The choice in our hands

While watching the horrific video clip of a British soldier’s murderer taking pride in the inhuman act, my eight-year-old daughter wondered how come Pakistan’s name is not appearing in connection with this breaking news on TV channels. For her, and sadly she is right to an extent, occasionally there is a Pakistani connection – either the terrorists have travelled to and got training in Pakistan’s tribal areas, or they were in touch with someone who got his skills sharpened in the tribal belt, or there is illegal financial transaction to support such activities. But her smile was short-lived; Friday evening got everyone in the family glued to TV screen when RAF Typhoon fighter jets scrambled to escort a Manchester bound PIA plane to a London airport. Later in the evening we came to know that it was a family dispute among the passengers wherein one excited passenger threatened to blow the plane while in the air. PIA crew took the threat at its face value and pilot pressed the panic/emergency button alerting the UK authorities of imminent danger to 300 onboard passengers.
Now my question: If RAF comes into action just on pressing of a plane’s emergency button, then how come we are unable to fight the menace at our soil which has terrorised the whole nation for the last many decades? Even today when we have already lost 40,000 Pakistani civilian and military personnel, we talk of peace deals with Taliban. From June onwards, Pakistan is going to have right-wing governments at centre and three provinces who have promised to strike peace deal with Taliban. In return what they have got so far; Taliban are hitting hard the police, army and sectarian opponents in a bid to come to negotiating table with upper hand. Upcoming right-wing governments need to understand that appeasing Taliban will only help them expand their area of influence. Futile peace deals in the past including the one done in 2008 wherein Swat valley was handed over to them to rule, prove that Pakistan has got only two options; either completely surrender and accept what Taliban are demanding, or fight back till Taliban and their hate-based philosophy is eliminated. Choice is in our hands.
MASOOD KHAN
Jubail, Saudi Arabia