Pakistan seethes at bad-boy image
By Zahid U Kramet
LAHORE - While Pakistan - and even the Taliban - have reacted angrily to a
report that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) has "strong" ties to
the Taliban in Afghanistan, the sensitive issue highlights Islamabad's growing
concerns over losing what has for many years been its key role in Afghanistan
as a United States ally.
The London School of Economics (LSE) this weekend released a report that said
its research "strongly suggested" that support for the Taliban was the ISI's
official policy, adding that the intelligence agency "orchestrates, sustains
and strongly influences the [Taliban] movement".
The LSE said that its report, prepared by Matt Waldman, a former Oxfam
official, was based on interviews with nine Taliban field commanders in
Afghanistan between February and May of this
year. The document also claimed that Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari
visited senior Taliban prisoners in Pakistan this year and promised their
release and help for militant operations.
A spokeswoman for Zardari called the allegations "absolutely spurious" and
suggested they were an attempt to derail US-Pakistani strategic talks. Military
spokesman Major-General Athar Abbas said, "It's the same old story which
provides no credible evidence. It is misleading with malicious intent. We
reject it." And Taliban spokesman Mullah Abdus Salam Zaeef called the report
"ridiculous and absurd". A senior ISI official simply dismissed it is
"rubbish".
An editorial on June 14 by Pakistan's Nation newspaper possibly came closest to
the heart of the matter. Under the headline "Pakistan targeted again", it
wrote, "There is certainly a double game going on here but it is being played
rather skillfully by the US and India with NATO [North Atlantic Treaty
Organization] a compliant partner."
In the bloody civil war of the early 1990s that followed the withdrawal of the
Soviet Union from Afghanistan, Pakistan saw the emerging Taliban as a key
strategic asset against bitter rival India, and it encouraged and nurtured the
movement.
When the Taliban took Kabul in 1996, Pakistan was one of only a few countries
to recognize the government. Although this support officially ended when the
Taliban were driven from power in the US-led invasion in late 2001 and
Islamabad signed onto the US's "war on terror", the ties to the Taliban run
very deep among sections of the security apparatus.
Footprint in Afghanistan
On Tuesday, two days after the release of the LSE report, America's top
commander in Iraq and Afghanistan, General David Petraeus, fainted during a
congressional hearing in which he was being questioned by senators about US
strategy in Afghanistan.
In particular, he was asked about President Barack Obama's resolve to begin a
US troop withdrawal from Afghanistan in July 2011. Republican Senator John
McCain asked, "When you say that you continue to support the president's policy
both in terms of additional troops and also the setting of that date to begin
the [troop] reduction, does that represent your best professional judgement?"
Petraeus hesitated before replying in the affirmative and McCain responded that
the deadline was "convincing the key actors inside and outside of Afghanistan
that the United States is more interested in leaving than succeeding in this
conflict".
Pakistan sees itself as one of these key actors. And while it roundly rejects
accusations such as those made in the LSE report of direct intervention in the
Afghan war, it has repeatedly voiced its concern about the expanded Indian
presence in that country.
Islamabad has been concerned over the reluctance of the US to press India to
work for a resolution of the Kashmir dispute with Pakistan, and it is also
upset that the US signed a civilian nuclear deal with India while refusing to
do so with Pakistan.
Ultimately, however, Pakistan remains concerned about the US's seemingly
ambivalent policy in the AfPak region, with Under Secretary of State William
Burns announcing at a seminar in Washington early this month that the US sees
"India's continued involvement in there [Afghanistan] as a key part of that
country's success, not part of its problems".
Yet a day later, General Stanley McChrystal, the commander of the US-led NATO
troops in Afghanistan, ventured in a "leaked" report, "Increasing Indian
influence in Afghanistan is likely to exacerbate tensions and encourage
Pakistani counter measures."
Confusion was compounded when Senator John Kerry, chairman of the US Senate
Foreign Relations Committee, reaffirmed in a Times of India article titled
"Promoting Strategic Dialogue" that India “will be a defining partnership of
the 21st century" to effectively marginalize the significance of Pakistan. [1]
This will not go down well with the Pakistani military, which is still smarting
over last year's Kerry Lugar bill that grants Pakistan US$1.5 billion annually
for five years. Although it is essentially a non-military aid package granted
for Pakistan's efforts in the "war on terror", it imposes some checks on the
military. The army's top commanders have officially expressed their "serious
concerns" on some of the clauses of the bill that they believe affect national
security. The objections center on clauses about the country's nuclear program
and suggestions of Pakistan’s support for cross-border militancy.
US Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia Robert Blake
recently made an effort to pacify Pakistan. During a web chat with a
confrontational Indian press he reminded that "we [the US] will not be able to
succeed without the active support of our friends in Pakistan".
But then US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton took up the cudgels on India's
behalf, again in the Times of India, in a column on June 4 entitled
"Partnership of Democracies" in which she wrote, "Through our strategic
dialogue, we are expanding our cooperation on global issues on which India can
and must play a leading role." [2]
Meanwhile, this month's peace jirga (council) instigated by Afghan
President Hamid Karzai ended with a call to "reintegrate" the Taliban
(supported by Pakistan initially) into the political system, but it has drawn
little water.
A major offensive planned against the Taliban in their strongholds in Kandahar
province has been delayed for several months, causing Obama, in an effort to
sustain public support for the war in Afghanistan, to give a December deadline
to show progress.
US Defense Secretary Robert Gates and McChrystal are confident of some success
by year's end, but they apparently warned during a closed-door meeting of NATO
ministers in Brussels that "gains will not come easily or without high cost".
Karzai's "talking with the Taliban" still appears the best option, but it is
clear that this has to be occasioned under the flag of a truce negotiated
directly with the Taliban leadership - and this would not go down well in
India. Delhi sees the Taliban as a Pakistan by-product and fears integrating
them into the Afghan political fold would jeopardize whatever efforts it is
willing to make towards Afghanistan's reconstruction.
Still, the news of a trillion dollars of minerals waiting to be tapped in
Afghanistan would have whetted the Indian appetite - more so with Afghanistan
reportedly having asked Indian companies to prospect and extract minerals such
as copper, lithium, iron ore, gold and precious stones. [3]
But herein lies the rub. A New York Times report by Alissa J Rubin warns that
the Laskar-e-Taiba, a "Pakistani-based militant group identified with attacks
on targets [in India] has expanded its operations in Afghanistan, inflicting
casualties on Afghans and Indians alike, setting up training camps, and adding
new volatility to relations between India and Pakistan". [4]
The United States needs to accommodate both Pakistan's and India's interests in
Afghanistan, while also trying to tame the Taliban. These complex
inter-relationships - and ups and downs like the LSE report - make the
likelihood of any US withdrawal most unlikely, let alone showing any progress
by December.
Zahid U Kramet, a Lahore-based political analyst specializing in
Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran, is the founder of the research and analysis
website theAsia Despatch.
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