Pak Tea House » Entries tagged with "Afghanistan"
Fall out of Malala Tragedy
By Prof. Farah A Khan: It was a sad day when 14 years old Malala was shot at point blank range in her school van in Mingora, Swat. Two other girls were also injured. This brought out massive grief and anger in the Pakistani society. But it left me and so many others confused. The TTP admitted responsibility for the shooting claiming that she was ‘defaming’ the Taliban and fraternizing with the enemy i.e. the Western … Read entire article »
Filed under: Terrorism
A Battle of Ideas
by Abdul Majeed Abid “When I knew that they were burning our schools, I thought they were burning education, they were burning books. I have to be educated. I’ll be educated no matter what the odds.” Malala Yousafzai Last Week’s attack on Malala Yousafzai, a 14 year old beacon of hope from Swat, garnered all sorts of reactions. Most people were shocked by the brutality of the perpetrators. The timing of that attack, in my opinion, was an extremely unfortunate one as it co-incided with the ending of PTI’s “Peace March” towards Waziristan. Attack on Malala has been construed as a stepping stone to military operation in Waziristan, a primer that turns public opinion towards a certain tilt. Conspiracy theories have been spun at an alarming pace about involvement of various Intelligence Agencies … Read entire article »
Filed under: Afghanistan, Al Qaeda, Army, Democracy, Education, FATA, Islam, Islamism, Pakistan, Religion, Society, Taliban, Terrorism, USA, violence, Women
Imran’s Peace March into Waziristan
By Prof. Farah A. Khan: On September 7th Imran’s PTI Peace marchers against drone attacks in Waziristan reached 20 km from Tank at the border of South Waziristan Agency but were stopped from going to Kotkai by the army. His opponents were ANP, JUI-F, PPP and PML-N who have never offered a solution to Fata issue. They have finally found common ground to unite against Imran. Maulvi Fazal (JUI-F) went over board. He accused Imran of not holding on to his Jewish wife and his children living abroad were being brought up by a Jewish mother. Under Islam this is nonsense. He also claimed that Imran was pushing Israeli agenda (Yahood and Ansara) but could not explain how and distributed pamphlets and made announcements in the mosques to the same effect. … Read entire article »
Filed under: Opinion
Future of Pakistan’s Western Frontier
By Prof Farakh A Khan (This is continuation of my last article.. It was felt that this subject requires greater depth since people in Pakistan have distorted view of our Fata issue. The origin and evolution of Jihadi Wahhabi movement has to be put in proper perspective) Conflict in society is the oldest human response inherited from our evolutionary animal past. As human society graduated from sticks and stones as weapons of aggression to high explosives and air war the level of carnage increased dramatically. We are now entering phase of robotic war lased with nuclear technology where power of destruction has escalated to a new level. The level of misery caused by modern wars is not acceptable anymore. War in Afghanistan either by foreign forces intervention or internal conflict for the … Read entire article »
Filed under: Politics
A study of Anti-Americanism in Pakistan (Part II)
By Abdul Majeed Abid History tells us that relations between Pakistan and United States started on the right note, as demonstrated by aforementioned speech of Prime Minister Liaqat Ali Khan. It was followed by the decade of co-operation between the two countries in matters of trade and military training. As we can see, the seeds of perceived animosity were laid during the 1965-71 period during which United States stopped the military aid to both Pakistan and India in the wake of the 1965 war. The people responsible for arousing these sentiments were the dexterous politicians of Pakistan and to some extent the religio-political parties and they did that just to mask their own shortcomings. A similar attitude was shown by Mr. Bhutto when he blamed the alarming political situation upon the machinations … Read entire article »
Filed under: Politics
Future of Pakistan’s Western Frontier
Prof Farakh A Khan’s exclusive contribution for PTH The aggressors have called people of what are now Fata and of Khyber-Pakhtunkhawa different names at different times of history labelled as terrorists or freedom fighters. The ten-year war has taken toll of the American purse and its fighters. On the other hand the Afghan people are constantly suffering. The Americans are openly talking to Afghan Taliban leadership since November 2010 to end American occupation of Afghanistan. The … Read entire article »
How can Pakistan Army Retreat from Fata?
By Prof Farakh A Khan: The American and Pakistan armies are locked in Afghanistan (2001) and Fata (2004) respectively. Pakistan is a poor country and cannot financially afford its continued presence of 1.5 lac soldiers deployed in Fata and sooner than later the army has to pull out since Pakistan cannot afford a 100-years war. My questions are how can the army pull out of Fata if at all? And when? Pakistani Afghan policy is tied to the American policy in that country. The Americans after 10 years have realised that they are unable to bring peace or their form of democracy to Afghanistan. The American trained Afghan army and police force are corrupt and unreliable despite huge amounts of dollar inflow. At the same time the Americans cannot leave Afghanistan to … Read entire article »
No more escape routes
Pakistan’s military should review the Taliban rule in Afghanistan and how they were not always the kind of partners and proxies we had envisioned By Raza Rumi Our Foreign Minister, Hina Rabbani Khar, has warned the United States that if the accusations against Pakistan continue, the US might lose an ally. This statement comes in the wake of US statements that Pakistan-based Haqqani network has allegedly been involved in recent acts of terrorism in Afghanistan, directly threatening and sabotaging the NATO and US interests. The US blames the Haqqanis for attacks on the US Embassy and NATO Headquarters in Kabul; for attacks on US troops in Wardak province earlier in September. US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen has used unprecedented and strong language against Pakistan’s premier spy agency … Read entire article »
Pakistan and the United States: Reduced to talking at each other
By Saad Hafiz Based on public pronouncements from both sides in the last few weeks it seems that Pak-U.S. relations are in free fall. It started with tough words from the most senior United States military officer, Admiral Mullen in the aftermath of the recent attack on the US embassy in Kabul blamed on the Haqqani network that “in choosing to use violent extremism as an instrument of policy, the government of Pakistan — and most especially the Pakistani Army and ISI — jeopardizes not only the prospect of our strategic partnership, but also Pakistan’s opportunity to be a respected nation with legitimate regional influence,”. Pakistan responding tersely that “U.S. could lose Pakistan as an ally” and that “any unilateral US operation or hot pursuit inside Pakistan would result in severe consequences”. But … Read entire article »
Why it is “our” war?
By Mashal.S Ahmad: I do not know what is a greater tragedy; that Pakistan is targeted by terrorists who have bombed mosques and shrines, army and civilian areas, universities, marketplaces, and have killed and maimed people of all faiths, ages and ethnicities, or that we are still, 10 years down the line, stuck in an intellectual grey space about whether terrorism is our problem or not. In Pakistan, one aspect of the issue is that there is … Read entire article »
Filed under: Opinion
The Afghanistan Stalemate
By Saad Hafiz: It is getting very difficult after the Bin Laden episode to explain Pakistan’s doublespeak on terrorism and the Taliban to increasingly skeptical Western friends. The ambiguous Pakistani terrorism strategy of running with the hare and hunting with the hounds is now recognized as official State policy. The Islamabad mantra describes “good” or “moderate” Taliban as those that are engaged in a nationalist struggle against coalition forces in Afghanistan. The good Taliban are expected to … Read entire article »
Filed under: Afghanistan, Al Qaeda, Terrorism
President Obama’s Road Map To Re Election
By: D. Asghar President Obama laid out his plans for troop draw down from Afghanistan. At least he is cognizant of the fact that 2012 re election bid is approaching soon. He will be on the campaign trail soon, behind the podiums, talking to a whole lot of Americans and the rest of the world. It is no surprise, that his approval ratings took a plunge again, right after the OBL episode. The fact remains that generally people are a bit disappointed with the first term. The troop withdrawal was one of his 2008 campaign items and it is wise of him to follow through. The Obama administration can definitely take credit for OBL elimination and some other stalwarts of the Jihadi side, in and around Pakistan. It is true that, Pakistan … Read entire article »
Filed under: Afghanistan, Pakistan, USA
2011-05-31 More from Raza Rumi on the Pakistan Papers – US Operations Constrained by India-Pakistan Relations
My interview which has appeared on Wikileaks Central. The Dawn Media Group in partnership with WikiLeaks has been releasing the “Pakistan Papers.” Thus far, some of the revelations include the following: US was concerned that Pakistan would oppose its policies at the United Nations; US was worried Pakistan would purchase oil from Iran, allowing them to get a foothold in Pakistan; Pakistan’s government was upset with US funding for the Pakistan military, which led to increased civil-military … Read entire article »
Pakistan’s Deep State – After OBL
By AA Khalid America Gets Closure The Deep State in Pakistan received a shock and a major blow with the death of Bin Laden. Under the noses of the Army and Intelligence services the world’s most wanted man resided in idyllic tranquillity, whilst the streets of Iraq and Afghanistan burnt at the hands of an angry and wounded United States. The US constructed its foreign policy based on anger after 9/11, but it should have heeded the words of Benjamin Franklin, that, ‘‘Whatever is begun in anger ends in shame’’. Iraq and Afghanistan will end in shame; America gave up on its own values of liberty and freedom to pursue senseless wars, corrupting its very soul in front of the world’s eyes. But with the death of the man who can only be … Read entire article »
Osama bin Laden Largely Discredited Among Muslim Publics in Recent Years
In the months leading up to Osama bin Laden’s death, a survey of Muslim publics around the world found little support for the al Qaeda leader. Among the six predominantly Muslim nations recently surveyed by the Pew Research Center’s Global Attitudes Project, bin Laden received his highest level of support among Muslims in the Palestinian territories – although even there only 34% said they had confidence in the terrorist leader to do the right thing … Read entire article »
Filed under: Afghanistan, Al Qaeda
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