Intolerable utterances

We are fed up with intolerable utterances. It wasn’t a rosy picture before, but after al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden’s death, it has become worse. In fact, it has become chaotic. The latest of such has come from the prime minister. Speaking to the parliament, he rejected allegations that government authorities were either hiding the al Qaeda chief or simply too incompetent to locate him and said that he has ordered a joint investigation into how bin Laden was able to live undetected in Abbottabad for such a long time. Army and civilian investigation officers will be used for this probe. Even more hurtful to the ears was Opposition Leader in the National Assembly Chaudhry Nisar’s response that the prime minister has failed to satisfy the nation and he is to blame for the failure of the intelligence agencies.
Does the probe into how bin Laden was hiding in Pakistan for so long stand any chance of success if we are to think that the our intelligence agencies, which we have come to believe have knowledge of almost everything under the sky in the country, were so incapable that they couldn’t locate him for years even though he lived right under their nose.
The investigation is nothing but a move to satisfy the US, which, by the way, has given a clean chit to the Pakistani government just a day earlier. The US national security adviser said that the Obama administration has seen no evidence that Pakistan’s leadership knew bin Laden was living in that country before his killing last week. However, the US president called upon the Pakistani government to probe the “support network” for the al Qaeda leader in the country.
So it can be imagined where the probe would be headed. As for Mr Nisar’s criticism just for the sake of criticism, it makes no sense to begin with. Why should the prime minister be blamed for the intelligence agencies’ failure? If Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz chief Nawaz Sharif can be kept in dark before the Kargil mess was started, why is it different in Mr Gilani’s case. All this nonsensical noise is maddening, but the masses still have to put up with it.

Pak-India rivalry

The response that Pakistan’s Foreign Office could come up with to the US forces’ operation in Abbottabad was a very carefully selected one and even that was not meant for the Americans, but was actually an indirect message for another country.

Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir warned that it will be catastrophic if any other country even imagines it can follow the example of the United States. He said that if any country ever acted on the assumption that it had a right to unilateralism of any sort, it would be construed as a miscalculation that could result in terrible catastrophe. There are no doubts that this warning was meant for India, which would also like to target some individuals in Pakistan – whom it believes are responsible for terrorist attacks on the Indian soil.

The message to the Americans from the GHQ was more potent, but again, it was also rather subdued than the fierce tone that could have been used considering that the country’s sovereignty had been breached.

Chairing a Corps Commanders’ Conference, Chief of the Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani hinted that military and intelligence cooperation with the US might be reviewed if an Abbottabad-type action that violates the sovereignty of Pakistan takes place again.

The military leadership also kept its focus on India, as the participants of the meeting took serious note of the assertions made by the Indian military about conducting similar operations and made it made clear that “any misadventures would be responded to very strongly”.

Considering the tight spot that Pakistan is in after the discovery that Osama bin Laden was hiding, not in the caves of Afghanistan or the rigid terrain of Pakistan’s tribal belt, but the garrison city of Abbottabad, the sovereignty issue does not really come into contention as far as the US’ operation is concerned, apart from the obligatory reaction to the incident. But what matters more to Pakistan is that India should not be having ideas of acting in a similar manner. Would India embarking on a mission similar to that of the US be a bigger wrong than what the Americans did? No. Any country violating Pakistan’s sovereignty should be dealt with in the same manner, but it is a different argument that individuals involved in terrorist activities should not be finding refuge in Pakistan in the first place. Pakistan’s obsession with India knows no bounds. It needs to set its priorities straight. There are bigger problems than the old Pak-India rivalry.

An exit from the mess

As expected, Pakistani authorities are now up against the wrath of the global community for - what the latter believes - either hiding the recently slain al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden on their soil for years or being too inept to figure out that the world’s most wanted man was under living under their nose all along.

An anti-Pakistan mood prevails in the US Congress with many American lawmakers believing that the operation in Abbottabad has exposed the treachery of the Pakistani government.

Further complicating the matter is CIA chief Leon Panetta’s statement that Pakistan was not included in the mission to kill bin Laden as US officials feared it could have jeopardised the operation by alerting the targets.

What puzzles the US lawmakers is the fact that the al Qaeda chief was living in a complex close to a major military academy in the city of Abbottabad - where the armed forces have a large share in the property.

There are questions over whether Americans should continue military and economic assistance to a nation, which might be abetting al Qaeda.

Pakistan, caught in the middle of all sorts of crises one can think of due to its own self-destructive policies, is in dire need of US assistance and is denying that it had any information about bin Laden’s whereabouts.

But to make matters worse for itself, it is allowing organisations including Jamaatud Dawa to openly mourn the death of the man, who was responsible for the deaths of so many people - more Muslims than the followers of any other religion perhaps. Jamaatud Dawa is supposed to be a banned outfit, but every now and then, it stages rallies in major cities including Karachi and Lahore, a proof that it enjoys the authorities’ free hand. Newspapers all around the world and websites carrying images of Jamaatud Dawa members shedding tears for bin Laden at a funeral in absentia in Karachi surely won’t help matters for Pakistan.

One ray of light for the country is that the Obama administration hasn’t used harsh words for it yet. In fact, it is saying that Pakistani cooperation is essential for the war on terror in the coming days. Perhaps that might provide Pakistan with an exit from the mess it is currently stuck in, but at the same time, it can expect a much greater amount of “do more” pressure headed its way.

Moral victory for US but Pakistan has to prepare for backlash

Osama bin Laden is dead and buried… well dumped into the sea that is (It is interesting to see the a flood of tweets all likening this to the way the remains of Megatron, the villainous leader of the Decepticons in the blockbuster movie Transformers, were thrown into the sea, but the he later made a comeback in the movie’s sequel from his watery grave). However, it is not over yet… in fact far from it. Bin Laden was nothing more than a symbolic figure in the ranks of al Qaeda now. The organisation’s operations were being run by others. But nevertheless, it is a great moral victory and the death of perhaps the most hated man after Adolf Hitler would be a great blow to terrorists. But even as the US can celebrate the sweet taste of revenge for what the bin Laden did on September 11, 2001; the Pakistanis would have to prepare for a very terrible backlash from al Qaeda operatives and the Taliban.
After the news about bin Laden’s broke out, a bomb blast near a mosque in Charsadda killed a woman and three children and wounded five others. This incident might not be related to the news about bin Laden’s death, but the possibility cannot be counted out.
In an audio message issued to the Pakistani media from an undisclosed location, the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan has said that it would avenge the killing of the al Qaeda chief. The most significant part of the message was that Pakistan is now the Taliban’s first target and the US the second. The death of the world’s most wanted man would dramatically alter the current scenario of policies and strategies and Pakistan would have to make changes accordingly.