Pakistan is falling deeper and deeper into the hands of the Taliban and terrorists. Now everyone living in Pakistan has accepted the fact that the Taliban and terrorists have been posing a threat to the very integrity of Pakistan.
Here the question arises as to who has created Taliban and why? Rulers in Pakistan always remained busy in looting and plundering. When the war on terror was launched by the United States they got the opportunity to fill their pockets with dollars.
The US administration also showed a hurry in in the initial days and acted on the wrong information. They have given dollars to the wrong people. Still there are officials within government, who have been extending full support to Taliban and terrorists.
The US leadership must show sincerity in the war on terrorism, otherwise the whole world may see more destruction, more horrible than 9/11.
A leading Pakistan newspaper in its editorial comments made some disclosures. It stated that in another drama of the absurd, the National Security Council (NSC), presided over by President General Pervez Musharraf on 4 June 2007, and attended by all the chief ministers, has cudgelled its brains over Talibanisation "as a potential threat to national security" following a presentation made to it that called for "immediate action before it is too late". Wonder of wonders, even the NWFP chief minister Akram Khan Durrani "was in total agreement with the assessment made at the meeting".
Obviously, no action was taken. Meanwhile, Mr Durrani continues to tell the people of Pakistan that the "terrorism under Talibanisation" is actually done by the federal government through its intelligence agencies.
The 15-page presentation at the NSC revealed that the Taliban had regrouped and reorganised and were now in a position to seriously threaten the country's security.
Anyone who has a partial knowledge of what is happening in Pakistan would have responded to the presentation with a belly-laugh. The crisis, representing the gradual erosion of Pakistan sovereignty, has been four years in the making.
Look at the sheer out-datedness of the warning delivered at the NSC: "Talibanisation has not only unfolded potential threats to our security, but is also casting its dark shadows over FATA and now in the settled areas adjoining the tribal belt. The reality is that it is spreading".
Further redundancy was piled on when the presentation made the assessment that "the rapidly deteriorating law and order situation was caused by the militancy and extremism that had risen with an increase in the number of suicide attacks and an unhindered movement of militants to the settled areas".
What the NSC should have discussed was the gradual abdication of the state under President Musharraf in the face of Talibanisation starting 2003.
When the state washed its hands of the Waziristan crisis in 2006 by reaching an agreement with the local warlords, the entire world warned of its capitulatory aspects. Across the border, Afghanistan immediately felt the negative fallout of this agreement, which was vehemently denied by Islamabad. Now the NSC is being told that "while the situation had marginally improved in South Waziristan after the flushing out of the Uzbek militants, a top militant commander continued to call the shots by harbouring foreigners and sponsoring terrorist activities throughout the country".
The territory being lost by Pakistan to Talibanisation was also tallied. In addition to the Federally Administered Tribal Areas called FATA, the following settled areas in the NWFP too had slipped from state control: Tank, Lakki Marwat, Kohat, Hangu, Dera Ismail Khan, Peshawar, Mardan, Charsadda, Mansehra, Swat, Malakand and Dir.
Far from blaming the state for preserving the "ungoverned spaces" as policy for 60 years, the presentation latched on to the familiar abstraction as cause: "Pakistan's alliance with the United States in the war on terror; long festering political disputes in the Muslim world and a growing feeling among Muslims that they are under attack from the West".
As icing on the cake, the NSC was also told that in some areas the police, instead of defending the writ of the state, had actually joined the Taliban warlords to facilitate state secession.
As a cherry on the icing, the NSC was also regaled to the fact that "this was for the first time that the issue was so comprehensively discussed in the NSC". The NSC should also have been told that the nation already knew the loss of territory and administrative control in great detail and no longer cared that the NSC was finally grasped of the issue; in fact, the nation was convinced that the "comprehensive" briefing would come to nothing.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
