Rah-e-Nejat Update

I have compiled a basic map showing Operation Rah-e-Nejat (click for larger version). Green icons indicate cities held by the Pakistani Army and black icons those held by the Taliban. The three red lines are the three "axes" referred to in news reports: the Razmak-Makin Axis, the Shakai-Kaniguram Axis, and the Jandola-Sararogha Axis. Note that while Kaniguram is still held by the Taliban, it has been surrounded by Pakistani forces and will probably soon fall.

Pakistan begins Taliban operation

The Pakistani military has begun a ground offensive against Taliban strongholds in South Waziristan.

The ground operation began early on Saturday, advancing from at least three directions - Zhob to the south, Razmak to the north and Jandola from the east. Air power was also put to use.

About 28,000 troops are to be employed in the offensive against about 10,000 Taliban.

The move followed crisis-talks and a meeting headed by Yousuf Raza Gilani, the prime minister, on Friday in which it was decided to launch the operation against Taliban.

The drive comes after continued bomb attacks in the country over the past two weeks that have killed more than 150 people.

[More.]

Waziristan offensive "imminent"

Pakistani jets bomb S Waziristan

Pakistani aircraft have attacked suspected Taliban fighters in South Waziristan near the Afghan border, in advance of an imminent ground assault.

The air raids on Sunday night came less than 24 hours after commandos stormed an office building and rescued dozens of security officials taken captive after an attack on the general army headquarters in Rawalpindi.

"The jets hit and destroyed two of their hideouts in Makeen and Ladha and we have a total of about 16 militants killed," a unnamed Pakistani intelligence official told Reuters news agency.

But the military has been conducting air and artillery strikes in South Waziristan for months, while moving troops, blockading the region and trying to split armed opposition to Islamabad's authority.

However, a ground offensive has yet to begin and may prove to be the army's toughest test since fighters turned on the state.

Imminent attack

Nevertheless, Rehman Malik, the interior minister, in an interview in Singapore said a ground offensive was "imminent".

"There is no mercy for them because our determination and resolve is to flush them out," he said.

"They have no room in Pakistan, I promise you."

Malik said members of the Pakistani Taliban and al-Qaeda were suspected to have been behind Saturday's attack on army headquarters, which ended a week when suicide bombers struck in the capital Islamabad and Peshawar, killing more than 50 people.

He also said the offensive against the fighters in South Waziristan was no longer a matter of choice.

"It is not an issue of commitment, it is becoming a compulsion because there was an appeal from the local tribes that we should do the operation," Malik said.

Provincial links

In an interview with Al Jazeera, Imtiaz Gul, a political analyst, said he agreed that the government was correct to commence an offensive against South Waziristan.

"A lot of al-Qaeda and ideologically tainted people belonging to the Islamic movement of Uzbekistan under the patronage of the Taliban are sheltering there," he said.

But not everyone agrees. Zafar Jaspal, a Pakistani analyst, believes that Islamabad has concentrated too much on the Swat valley and South Waziristan.

"Till today, the government has no clear strategy on how to deal with the militants who are residing in southern Punjab," he told Al Jazeera.

"The person who was captured alive after [the GHQ attack] comes from Punjab, and other members of that group are also from Punjab ... certainly the government needs to have a parallel strategy - for Punjab as well as South Waziristan."

Al Jazeera



Comment:

And so it begins.

This is not quite the final push — Orakzai is still in the Taliban's hands — but it might as well be. Once Waziristan has been won, the fate of the Pakistani Taliban will have been sealed. Most surviving militants will probably flee into Afghanistan, in a remarkable mirroring of the events eight years ago. This time, though, the US military will be there to meet them. The tactical imperative of increasing the number of troops in eastern Afghanistan is more clear now than ever: a Taliban surge is coming, and there must be an American surge to counter it.

Pakistan 'expands war on Taliban'

Pakistan's military is beginning a significant move into South Waziristan, where the
Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan - or the Pakistani Taliban - are based, US officials have said.

The operation is said to be targeting Baitullah Mehsud, the leader of the Pakistani Taliban, and will be carried out with greater support from the US.

Witnesses and intelligence officials said Pakistani aircraft had bombed a stronghold of Baitullah Mehsud on Saturday, the Pakistani Taliban leader, in the South Waziristan.

"Four fighter jets bombed parts of Makken early on Saturday but we don't know about the extent of damage or any casualties," Mohammad Khan, a shopkeeper in the area said.

Pakistan's Geo TV reported that large numbers of people were migrating from South Waziristan to North Waziristan.

"Operations that appear to be under way now would be the largest operations that have been undertaken in Waziristan," a US defence official said on Friday.

"We think that the initial phases of that operation have already begun."

Pakistan says it has almost completed an offensive to drive Taliban fighters out of the Swat Valley, an area to the north of Waziristan in North West Frontier Province (NWFP).

Fight 'to the end'

Asif Ali Zardari, the Pakistani president, said on Saturday he would fight the Pakistani Taliban "to the end".

"This war has the support of parliament, the support of the political parties as well as the people of Pakistan," he said in a televised address to the nation broadcast after 1am (1900 GMT on Friday).

"We are fighting a war for our sovereignty. We will continue this war until the end, and we will win it at any cost," he said.

"These people want to capture the institutions of Pakistan by spreading terrorism and by intimidating the people.

"They have killed thousands of innocent people."

Zardari's comments came after two suicide bomb attacks on Friday, claimed by the Pakistani Taliban, in Lahore and Nowshera, in NWFP, killed at least eight people, including a pro-government religious leader.

Maulana Sarfraz Naeemi, known to oppose the Taliban, had condemned the use of suicide bombings.

The US defence official said on Friday that the Pentagon expected Pakistan to conduct "fairly significant combat operations in South Waziristan".

Another US official said Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders were "under very significant pressure", while a third US official said the US would be providing increased intelligence and surveillance support to Pakistan.

Taliban 'resistance'

Pakistan's recent operations have been under way for six weeks, taking the military first into Buner and Upper Dir districts, then into the Swat Valley.

The first US official warned that "isolated pockets of resistance still remain" in parts of the Swat valley as the Pakistani army worked to finish the two-month campaign, and that Islamabad needed to brace for more attacks.

"[Mehsud] has turned suicide bombing into a production output not unlike Toyota outputs cars," the official, who described the Mehsud as leading an extensive network of religious schools that sold or bartered child suicide bombers in NWFP, said.

The key element of the US Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy, the defence official said, is to have troops put pressure on al-Qaea and Taliban fighters believed to be operating out of safe havens in Waziristan.

From Al Jazeera.


Comment:

First a president was elected who is extremely popular in the Muslim world, then that president gave a speech that surpassed their wildest hopes, then al-Qaeda announced that it's broke, and now Pakistan has finally, at long last, taken the fight against the Islamic Emirate of Waziristan and its allies to Waziristan itself. Meanwhile, troops and development projects pour into Afghanistan, and public opinion in Pakistan turns against the TTP.

Could this be the beginning of the end?

Captured battle plan shows strength and training of Taleban forces

The map tells a war story of its own. Sketched by a Taleban commander, it is of a stretch of territory fought over in Bajaur between the Pakistani Army and the insurgents. The ground has been neatly divided into specific areas of responsibility for different Taleban units.

Weapons caches, assembly areas and rendezvous points have been carefully marked and coded. This is not the work of a renegade gunman resistant to central authority; it is the assessment of a skilled and experienced fighter, and begins to explain how more than 400 Pakistani soldiers have been killed or wounded since August in Bajaur, the tribal district agency that is said to be the haunt of Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri.

Discovered along with the map in a series of recently captured tunnel complexes are other documents - radio frequency lists, guerrilla warfare manuals, students' notes, jihadist propaganda and bombmaking instructions - that provide further evidence of the Taleban's organisation and training. They prove that the Taleban in Bajaur, one of Pakistan's seven Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata), were planning not only to fight, but also to disseminate their fighting knowledge.

“They were training people here,” Colonel Javed Baluch, whose troops seized the village of Tang Khata in an early stage of the autumn fighting, said, as he thumbed through the captured literature. “This was one of their centres. There were students here taking notes on bombmaking and guerrilla warfare. They were well trained and well organised.”

But training whom and to do what? Despite the documentary evidence in Bajaur, the Taleban's ultimate aims - and the nature of their relationship with al-Qaeda - remain contentious issues.

America and Britain claim that the terrorist network and affiliated organisations are being hosted by the Taleban in the tribal areas, which they use as a base for training camps, refuge and recruitment. This, they say, extends the threat from the tribal agencies to the rest of the world.

“If I were going to pick the next attack to hit the United States, it would come out of Fata,” Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said recently. A Western diplomat in Islamabad claimed last month that among those killed by a Predator drone strike in the tribal area - there have been at least 18 drone attacks there in the past 12 weeks - were members of a terrorist cell planning an attack on Britain.

One eminent Pakistani political figure, speaking on condition of anonymity, claimed that al-Qaeda and the Taleban had set up a joint headquarters in 2004 as an “Islamic emirate” in North Waziristan, headed by Sirajuddin Haqqani, an Afghan Taleban commander. (His father, Jalaluddin Haqqani, a veteran of the fight against the Soviet Union, was funded by the CIA 30 years ago and was once fêted at the White House by Ronald Reagan.)

“Sirajuddin ... connects the Taleban with al-Qaeda and the Pakistani Taleban with the Afghan Taleban,” the source said. “It basically runs the war and has made Fata today the same as Afghanistan was before September 11 - controlled by foreign and local militants who fight a war on both sides of the border.”

Such claims, which have been circulated widely in Pakistan, are denied strongly by the military. Many officers describe the Taleban in Fata as a disparate group of home-grown militants with little vision beyond the affairs of their own district, and claim that al-Qaeda's involvement is negligible.

“There was an al-Qaeda presence here but it didn't include their training bases or headquarters,” Colonel Nauman Saeed, commander of the Frontier Corps garrison in Khar, Bajaur's capital, said. “They [al-Qaeda] were as a pinch of salt in the flour.”

General Tariq Khan, the officer commanding the Bajaur operation, said: “I do not see a coherent stategy in any of these militants. I don't see any Islamic movement of Waziristan or an Islamic emirate ... I think that everyone is in it for himself.”

The Pakistani military claims to have killed more than 1,500 insurgents in Bajaur, and General Khan admits that many foreign fighters - “Uzbeks, Chechens, Turkmen, some Afghans” - have been among them. Of al-Qaeda's top leadership, however, not a trace has been found. “We've hit some Arab leadership there but not of a very high level,” he said.

It could be that the leaders have withdrawn to the two valley strongholds still held by the Taleban in Bajaur, or that they have escaped to Afghanistan or to a neighbouring tribal area.

Or were they ever in Bajaur at all? Shafirullah Khan is the savvy political agent in the area, himself a Pashtun and a long-term veteran of tribal affairs. “At first I would never have believed that al-Zawahiri was here,” he said of the rumours that bin Laden's deputy had been a visitor.

“But now that I have seen those tunnels and hidden shelters, I am not so sure.”

Via the Times.

'US missiles' hit Pakistan village

A suspected US drone has launched a missile strike into northwest Pakistan, reportedly killing at least 10 people.

The attack on Friday targeted a town in North Waziristan, a tribal region on the Afghan border, security officials said.

"It happened close to the border," a Pakistani military officer said.

"We have reports of 10 dead but it will take time to get more information."

The North Waziristan region is a reputed stronghold of the Taliban and al-Qaeda linked fighters.

Other Pakistani officials told the AFP news agency that up to 14 fighters were killed when the missile strike destroyed an al-Qaeda training camp.

Four missiles

Four missiles are thought to have been fired at the camp, in Kum Sham village, some 35km south of Miranshah in North Waziristan.

Security sources said the village is dominated by Wazir tribes and is near the border with South Waziristan, another hub of Taliban and Al-Qaeda operatives.

"Between 11 to 14 militants, mainly foreigners, were killed in the strike," a senior military official said.

It was not immediately clear if there were any high-value targets among those killed, sources said.

An intelligence official, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said: "The strike successfully destroyed the camp."

Al Jazeera's Kamal Hyder, speaking from the Pakistani capital Islamabad, said: "At the moment we are being told by sources in the area that the attack took place in the Razmak village [of North Waziristan].

"We are told that up to 17 people were also wounded in this attack.

"Just a few days ago we were in this region. And we were able to observe that even at nighttime the drones have been flying over this area.

"It has also causing considerable anger in that region because the Pakistani military forces have been deployed in very large numbers along this border and every time there is a strike deep into Pakistan it creates more public resentment. Not just against the Americans but also the local forces which are not able to stop these attacks.

"In spite of opposition by the Pakistani government, the Americans have been buzzing the Pakistani tribal territories ... and they have been picking out targets with impunity."

Sovereignity violated

At least 18 such attacks by unmanned US aircraft have occured since September.

However, this is the first since General David Petraeus, the US Central Command chief, took charge of the war in Afghanistan.

[More]


Comment:

I had been hoping that Petraeus would put an immediate end to the strikes, but I guess not. At least no civilians were killed this time.

In map-related news, I have finally found Tehsil-level maps of FATA. They turned out to be hiding in the 1998 Pakistani Census, which UC Berkeley has a copy of. This means that I can at last begin work on the base map.

Interview with Waziri soldier

Very, very interesting.

Report Says Pakistan Troops Fire on US Helos

Islamabad - Pakistani security forces and armed tribesmen on Monday foiled an attempt by US troops to enter Pakistani territory by firing shots at them, security officials said.

The attacks came as Pakistani forces killed up to 20 Taliban militants in the tribal region bordering Afghanistan.

Two US military helicopters crossed into Pakistan and tried to land near Angor Adda area of South Waziristan tribal district along the Afghan border before dawn, a local security official said.

"But our security forces and the tribesmen who were alert opened fire at them and forced them to flee back to Afghanistan," added the official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

There were conflicting official versions of the attempted US strike.

Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman denied the attack on U.S. forces had occurred, saying the Pakistani security official’s statement “didn’t appear to be accurate,” wire reports said.

A senior official in the country's foreign ministry said American ground troops, which were backed by US helicopter gunships, tried to cross over border, but were forced to flee by the tribesmen.

"Pakistani troops did not take part in the action," he said seeking anonymity.

No one was hurt in the incident, which an army spokesman denied took place.

"We completely deny the incident. There was no violation of our border from the Afghan side and therefore there was no question of any firing from our side," Major Murad Khan insisted.

However, he said firing was heard in the area but the army did not know where it had come from and where it was aimed.

A local resident, Sher Ali, said the tribesmen in the Angor Adda area had been on alert since September 3 when US special forces dropped by US helicopters killed more than 20 civilians.

"People had information since Sunday night that the US forces were gathering across the border so thousands of armed tribesmen were guarding their area," he added.

"Good for them (Americans) that they turned back. Otherwise, people were ready to give them the sort of welcome they deserve."

Tension has been brewing between Islamabad and Washington in recent weeks as US forces have increased missile attacks, mostly carried out by drones, at the suspected hideouts of militants who launch cross-border raids on international forces in Afghanistan.

Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen told the US Congress last Wednesday that Washington was planning military operations to eliminate militant sanctuaries in Pakistan.

In response, Pakistan's military chief General Ishfaq Parvez Kayani has vowed to defend the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country "at all cost."

The US attacks have also fuelled anger among the Pakistani public which is now demanding the new government in Islamabad abandon cooperation with the US in the international fight against terrorism.

But there are no indications that the government, led by the widower of slain Benazir Bhutto, President Asif Ali Zardari, intends to do that. The government has vowed to resolve the issue through diplomacy.

On Tuesday Zardari will meet British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in London to discuss the matter and next week he is expected to see US President George W Bush after he arrives in Washington on an official visit.

Meanwhile, in Bajaur tribal district up to 20 militants died as Pakistani jets, helicopters and artillery pounded positions in Kamangar, Loi Sum and Banda, according to a local security official.

Army spokesman Major Murad said several militant positions were attacked on Monday but the losses had yet to be ascertained.

Via Military.com.

Comment:

At this point, it is extremely difficult to determine what, if anything, happened. In addition to the versions reported above, it has also been claimed that "Pakistani paramilitary soldiers at a checkpoint opened fire into the air and the US troops decided not to continue forward."¹ Sher Ali's claim that the tribesmen had received reports that the US was preparing to launch an attack is almost certainly false, as there isn't anything to speak of on the other side of the border that they could have observed. The BBC version linked to above, which describes the troops as arriving in Chinook helicopters, is more likely to be correct, but even it makes very little sense, as it also says that the Chinooks were accompanied by helicopter gunships, which then just sat there during the actual incursion. The big problem with all of these versions, however, is that they claim that the troops ran away rather than fight. If you're engaging in a military incursion, you're probably ready for some combat.

'US drone' fires on Pakistan target

A suspected US drone aircraft has left at least eight people dead in northern Pakistan, while dozens of suspected fighters have been killed in the Bajaur region, Pakistani officials say.

The drone aircraft on Friday fired on a house near Miran Shah, the main town in the North Waziristan tribal region, leaving another 10 people injured.

North Waziristan, seen by the US as a safehaven for supporters of the Taliban and al-Qaeda, is part of a belt of tribally governed territory where Pakistan's government has little control.

Residents said two missiles were fired at a former government school where suspected fighters and their families were living in Tul Khail village, 5km east of Miran Shah.

Those killed were members of Al Badar, the armed Afghan group of veteran leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, according to an unnamed Pakistani official.

Heykmatyar is an Afghan leader who fought against Soviet occupation in the 1980s and against the Taliban in the 1990s. He reportedly allied with the deposed group after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, demanding the withdrawal of foreign forces.

US tensions

Friday's missile attack brings to five the number of such raids in the past two weeks.

Thirty-eight people, including women and children, have been killed in the past week's missile attacks.

Both the US military and the CIA operate drone aircraft armed with missiles of the type believed to have killed two senior al-Qaeda commanders in Pakistani territory earlier this year. Pakistan says it does not have missile-equipped drones.

Tensions between the US and Pakistan have further risen after a raid last week in which helicopter-borne US commandos landed in Pakistan's South Waziristan - the first known incursion into Pakistan by US troops since the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan.

Ashfaq Kayani, Pakistan's military chief, on Wednesday denounced the apparent US raids, saying unilateral actions risked undermining their co-operation.

He warned that "the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country will be defended at all cost. No external force is allowed to conduct operations inside Pakistan."

A day later, The New York Times reported that George Bush, the US president, had secretly approved orders in July to allow US special forces to carry out ground assaults inside Pakistan without the approval of the Pakistani government.

Bajaur fighting

Concurrent with the attack in North Waziristan, Major Murad Khan, a Pakistani military spokesman, announced 32 fighters had been killed, as well as two soldiers, over the last day during violence in the Bajur region.

Pakistani officials say hundreds of fighters have been killed there during a week-long offensive, which has forced 500,000 people to flee their homes. Officials acknowledge that civilian have been killed and villages badly damaged in the fighting.

Rehman Malik, the Pakistani interior minister, had previously announced a government ceasefire with fighters in Bajaur and other tribal areas in honour of Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting.

Via Al Jazeera.


Comment:

First off, a note on the article itself. As is mentioned, only militants were killed in the raid. Nevertheless, Al Jazeera decided to include a picture of a wounded child, the explanation given being that "Earlier air raids, which have killed and wounded civilians, have angered Pakistanis." This is blatantly biased, the sort of thing I'd expect from FOX, and if it continues I may have to reconsider using Al Jazeera as my primary news source.

As for the raid, ordinarily I would not have objected to it, because if Pakistan wants to claim that it has sovereignty over Waziristan, then it needs to actually exercise that sovereignty. However, it has now begun to do just that. With Pakistan finally taking the threat from TTP seriously, there is no need for us to intervene directly. Doing so, especially against their expressly declared wishes, is foolish.

Apologies on not posting more often. I have my hands full with my Persian lit. class.

Ground assault by US-led forces: Women, children among 20 killed in Waziristan

WANA, Sept 3: At least 20 people, most of them women and children, were killed in an assault by US-led coalition forces on a village near the Afghan border on Wednesday.

According to people in Musa Neka Ziarat, three US helicopters landed in the plains at around 4am, troops disembarked from them and attacked a house, killing 10 people.

They said that two children, three women and five men were killed in the attack on the house of one Payo Jan Torjikhel. A woman survived the indiscriminate shooting, they said.

The troops then opened fire on villagers who had come out of their homes, killing another 10 people. The victims, including three children and two women, belonged to the families of Faiz Mohammad and Nazar Jan.

Payo Jan and Nazar Jan were also killed.

Local people said Payo Jan and the two other families had no association with militants.

“The Americans came in helicopters, landed, walked up to the houses, started shooting and then flew back towards Afghanistan,” a villager told Dawn.

“It is an outrage,” NWFP Governor Owais Ahmad Ghani said in a statement. “This is a direct assault on the sovereignty of Pakistan and the people expect that the armed forces of Pakistan will rise to defend the sovereignty of the country and give a befitting reply.”

The attack comes amid an increase in the number of missile and predator attacks on suspected Al Qaeda hideouts in Waziristan in recent days.

It was the first known ground assault of its kind.

A security official said the Americans no longer shared information with Pakistan before launching missile or predator attacks in the tribal region. “They are not sharing any information with us. These are all totally unilateral actions.”

Our Reporter in Islamabad adds: Inter-Services Public Relations chief Maj-Gen Athar Abbas said, “In the wee hours of the morning on Sept 3, Isaf (International Security Assistance Force) troops in two helicopters landed at a village near Angoor Adda, South Waziristan Agency, and as per reports received so far, killed seven innocent civilians.”The army spokesman condemned the “completely unprovoked act of killing” and regretted the loss of precious lives.

He blamed the coalition forces for the violent act and said that such acts of aggression would not serve the common cause of fighting terrorism and militancy in the area.

He said the Pakistan Army had lodged a strong protest with the Office of the Defence Representative in Pakistan and said that “we reserve the right of self-defence and retaliation to protect our citizens and soldiers against aggression”.

There were unconfirmed reports that the Isaf troops had also captured some people and taken them to Afghanistan.

Via Dawn.


Comment:

Hmm. I smell something here. According to Al Jazeera, "Both the US-led forces operating in Afghanistan and the separate Nato-led International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) have said they have no knowledge of the incident."¹ Ordinarily I wouldn't attach too much importance to this, but the only sources for this raid are South Waziri locals, who are not exactly impartial, and the account of the raid simply doesn't make sense. Why on earth would they have gotten out of their helicopters? Why would they have even left the country? We have Predators for that sort of thing. South Waziristan is an extremely dangerous place, and I can't imagine us needlessly risking our troops lives like that.

Pakistan outlaws TTP

ISLAMABAD (PAN): The government, hours after rejecting a truce offer from militants active in the volatile tribal region near the border with Afghanistan, outlawed on Monday an umbrella insurgent group called Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).

Speaking to journalists in Islamabad, the advisor to prime minister on interior announced the ban on TTP, formed in December 2007. Rehman Malik, promising punitive action against militant leaders, said bank accounts of the outfit had been frozen.

Activities of the extremist organisation, led by Baitullah Mehsud who has been linked to the assassination of former premier Benazir Bhutto, have touched off a series of military operations in Waziristan, Swat, Bajaur and other regions of the NWFP.

On Sunday, Malik scorned a Taliban offer for a ceasefire in tribal areas and said if the militants were serious about peace talks, they should first surrender their weapons. The TTP had earlier declared a unilateral truce, expressing its willingness to enter dialogue with the government if an ongoing military operation was halted.

In response to the proposal, Malik said: We will not consider it until the Taliban renounced recourse to arms. He went on to reaffirm his resolve to establish the governments writ all over the country. We will not back down from our principled decision.

The ban came soon after the group asserted responsibility for one of the country's worst-ever terrorist attacks that left ten people dead in the restive Swat Valley, the stronghold of firebrand cleric Maulana Fazlullah and a former tourist attraction.

"The TTP is a terrorist organisation which has been killing innocent people, the advisor remarked, accusing the fighters of continuing attacks on security forces, burning schools and damaging public buildings in violation of a much-maligned peace deal.

Anyone aiding the TTP, lending it financial assistance, having other links to it and spreading its night letters or literature would be dealt with according to the law, warned Malik. Under Pakistan's anti-terrorism laws, supporters of insurgents could be jailed for up to 10 years.

But political analysts here blame the governments lenient attitude for the increasing influence of Pakistani Taliban. The proscription should have come about long ago, believes leading commentator Shah Jehan Wagarpal. If Islamabad had taken this action in time, the guerrillas could have been prevented stepping up their activities in Bajaur, Swat and elsewhere.

Senator Raza Muhammad Raza, welcoming the announcement, hoped the government would not shrink from taking practical steps to eliminate the terrorists. In a chat with Pajhwok Afghan News, the nationalist lawmaker said the Taliban were raising anti-US slogans but killing innocent civilians. What kind of jihad it is, he exclaimed.

A day earlier, Co-Chairman of ruling Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Asif Ali Zardari called for an immediate ban on the radical group. He told an English TV channel the Taliban were a headache for the entire world, not Pakistan alone.

Via Pajhwok Afghan News.

Comment:

About time.

Top al-Qaeda leader 'killed'

Abu Laith al-Libi, a leading al-Qaeda member in Afghanistan, has been killed, a website often used Islamist groups said. The Ekhlaas.org site said on Thursday that al-Libi had "fallen as a martyr", without giving further details.

It was not immediately clear if al-Libi's death was linked to a suspected US missile strike that killed up to 13 foreign fighters in Pakistan's North Waziristan region this week.

The attack had targeted second or third tier al Qaeda leaders, according to residents in the tribal area. A western official said on Thursday that there are "strong indications" that al-Libi, has been killed. "Indications are at this point that Abu Laith al-Libi is dead," the official said. "They are very strong indications." The official, who asked not to be identified, would provide no details on where or how al-Libi was killed. Tribesmen in in Pakistan's North Waziristan region had said a deputy of al-Libi had been staying there and was among the dead, according to an intelligence official. Al-Libi, a Libyan, appeared with Ayman al-Zawahri, al Qaeda second-in-command, in a video issued in November to announce that a Libyan Islamist group had joined the organisation. Islamist websites have carried messages from al-Libi, including one in May in which he said al Qaeda in Afghanistan was willing to exchange prisoners with Britain and other Western countries.

Via Al Jazeera.


Comment:

This is good news. Al-Libi is thought to have been the person who organized last February's attack on a base Dick Cheney happened to be in. I would wax eloquent about the precise nature of his role within the al-Qaeda organization, but unfortunately all of my notes on that subject are on my laptop, which is still in the repair shop.

Pakistanis die in sectarian clashes

At least 30 people have been killed and more than 100 wounded in sectarian clashes between Sunni and Shia Muslims in a Pakistani tribal region near the Afghan border, officials say.

Clashes broke out on Friday in Parachinar, the main town in Pakistan's northern Kurram tribal region.

Haneef Jan, head of Kurram tribal agency hospital in Parachinar, said: "Nineteen bodies have been brought from different areas while a woman died of wounds at the hospital.

"More than 100 people are also being treated mainly for bullet wounds, of which some 10 to 12 are critically injured."

Mohammed Nadeem, a local police official, said fighting escalated after clashes began when armed men opened fire on a Sunni mosque.

[More]


Comment:

This is bizarre. I am at a complete loss to explain it.

I doubt that the Shia are the instigators here, it just doesn't make sense. For one thing, they're surrounded by potentially vindicative Sunnis; if a sectarian civil war breaks out here, they will not win. Also, there doesn't seem to have been anything to set them off. The fact that the Pakistani government is currently preoccupied with oppressing its own citizens doesn't explain it, as the Pakistani government never exerted much of a restraining influence here in the first place. I suppose some new preacher railing away at the evil Sunnis might explain it, but no such preacher is ever alluded to. I suppose the Shia could have grown nervous about the agency's Sunni siding with the increasingly problematic Taliban, but that doesn't seem right, either. These actions will serve only to incite the Sunnis, and besides, it doesn't make sense for the Taliban to have designs on the agency, either.

According to the Federally Administered Tribal Area's website,¹ Kurram has a population of 448,310. The Islamic Emirate of Waziristan, which is more than four and a half times its size, has a population of 883,873 — larger, but not overwhelmingly so. All of the sources I've seen say that Kurram is "majority Shiite" without providing an actual percentage, so the most specific we can be is to say that the agency contains between 224,156 and 448,309 Shia. If the area were to be taken over by Waziristan, that means that Waziristan would be at least 16.8-33.6% Shia — quite a sizable minority. I just don't see why the Apostasy would want that sort of demographic headache; it makes much more sense for it to expand elsewhere, in friendlier territory (which is exactly what it's been doing in Swat). I suppose it's possible that the Apostates are trying to set up a "Shia menace" in order to try to scare non-aligned Sunnis over to their side, but that's extremely speculative, and seems a bit more trouble than it's worth.

It may well be that a group of Sunnis living in Kurram has become radicalized (e.g. by attending extremist madrassahs elsewhere in the country) and is acting on its own. Until more information comes in, that's the best I can think of.

Curfew lifted in northwest Pakistan

Pakistani forces and fighters have reached a ceasefire in northwest Pakistan where fighting killed some 250 people last week, according to a tribal leader and officials. The Pakistani army lifted a curfew in the region on Tuesday after a tribal council brokered the truce on Monday in the area around Mir Ali near the Afghan border.

Major-General Waheed Arshad, the military spokesman, said the curfew had been lifted to help civilians while authorities were considering a request from the fighters for a ceasefire. Tribal leaders said the situation was returning to normal after talks between elders' council and the fighters.

"There is now peace in the area," said Maulana Faizullah, a tribal leader who was involved in the negotiations. "The Taliban will not attack security forces unless they are attacked." Fighting in North Waziristan, and violence in other parts of northwest Pakistan, has intensified sharply since July when a nine-month pact broke down and commandos stormed a mosque complex in Islamabad supported by fighters from Waziristan.

[More]

Comment:

The Islamic Emirate of Waziristan poses a bit of a problem. Virtually unknown to most Americans, it lies in Pakistan along the Afghan border, and is one of the two regions to have reached stage three of the plan (referenced in previous posts). While it is not technically a state, per se, the central Pakistani government has no real control over it, so it is de facto independent. It appears to have the support of the local populace; the absence of anyone crying for liberation, as well as the huge difficulties that would be involved in removing it, argue strongly for leaving it alone.

Unfortunately, stage three of the plan does not call for a life of peace and solitude. Instead, these Emirates are expected to expand the area of Apostate control by assisting terror groups in neighboring regions, and ultimately invading. Indeed, Waziristan has been crucial for the Taliban's continued existence, providing them with a safe haven beyond the Coalition's reach. Were it not for the Islamic Emirate of Waziristan, the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan would be little more than a fading memory.

What, then, to do? Pakistan has been trying to deal with them, but lacks the muscle and support to do so effectively. It is in Musharraf's best interest to establish a lasting cease-fire. We can't come marching in, because a) our military is busy elsewhere and b) Waziristan is technically Pakistani territory, and one of the most sure-fire ways of alienating an ally is bombing them. However, we can't just let them continue to cause problems in Afghanistan. There are no easy answers.

Waziristan Peace Treaty Ends

From the Al Jazeera article Attacks kill troops in Pakistan:

...Also on Sunday, tribal elders in the North Waziristan region called off a 10-month peace deal with the government after accusing authorities of violating the pact...

...The collapse of the North Waziristan peace deal did not appear to be linked to the Lal Masjid assault, but is likely to add to the problems security forces are facing. Under the pact, the authorities agreed to stop operations against the tribes in return for their pledge to not send fighters into Afghanistan or launch attacks on security forces. While US military officials in Afghanistan said the pact had not stopped armed raids into Afghanistan, it did lead to a sharp fall in attacks on Pakistani forces in North Waziristan.

A tribal leadership council said it was abandoning the pact because security forces had launched several attacks on them and the government had deployed more troops in the region. The council said in pamphlets that it would refuse all dialogue and co-operation with authorities after the government had failed to meet a Sunday deadline to abandon 25 new military checkpoints. The Pakistani army has been moving more troops into the tribal areas after Pervez Musharraf, the Pakistani president, said last week he would crush extremists and "root them out from every corner of the country". Kamal Hyder, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Pakistan, said many analysts feel Musharraf is plotting a dangerous course in the region where the military is at risk of confronting its own people.

Hyder said the president's policies are not going down well and there is a definite risk that attacks in the area will increase.

General Assad Durrani, former head of Pakistani intelligence, told Al Jazeera: "If you look at the pattern of the last five to six years, ever since we joined the so-called 'war on terror', there have been enough warnings from the people of this area to suggest that there would be some reprisal attacks.

"The warning from the president may be now ... but experts had already said many years ago that this was likely to happen."


Comment:

It will be interesting to see what the repercussions of this will be. Unfortunately, I do not now have time for a detailed analysis, but God willing I will add one soon.

Uzbek fighters killed in Pakistan

More than 50 people have been killed in clashes between local tribesmen and foreign fighters linked to al-Qaeda in Pakistan.

About 1,000 tribesmen launched an offensive in an attempt drive the Uzbek, Chechen and Arab fighters out of their lands in South Waziristan, security officials said.

"Both sides have been using heavy weapons since this morning and tribal fighters captured important Uzbek bunkers. In the clashes, 44 foreigners were killed and seven tribesmen," one security official told AFP news agency.

An intelligence official told Reuters that the tribesmen had captured the fighters' base in a village near Wana, the main town in South Waziristan.

Thousands of foreign fighters fled to the semi-autonomous tribal lands on the Pakistani side of the border with Afghanistan after US-led forces ousted the Taliban in 2001.

They were given refuge by a number of Pashtun tribes that straddle the border, but relations between the foreigners and some of the tribesmen broke down last month when fighting erupted after a pro-government tribal leader was killed.

Tribesmen beating war drums for the first time in three years summoned 1,500 volunteers to form an army, known as a lashkar, in Wana on Tuesday.

In tribal tradition the beating of the drum announces a danger or emergency.

The army vowed to force the foreign fighters from the tribal lands and punish any Pakistanis sheltering them.

Government officials say that more than 200 people have been killed, most of them Uzbek fighters, since early last month.

Residents say up to 1,200 Uzbek fighters are in the region, most from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan commanded by Tahir Yuldashev.

Pakistani authorities have reached pacts with tribesmen in several areas near the border in the hope of driving a wedge between them and the foreign fighters.

Fighting in Pakistan's Tribal Area Leaves 160 Dead

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Clashes between Pakistani tribesmen and foreign militants near the Afghan border this week have left up to 160 people dead, including about 130 Uzbek and Chechen fighters, the provincial governor said Friday.

Ali Mohammed Jan Aurakzai, the top government official in Northwest Frontier Province, said between 25 and 30 tribesmen also had died in fighting that started Monday in the South Waziristan tribal region and was continuing Friday.

The government says the bloodletting shows the success of its decision to use local tribesmen to root out foreign militants linked to Al Qaeda. However, experts say it also exposes authorities' lack of control of a region also used by the Taliban to support attacks in Afghanistan.

Aurakzai, a retired Pakistani army general, said tribal militants had captured another 63 foreigners and were hunting 200 more who had scattered into the area's mountains.

"Our forces are not involved. Local tribesmen are not allowing foreigners to live in their areas," he told reporters at his British colonial-era residence in the regional capital, Peshawar.

The death toll from the fighting in several towns in South Waziristan has risen rapidly, and had stood at about 135 on Thursday. Officials say the two sides have observed brief truces to allow for the burial of dead, but that attempts by local militant leaders to broker an agreement to halt the fighting had failed.

Hundreds of Central Asian and Arab militants linked to Al Qaeda fled to this semiautonomous region after the collapse of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan and forged alliances with local tribes. Other Uzbek Islamists opposed to the regime of President Islam Karimov in their homeland have reportedly since joined them from Uzbekistan.

Aurakzai said that Tahir Yuldash, the leader of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, a militant opposition group, was in the area when fighting started but would not say what had happened to him.

As part of its support of the U.S.-led war on terror, Pakistan launched military operations in 2004 to wipe the foreign militants out. They succeeded in busting camps used by Al Qaeda but suffered hundreds of casualties and failed to expel the foreign fighters.

The military said at the time that Yuldash, one of Uzbekistan's most wanted men, was wounded but escaped during a raid on a suspected Al Qaeda camp near Wana, South Waziristan's main town.

More recently, Pakistan has cut deals with pro-Taliban militants and urged local tribal elders to police the region themselves.

That has sparked concern that Taliban and other militants now have freer rein to launch crossborder attacks into Afghanistan on U.S. and NATO forces. American officials are also worried it has allowed Al Qaeda to regroup.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Wednesday that the fighting between tribal groups and foreign fighters could help defeat extremists.

Some analysts, however, say militants with links to Taliban and Al Qaeda are involved on both sides of the current conflict, which also pits local tribes against each other, and that blood feuds could deepen insecurity in a region viewed as a possible hiding place for Usama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahri.

Comment
This is very interesting. It looks like al Qaeda may be starting to run out of places to hide. Something similar is happening in 'Iraq, where two tribes recently joined a Sunni tribal alliance dedicated to evicting al Qaeda.

Via FOX News.

Uzbek fighters killed in Waziristan

Up to 30 people have been killed in fighting over the past two days on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, officials said on Tuesday.

The clashes, which started on Monday are said to be between foreign fighters, mostly Uzbeks, and the area's Pashtun tribesmen.

The conflict started near the town of Wana in south Waziristan.

"The number of casualties is rising and we have reports of 25 to 30 dead," Major-General Waheed Arshad, a Pakistan military spokesman, said.

Fighting had previously broken out between the two groups on March 6.

The conflict came after the government tried to convince tribal elders to keep order and stop militant raids into Afghanistan.

The tribesmen had been known for their tradition of providing sanctuary to those fighting against US-led forces in Afghanistan.

Government security forces were not involved, Arshad said.

Amid the fighting, three children were reportedly killed and about 20 more wounded when a stray mortar hit their school bus.

Tribal refuge

Hundreds of foreign fighters, including Uzbeks, Chechens and Arabs, fled to the semi-autonomous tribal lands on the Pakistani side of the border after US-led forces overthrew the Taliban government in Afghanistan in 2001.

Most of the tribesmen, who inhabit both sides of the Pakistani-Afghan border, have given refuge to the men despite government efforts to remove them.

The fighting this month indicates that, in at least one area, relations have broken down.

Arshad said: "It's a success of the government strategy ... the tribesmen are fed up with them because they and their activities adversely affect their lives and business."

An intelligence official in Wana said the Uzbek fighters had cut off a road to the west of the town and security forces would take action to clear it if they did not withdraw in 24 hours.

Seventeen people, most of them Uzbeks, were killed in the March 6 battle that broke out after the men tried to kill a pro-government tribal leader.

The cause of the latest fighting was not clear, but the tribal leader and his men had been demanding that the foreign militants lay down their arms, a security official in the area said.

The militants have killed many people across the region over the past few years, including pro-government tribal leaders and people they accuse of spying for US forces in Afghanistan.

Via al Jazeera.