarian in nature and one wonders if there is an Ummah then why is it so divided and why are we even imagining ourselves as its leader when we have clearly sided with one sectarian, albeit majoritarian, bloc. In the recent Saudi-Qatar spat, Pakistan’s leverage was seriously exposed as any hint of Pakistani mediation was denied by concerned parties. Power in this day and age is not just a function of how many tanks and nukes you possess but what your economic worth is. Can Pakistan ever bridge Saudi-Iran differences? The answer is in the negative.
Finally, a new truth has emerged. China and its $53 billion economic corridor is a panacea for everything that afflicts us. Our energy crisis will be solved because the Chinese are setting up power plants. Our regional isolation will be tackled as China backs us and we let Iran, Afghanistan and India continue to resent us. And who cares for the relationship with the United States, as China will do all that the US assistance has been doing for the military and our chronic balance of payments deficits. CPEC is a welcome development and certainly a game changer but how would the Chinese make Pakistanis pay more direct taxes? How is the domestic investment going to increase when most of the contracts may be awarded to Chinese companies? And the increased indebtedness is already a reality. Future projections are even scarier. Most importantly, without a stable Afghanistan how are we going to reap the benefits of our much-touted ‘geo-strategic location'? The US is a major destination for Pakistani exports. It is also a key source for remittances from the Diaspora. What would happen when the relations with US take a nosedive? These are mind-boggling questions, which no one bothers to answer.
It is time that we infuse a bit of realism in our collective thinking and policymaking processes. Peddling and employing myths as cornerstones of policy and national pride leads nowhere.
Source: dailytimes.com.pk/opinion/02-Jul-17/five-myths-that-need-to-be-buried-for-good
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Death Of Indian Secularism Is Sure!
By Kuldip Nayar
July 2, 2017
THE Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) cannot hide its anti-Muslim fangs. Instead of building consensus behind the candidature of Hamid Ansari for presidentship, the party has appointed its top three leaders to find a candidate who commands the consent of most political parties. I cannot understand what is wrong with vice-president Ansari. He has handled the Rajya Sabha extremely well and before that he made the Aligarh Muslim University a really thriving academic institution during his tenure as the vice-chancellor. His erudition is beyond doubt and his commitment to secularism is without any blemish.
The non-BJP parties have come together to adopt vice-president Ansari who is acceptable to all parties. It would be embarrassing for him to be the opposition candidate when he is the country’s vice-president. Dr Abdul Kalam, former President, was the popular choice of several opposition parties for a second term but had to face a similar predicament before pulling out. So, all that he got was the re-naming of the Aurangzeb Road as Dr Abdul Kalam Road. The BJP is ultimately going to tick the choice of the RSS. It has indicated that it would keep in mind the secular ethos of the county. But it is neither here nor there because when it comes to selecting a person for the top constitutional post, a Muslim candidate would be far from the thought of the RSS.
It would ultimately depend on Prime Minister Narndra Modi to nudge the party to choose a person of his choice. And from the speeches made by the BJP president, Amit Shah, quite clearly indicated that the person thus chosen would be anybody but a Muslim. He has been touring different parts of the country, including the southern states, and exhorting that the choice of a presidential candidate should be someone who is acceptable to the ruling party.
The two houses of parliament and the state legislatures which comprise the Electoral College suggest that the BJP will have its way. The BJP’s appointment of a three-member committee — Rajnath Singh, Arun Jaitley and Venkaiah Naidu—who are part of Prime Minister Modi’s cabinet, makes it clear that the party’s top leadership will ultimately decide who should go to Rashtrapati Bhavan.
Speaker Sumitra Mahajan, who was initially, supported by the ruling party has been dropped. She is not being considered by either the DMK or the AIADMK. Understandably, the person has to be acceptable to the southern states like Andhra, Telangana, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Even LK Advani looked like the candidate of the BJP. Probably, the court verdict on Babri Masjid demolition may have forced the party to look elsewhere as he has been charged as part of a conspiracy to destroy the Masjid. Over the years, the rough ends in Advani had been rounded off and he is more like a person who went to Karachi and laid a wreath at the mausoleum of Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah.
If one were to look back, controversies between the President and Prime Ministers have not been rare. Of the seven previous presidents, only Dr Zakir Hussain and Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed left office without any public confrontation. Zakir Hussain, who died in harness, confined himself to scholarly pursuits while Ahmed was one of the most pliable heads of state India has ever had. It was during his tenure that the Emergency was declared and he signed the proclamation without verifying whether it had the Cabinet approval or not.
Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and Dr Rajendra Prasad had many constitutional run-ins. Dr S. Radhakrishnan had even succeeded in getting defence minister Krishna Menon sacked after India’s debacle at the hands of the Chinese in 1962. In 1967, Radhakrishnan embarrassed the ruling Congress by allowing the Swatantra Party to parade its MLAs in Rashtrapati Bhavan to prove their majority in the Rajasthan Assembly. Even V V Giri, a prominent trade unionist who was elected with the help of Mrs Indira Gandhi then Congress President to the presidency, often expressed his reservations over anti-labour legislation. Thus he objected when the Centre wanted to dismiss striking Railway employees. He also registered his protest over the supersession of Supreme Court judges.
Then acting president B.D. Jatti, who succeeded Giri temporarily, proved more assertive. When requested by the Janata government to sign the ordinance dissolving nine assemblies in states ruled by the Congress, Jatti prevaricated, pleading that the Centre had no powers to prematurely dissolve duly-elected assemblies without proper reason. Then Prime Minister Morarji Desai was forced to hold out the threat of his resignation if Jatti delayed the ordinance and the Janata Party even organised angry demonstrations against the President.
Matters hardly improved even after the Janata Party installed Sanjiva Reddy. Reddy and Desai could not get along and the latter prevented the President from going abroad even on ceremonial visits. Reddy, nursing a grouse against the Janata government, made constitutional history when he invited Charan Singh to form a government after Morarji Desai lost his majority in the Lok Sabha. Reddy set yet another precedent when he dissolved the Lok Sabha on the advice of a prime minister who could not prove his majority. Even Zail Singh installed Rajiv Gandhi soon after Mrs Gandhi’s assassination even before he was elected to the parliamentary party. It is another matter that both Zail Singh and Rajiv Gandhi were at loggerheads more often than not.
I wish Pranab Mukherjee had utilized his term to erase the decision which he took during the emergency. He was the right-hand man of Sanjay Gandhi, an extra-constitutional authority. Hence, his name will not go down well in the history. Like his predecessors, he too was mired in controversies particularly when he published the book while in office. He could have waited for his retirement to pen down experience at Rashtrapati Bhavan. Meanwhile, the present government at the centre must explain how secularism can survive when soft-Hindutva is spreading in the country. By elevating Ansari as President the BJP would have assured the people that the country’s ethos cannot go astray and do things which do not fit into the idea of India: democratic and secular.
Source: pakobserver.net/death-indian-secularism-sure/
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Islamic State and Baloch Militants
By Dr Raza Khan
July 2, 2017
The biggest stronghold of the global terrorist and militant organisation, the Islamic State (IS), in Pakistan has been shattered. The said base of the IS reportedly was smashed in a security operation conducted in a far-flung area of Balochistan’s Mastung district.
This is Pakistan’s counterterrorism agencies greatest achievement against the IS. However, Ejaz Bangulzai, who was controlling the IS activities in Sindh, Balochistan and Punjab reportedly escaped. The cave complex was being used by the IS and its local affiliate Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ).
But it must be admitted that Pakistani counterterrorism agencies operations against the IS have, by and large, been reactive rather than proactive. The recently conducted operation in Mastung points towards this fact. The operation was conducted after attack on the Deputy Chairman of Senate, Abdul Ghafoor Haideri, and the abduction and presumed execution of two Chinese teachers based in Quetta. Reportedly, during the Mastung operation the vehicle in which the Chinese nationals were abducted was recovered but their whereabouts could not be traced, while officials also claimed to have killed Haideri’s attackers.
The kidnapping of the two Chinese teachers allegedly by the IS at a time when work is under way on CPEC is profoundly purposeful. So far neither the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) nor al Qaeda or any of their foreign and local affiliates have claimed or vowed to attack the CPEC projects and personnel engaged in work on these projects.
Irrespective of the presence of the IS, the scale of the threat it poses and counterterrorism operations against the group there is another important aspect to the recent dismantling of the IS network in Balochistan. The revelation that the largest stronghold of the IS in Pakistan was in Mastung and the group is being led by a Baloch, Bangulzai, is very surprising. Previously, there has been negligible presence of Baloch within the religiously-oriented militant and terrorist groups operating in Pakistan. Almost all of these groups have been dominated by Pashtuns and Punjabis. Contrarily, a sizeable number of Baloch have been part of non-religious separatist militant terrorist groups like the Baloch Republican Army (BRA) and the Baloch Liberation Front, and these groups never espoused an Islamist agenda.
Within that context it is not difficult to understand that Bangulzai must have got support and funding from state and non-state actors, which are against stability in Pakistan and resultantly against economic corridor. Here it is important to note that already an Iranian Baloch nationalist and sectarian group, Jundullah, founded by Abdul Malik Regi, struggling to separate Balochistan and Sistan-Baluchistan province of Iran to create an independent Baloch state used religion as its foundational and operational agenda. Hence, Pakistani Baloch separatist militant and sectarian groups failing to get a separate state after decades of struggle with support from India and Afghanistan may now want to join hands with Jundullah or follow it. But for the time being, these groups and individuals would like to use a religious façade only to create problems for CPEC.
It is also pertinent to note that militant groups like the TTP, al Qaeda or sectarian groups such as LeJ have never been potent in the Baloch inhabited parts of the province or for that matter the entire Balochistan. This compels one to understand why the IS or LeJ want to create their networks in the province and not in the remote and relatively more mountainous and inaccessible Fata. They might have been provided sanctuaries by Baloch nationalists in the province to create problems for the state of Pakistan and its security forces, aiming to sabotage CPEC. Let’s not forget Mastung has been a stronghold of the BRA.
Source: tribune.com.pk/story/1448219/islamic-state-baloch-militants/
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Qatar in the Crosshairs
By I Hussain
July 2, 2017
A coalition of several Gulf Cooperation Council countries led by Saudi Arabia, including the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Egypt, has put Qatar on notice that, unless it complies with a list of 13 demands, it will be subject to continuation of the diplomatic and economic blockade that began earlier in June. As Minister of State for Foreign Affairs of the UAE Anwar Gargash tweeted, if Qatar does not accede to these demands there will be a ‘divorce’; and, given the minister’s hawkish tone, it will hardly be an amicable one.
One major demand of the Saudi Arabian coalition is that Qatar shuts down the Al-Jazeera broadcasting network whose Arabic language transmissions have angered governments in the region by airing views they view as tantamount to calls for regime change. In an environment where the media is tightly controlled by governments, Al-Jazeera is widely seen as a Qatari-funded and inspired instrument of subversion. The coverage given to the Arab Spring protests from 2011 onwards rankled monarchies in the region; Egypt also bears a grudge since Al-Jazeera provides a platform to the Muslim Brotherhood which Egyptian President Fattah el-Sisi’s government banned in 2013 after he ousted former president Morsi, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, in a military coup.
Other coalition demands require Qatar to sever diplomatic ties and drastically cut back on trade with Iran, close the Turkish military base and end military ties with Turkey, sever ties with “terrorist” organisations – specifically the Muslim Brotherhood, Islamic State, Hezbollah, and Al-Qaeda – and pay reparations and compensation for loss of life due to Qatar’s policies. The last of these is probably easiest for Qatar to meet since it has the highest per capita income in the world as a result of its natural gas and oil production; it also has a Sovereign Wealth Fund which has assets exceeding $335 billion. This of course begs the question of how and whether its policies have resulted in loss of life in the coalition countries and who will determine this.
Whether the coalition succeeds in getting Qatar to submit to its demands is dependent on the signals coming from Washington as to how it wishes to resolve the conflict. Currently it is not clear which side the US government is backing, with President Trump earlier voicing support for Saudi actions but the US State Department and the Pentagon providing a counterpoint because of their concern that isolating and punishing Qatar will foment instability that will add to Iranian influence in the region.
What also complicates the situation for the Americans is that Qatar hosts a US airbase with 11,000 American troops stationed there which is being used for air operations against the Islamic State. To add to the mixed messages coming from Washington, the US government just days back approved the sale of $12 billion worth of F-15 fighter planes for Qatar; this a few days after Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia in May in which an arms deal worth $110 billion was inked by the Americans with the Saudis.
Saudi Arabia has been Pakistan’s stalwart friend and benefactor for long and is hosting well over a million Pakistani workers. However, it would be in the Saudis’ interest to consider that the blockade of Qatar could have undesirable consequences for the stability of the Gulf region and may well militate against their strategic interests while driving further wedges between Islamic countries.
The demands made on Qatar are in part reminiscent from the Soviet Union’s cold-war playbook during which it formulated under its leader Leonid Brezhnev (1964-82) the ‘Brezhnev doctrine of limited sovereignty’. The core message of the Brezhnev doctrine, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica, was that “the USSR and the community of Socialist nations had the right to intervene if, in their judgment, one of their number was pursuing policies that threaten the essential common interests of the others.”
The Brezhnev doctrine, formulated just weeks after the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, was retroactively used to justify the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956. It was later used for the first time as a reason for armed intervention in a non-Warsaw pact country when the Soviets marched into Afghanistan in 1979.
The major problem confronting the interventionist policy along the lines that the Saudi coalition is pursuing against Doha is that it violates the Charter of the United Nations (UN) and is therefore illegal under international law (as the Turkish government has already pointed out.) Article 2 (4) of the United Nations Charter stipulates: “All members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations” (emphasis added).
The exceptions provided to Article 2 (4) by the UN Charter is article 51 which is the right of self-defence by a state against an armed attack and articles 41 and 42 which authorise the UN’s Security Council to empower member countries “to take such action by air, sea, or land forces as may be necessary to maintain or restore international peace and security”.
Apart from the blockade being a breach of international law, the fact is that there is also a humanitarian issue across the region since there are numerous reports of families being separated, people forced to leave their jobs, education being disrupted, and the cost of essentials such as food rising on account of the blockade. The rise in food prices especially hurts low-income migrant workers of which there are about 1.5 million in Qatar mainly from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and the Philippines. The living and working conditions of many of these workers was already appalling as reported on by human rights organisations such as Amnesty International and it now may deteriorate further as a result of the blockade.
Short of a military intervention, which is unlikely, Qatar is not expected to give in to the demands for a subservient foreign policy. If anything,, this entire episode will encourage them to seek closer ties with Iran and Turkey, two countries that openly supported them in the current crisis.
Despite President Trump’s support of the coalition’s efforts to isolate Qatar, the signals from the foreign policy and defence establishments of Western powers indicate that they are exasperated by the Saudi coalition’s move. They see them as a distraction in the war against the Islamic State and in the fight against the Assad regime in Syria. Even Trump has stayed quiet in recent days, perhaps realising that there is a limit to the number of balls that the American military can juggle in the air at the same time. And with US Defence Secretary Mattis favouring a mini-troop surge in Afghanistan for a war that the Americans have been fighting for 16 years and losing, it is all the more important that the Qataris be on board in case talks with the Taliban become necessary (talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban were held in Doha in 2015).
Expect then to see then a Washington brokered reconciliation that saves face for both parties through some broadly-worded settlement whose meaning will be elastic enough for both sides to be able to claim victory.
Source: thenews.com.pk/print/213860-Qatar-in-the-crosshairs
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It’s China’s Turn
By Muhammad Amir Rana
July 2, 2017
DESPITE billions of dollars spent and diverse efforts made, including multiple military campaigns, political strategies and reconciliation efforts, peace and stability in Afghanistan remain a distant dream. It’s more than one and a half decades that the world has been trying to solve the Afghanistan puzzle but in vain. Now China has entered the theatre, probably with a new framework of conflict management.
Rightly or wrongly, Pakistan is considered crucial to achieving peace and stability in Afghanistan. Pakistan, too, does not attempt to dispel the impression, due to some strategic advantages (invisible to ordinary Pakistanis) it sees in Afghanistan. This has strengthened the notion that the passage of peace in Afghanistan passes through Islamabad.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi was in Islamabad recently in an attempt to reduce the trust deficit between Afghanistan and Pakistan. While regional security and stability are among the foremost prerequisites for the Chinese connectivity dream of One Belt One Road (OBOR), peace and stability in Afghanistan are also vital for China’s internal security. The US would probably welcome any move that shares its burden in Afghanistan, including of failures.
Previously, China avoided playing an assertive role in Afghanistan despite its strong desire to see peace prevail in the country. Though Beijing made a few backchannel efforts to convince the Afghan Taliban to become part of the dialogue process, it avoided taking a lead role in the Quadrilateral Coordination Group that also included the US, Afghanistan and Pakistan. After the quadrilateral peace process broke down, China partnered with Russia to create space for another attempt at peace in Afghanistan. The fate of this initiative remains unclear.
Afghanistan is a test case for China as it assumes a bigger role in resolving regional disputes.
Recently, China has taken a rare and bold diplomatic step and brokered a deal between Pakistan and Afghanistan to normalise their bilateral relationship that is important for any peace initiative in the region. China helped the two countries in the establishment of a bilateral crisis management mechanism to avoid a complete breakdown in communication.
Many see it as a desperate move by China for achieving regional stability. One cannot ignore the fact that the country’s growing diplomatic and political stature in the world requires it to assume a more effective role in resolving regional and international disputes. Afghanistan is a test case for China for it entails diverse internal, regional and international conflict dynamics. To start with, removing the deep-seated mistrust between Afghanistan and Pakistan, particularly when seen in the context of India, would not be an easy task for China.
On the one hand, China and Pakistan are strategic and economic allies in regional and international politics, and on the other, Afghanistan has also signed a strategic partnership agreement with China. But Afghanistan is still far from becoming a functional state. It has also maintained a close association with India, which has thus far not appreciated China-led regional connectivity initiatives including CPEC.
However, it is a big achievement that Pakistan and Afghanistan have agreed to resume a bilateral normalisation process for which a trilateral — China-Afghanistan-Pakistan — foreign minister-level dialogue forum has been established. The trilateral forum has also asked the Afghan Taliban to join the Afghan reconciliation process.
Reiterating the earlier position of the insurgents, the Taliban head Maulvi Haibatullah Akhundzadah in his annual message demanded the complete evacuation of Nato troops from Afghanistan as a condition for peace talks. It is, however, not known what stance the Taliban adopted in recent backdoor interactions. Even if the Taliban shura has given any indication for peace talks to resume, it would be difficult for them to develop a consensus among their rank and file. The recent surge in terrorist attacks in Afghanistan is also seen as an attempt by anti-talks Taliban commanders to increase pressure on Kabul to such a level that the government itself declines to initiate talks.
There are other impediments too, including the worsening Afghan political crisis, decreasing morale of the Afghan security forces and competing positions of international stakeholders in the peace process. Even as China and Russia are trying to convince Kabul to restart the reconciliation process with the Taliban, the US is preparing a troop surge in Afghanistan which indicates that the new administration is thinking along the lines of defeating the Taliban militarily. Another critical issue is the emerging US-India strategic partnership on regional security issues, which will encourage India to exploit the situation in Afghanistan against Pakistan and even China.
Pakistan’s dilemma is that over the decades the world has learned to see the country through the prism of Afghanistan. On the other hand, Pakistan’s Arab friends have high expectations from the country mainly in terms of military cooperation. However, they have not taken any initiative to ease Pakistan’s diplomatic burden by offering any mediation between the two countries.
Afghanistan and Pakistan both know how to improve their bilateral relationship but sadly they are trapped in a vicious cycle of mutual mistrust. They have huge potential for trade and economic cooperation including regional connectivity through CPEC and routes with Central Asia. At one point in time, the two countries were planning to develop a multilayered security cooperation mechanism, but the forces of status quo did not let it materialise. Both sides have complaints about alleged cross-border terrorist sanctuaries. Failing to achieve bilateral cooperation on border security, Pakistan is investing a lot in border management. But without Afghan cooperation, Pakistan will find it difficult to secure its border with Afghanistan from militants’ incursions.
Can China help the two countries develop such cooperation? Pakistan and Afghanistan in the past had discussed prospects for intelligence sharing and mechanisms for border security; some workable modalities were also formed. In the next phase, China may facilitate such cooperation between the two countries. The prospects of joint security operations against terrorists in border regions can also be explored, especially in the context of the capabilities of the Afghan security forces.
Source: dawn.com/news/1342694/its-chinas-turn
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The Strangest Plot
By Cyril Almeida
July 2, 2017
ASSUME they’re right. The JIT isn’t about corruption. The investigation is just a vehicle to oust Nawaz. Old tricks adapted for new times.
Fine.
We can go further. They — the permanent establishment, the boys, whomever — want to oust Nawaz because of what Nawaz represents and because of what Nawaz wants to do.
What he represents is danger, a popular politician from Punjab who dislikes and is disliked by the boys. What he wants to do is dangerous: rid us of proxies and focus on regional connectivity and trade.
The timing is convenient, just ahead of an election which Nawaz looks like he can win. Get him now and you’ve got him for good — shut out from the next election and then on for the next five years at least.
For all its weaknesses, the mere existence of an independent prime minister’s office is a potential threat because it’s impossible to fully control.
By then Nawaz would be an old man and the next generation ready to take over.
If that’s the game, the rest of us are all just passengers along for the ride. The boys will do what the boys think they need to do. Nawaz and co will fight until they can or up to the point they think it’s worth it.
But while they fight their wars and decide our fate, at least we can ask: has Nawaz really posed a threat?
Because all of it — why they’ve wanted to oust him and why they still need to oust him— rests on the premise that Nawaz is a danger and his agenda dangerous.
And that twin belief could just be megalomania on one side — Nawaz’s — and miscalculation on the other, the boys’.
Start with the danger that Nawaz the Punjabi politician is supposed to embody. When he calls, Punjab responds. But winning elections doesn’t necessarily filter down to policy fights.
When it comes to picking sides between Nawaz and the boys, most of Punjab is probably where it has mostly been: wanting the two to just get along.
Sure, Punjab will vote for Nawaz, but will Punjab fight for Nawaz? Especially if the opponent is the boys? Probably not.
There’re many reasons historical and particular to Punjab for that, but there’s one specific to Nawaz too: for all his electoral success, he hasn’t built a formidable party machine dedicated to serving his agenda.
The name Nawaz may mean votes in the bank, but there is no awe, great love or terrible fear. Nothing that approaches what the other side has.
Real as Nawaz’s electoral support may be, it can’t be weaponised because its core is soft. It’s good enough to win elections, not enough to stand on and challenge the gods.
What winning elections does though is win you a seat at the table. From there, even if your electoral base is soft, you can try and ram through policy changes.
That’s the second part: the dangerous Nawaz agenda.
For all its weaknesses, the mere existence of an independent prime minister’s office is a potential threat because it’s impossible to fully control.
You can’t stop a prime minister from dreaming; you can’t stop his office from plotting; and because of the constraints of nominal democracy, you can’t immediately swat away all prime ministerial ideas and initiatives.
But then just have a look at Nawaz’s record this term.
Forget the bits where he’s been cut down, shut down or shoved aside. That was inevitable. It’s not like the other side was ever going to just surrender policy control.
The third term was the biggest opening Nawaz has ever had or arguably ever will — and it’s littered with rookie mistakes and unforced errors.
He refused to instal a foreign minister and only reluctantly installed a part-time defence minister. He chose to put Musharraf on trial instead of signing a trade deal with Congress ahead of the Indian election.
He insisted on talking to the Taliban for too long, allowing the boys to switch the militancy narrative themselves. He tried to talk to Modi but wasn’t able to terror-proof dialogue.
After Kashmir erupted, he’s remained stuck in the same incongruous gear. On Afghanistan, there is not a single idea or initiative that has emerged — not even at the level of theory.
CPEC is the great new arrival, but it was dreamt up by the Chinese and presented to us. The more damning thing is the lopsidedness of the loans and investments — 75 per cent dedicated to addressing the electricity deficit, a waste of a historic opportunity.
Round and round you can go, and even adjusting for all that Nawaz has been thwarted in doing and all that he’s been shut down on, there’s just no sign of the great big policy threat that he is supposed to be.
More obvious is the opposite: keeping him in place may be better than chucking him out. The fillip he’ll get from another election win won’t exceed the political capital he got after 2013.
Next time round, with a new US approach in Afghanistan and a confident Modi striding towards re-election, there’ll be even less space for a Nawaz doctrine regionally.
Economic take-off is certainly not imminent, meaning he won’t suddenly surge to massive popularity around 2020 or so. And most of all, the boys have figured out how to contain him — something they’d have to learn anew with Imran.
And yet the PML-N remains convinced: the aim is to oust Nawaz because of the threat he is and the threat his agenda is.
They may be right. Or between megalomania and miscalculation may lie our fate yet again.
Source: dawn.com/news/1342693/the-strangest-plot
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Parachinar Pains
By Asad Rahim Khan
July 2, 2017
AS we all now know — despite the best efforts of the mainstream press — twin blasts tore through Parachinar recently, killing scores. Parachinar in turn proved to be part of a hideous week that saw attacks on police in Quetta and Karachi, and a massive oil tanker disaster in Bahawalpur.
And though desperation followed disaster, no one was listening. Long deaf toward any province that’s not Punjab (and within Punjab, any place that’s not Lahore), the Muslim League has — even by its own high standards — stuffed quality cotton wool in its ears.
It began as badly as it ended: the prime minister left London to rush to Bahawalpur. The naysayers were unimpressed: prior attacks in Fata and two other provinces didn’t shatter his complacency, so why this? We hoped he would prove them wrong.
Instead the naysayers were proven right. Bahawalpur is part of Punjab. Parachinar is not. Quetta is not. Karachi is not. As of this writing, the prime minister has visited one of the above, and none else.
It seems all lives are equal, but some are more equal than others.
The same can’t be said for his rivals. When it comes to Parachinar, the PPP may be credited with trying and failing; the PTI for trying and succeeding. But the ruling party can’t be credited with anything at all, because it never tried in the first place.
What it did do made matters worse: announcing a million rupees for the family of each martyr — half of what was pledged to the Bahawalpur families already. When it comes to compensation, the prime minister may have been paraphrasing Orwell: all lives are equal; some are just more equal than others.
Even otherwise, chopper rides and compensation packages weren’t about to cut it in Fata (just as Bahawalpur’s millions were no substitute for burn units). Had Nero been more skilled at playing the lyre, Rome would still have burned.
It would be best to turn to the root causes instead: sectarianism being the first. We’re told sectarians aren’t terrorists or — more recently — that terrorism isn’t sectarian. We read a circular to that effect by the military and, before that, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar told the Senate that sectarian outfits shouldn’t be equated with terror groups — besides, the Shia-Sunni war had been raging for 1,300 years anyway. No and no, actually. We know sectarianism is terrorism because the law says so. Section 6(c) of the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997, literally defines terrorism as “the use or threat [of action…] made for the purpose of advancing a religious, sectarian or ethnic cause”. Equally ironic is the fact that the ATA was brought in by the same Muslim League 20 years ago, to combat a wave of sectarian attacks in the wake of the Mehram Ali bombings.
As to the myth of the 1,300-year Shia-Sunni war, the minister would be better off reading journalist Murtaza Hussain: Sunnis and Shias have lived together in peace “to a degree without parallel elsewhere in the world”, as centuries of coexistence (between the Ottomans and Safavids to name one example) stand testament.
We now turn to the actual nature of state failure in Parachinar, and setting things right.
First, having endured everything from jihadi training grounds to Taliban sieges, Parachinar needs to be construed less as a boxing ring for Afghanistan-related hijinks than as a part of Pakistan proper.
Second, decades of inertia towards sectarian militants in Kurram Agency have now culminated in 2017, with the Lashkar-i-Jhangvi and its affiliates attacking Parachinar in January, March, and June. It’s now or never.
Third, the Gulf’s financiers allegedly continue to fund these maniacs, while Pakistan’s lending its former army chief to Riyadh has done us few favours. That funding must be cut, and Raheel Sharif must return.
Fourth, there are reports that Iran is knee-deep in Parachinar, recruiting Shia locals for Syria via its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. That Pakistani citizens be used as cannon fodder for the grisly Assads is intolerable.
Fifth, those demanding clampdowns on social media — against those rightly calling this attack sectarian — would best read Jahanzaib Haque and Omer Bashir’s investigative report in this paper instead, and go after the actual offenders.
Finally, this is about Fata, and oppressing it using the same tools as our colonisers. Until Fata is merged with KP, Islamabad will continue to treat it as an alien planet. Until the FCR is lifted, we will continue to witness security forces opening fire on protestors. Until parliament steels itself, it will continue to be cowed by Messrs Fazl and Achakzai. Until Pakistan owns, reforms and revives Fata, we will continue to be a federation in name only. Until then, all that may be left is to pray for Parachinar.
Source: dawn.com/news/1342692/parachinar-pains
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Setback To Peace
By S. Mudassir Ali Shah
July 2, 2017
SIX months into his tenure, US President Donald Trump’s strategy for ending the war in Afghanistan remains crafty and cagey. In a recent tweet, he waxed lyrical about American service members. The president demonstrated great pride in being commander-in-chief of the US army. But the way he handles America’s colossal war machine and deploys men and women in uniform to conflict zones tells a conflicting story.
Trump has given his defence secretary Jim Mattis carte blanche to set troop levels in Afghanistan. Glossing over his responsibility to protect American soldiers, and ignoring disagreements within his administration, the president empowered Mattis to ramp up troop levels in the country from the current 8,800 to more than 14,000. The crafty move has paved the ground for Nato commander John Nicholson’s proposal going forward.
Although the US is far from winning the war, as acknowledged by the defence secretary and many others, pouring more troops into combat represents a callous disregard for the safety of US and Afghan security personnel. The long-anticipated policy does not explain how the bleak security situation will be turned around. It is apparent that no corrective action is being applied to the rotten political system and economic crisis in Afghanistan.
One had hoped that Trump would learn from his predecessor’s flip-flop on ending America’s longest military campaign, but he did not. Instead, he went for even deeper involvement in a war that has already resulted in the loss of thousands of American and Afghan lives and cost billions of dollars. Dismissive as he may be of Barack Obama’s micromanagement of the mission, he is expanding a conflict that continues to fuel instability in a region haunted by terrorism.
Pouring More Troops Into Afghanistan Will Not Work.
As Trump continues to shy away from tackling the challenge head on, will the new US strategy succeed? Odds are that it will fall flat on its face, because American public opinion has gradually swung against what was previously billed as a good war. Additionally, there has been no constructive debate on the case for a fresh surge — that may not wrest the battlefield momentum from the Afghan Taliban and the militant Islamic State group. Both have lately made more territorial gains in different parts of the benighted country.
Worse still, the Trump team has been reticent on the subject of a viable political settlement with the Taliban, improving governance, combating endemic corruption in Afghan institutions, consolidating the economy and taking Afghanistan’s neighbours on board on how to wrap up the war. Unilateral plans are not going to come to fruition in a country where 120,000 international troops could not vanquish the insurgency some years ago.
Meanwhile, the slot of US Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan has fallen vacant. Now that Laurel Miller has gone, there is no indication of any diplomat with policymaking experience filling the key position. Planned staff cuts in the State Department, where several offices are vacant at the moment, suggest relations between the estranged neighbours will continue to be on the rocks.
Trump may delegate authority to his defence secretary to deal with troop levels, but he cannot be allowed to escape blame for failure. If the gambit does not succeed, who will be the fall guy? The buck will eventually stop with the commander-in-chief, not the Pentagon chief. What is Trump trying to achieve? And mission creep is unlikely to help Afghan security forces keep the emboldened militants at bay.
For this new tactical shift to be successful, the US will have to forge a more efficient regional approach, including cooperation from Pakistan. Many in Washington and Kabul accuse Islamabad of aiding the Afghan Taliban and the Haqqani network. At the same time, Afghanistan’s political institutions have to be bolstered as well, a long-drawn-out process that needs to be spearheaded by the White House and the State Department, not the Pentagon.
To ensure Pakistan’s support for a political solution in Afghanistan, the US will have to convince Islamabad and New Delhi to initiate a substantive dialogue to resolve their long-running disputes. Pakistan’s soft corner for the Afghan Taliban is ostensibly aimed at offseting growing Kabul-Delhi links. Revival of the Quadrilateral Coordination Group would be a giant stride towards aligning regional efforts for stability in Afghanistan.
If regional actors are sidelined, the Resolute Support Mission will be in trouble. A change for the better will not come about in the absence of a cohesive vision for reconciliation. For now, the lack of commitment to a meaningful regional peace push continues to cast doubt on the validity of the surge, an option that failed under Obama.
Source: dawn.com/news/1342691/setback-to-peace
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URL: https://www.newageislam.com/pakistan-press/five-myths-that-need-be/d/111748