Nearly 200 lawyers had collected at the Civil Hospital Quetta to mourn for their slain colleague Bilal Anwar Kasi, when a suicide attack at the hospital killed over 70 originally stated practically wiping out a generation of lawyers and journalists who accompanied his body. Both ISIL and a faction of Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.
After high profile condolence visits and messages, political pundits and political analysts blaming security lapses et al, Quetta saw another attack within days even as the dust had not settled yet.
Why such gory incidents in spite of so many years of WOT?
In spite of Pakistan paying a heavy price for WOT, why today, sympathies of nations are not with Pakistan? An example is Pentagon’s refusal to pay $300 million in military reimbursements to Pakistan. The National Defense Authorization Act 2017 among imposing many strict conditions passes the condition of the removal of national security waiver option earlier present to the tune of $450 million provided Secretary of Defense certifies carrying out of military operations against Haqqani network in North Waziristan along with full cooperation on movement of militants at the Pak-Afghan border.
Let me state here, the Kerry Lugar Bill had placed many terms and conditions that did not offer a semblance of balance between the two nations. Why was the Pakistan government at that time so eager to accept terms reflected in certain clauses that led to putting Pakistan on a shallow footing is something only the then political dispensation in their legal wisdom can respond to.
Pentagon has officially accepted on many occasions the work carried out to Pak military, it feels much more needs to be done. However, Pakistan on the other hand is handicapped in terms of taking on every outfit simultaneously for fear of a huge negative cascading effect. With much time having passed since military operations started, many question as to why the net of ops has not included other outfits.
Further, placing the entire burden of putting a stop to movement of militants between the Pak-Afghan borders on Pakistan alone to the exclusion of Afghanistan cannot be deemed as impartial.
The more surprising aspect is the failing of Pakistan on diplomatic front to put her case forward under successive governments. In a more current context, Pakistan has yet to appoint a full-fledged Finance Minister, relying instead on Sartaj Aziz, and trained economist with Tareq Fatemi a former diplomat as a junior de facto foreign minister. The Foreign Minister (as the portfolio is with Nawaz Sharif) with the Prime Minister were on a long leave from the country, often photographed shopping at Harrods. “The inadequacies in the Foreign Office appear to be in sync with Sharif’s way of running his government where short-term expediencies continue to dominate long-term interests. Since late last month, Sharif has been in London, where he underwent open-heart surgery and is now recuperating. His absence from Pakistan has triggered uncomfortable questions over exactly how the business of the state ought to be run without the prime minister.” (Gulf News, June 28, 2016)
The other side of the coin of conducting military ops is the implementation of NAP. Many clauses within deal with placing civil mechanisms in place without which military ops can only offer temporary relief. Some steps have been taken but half hearted, delayed and few whereas it should have been the main focus of the government. Dawn reports, “Acting under the National Action Plan (NAP), law-enforcement agencies have so far sealed 182 religious seminaries in Punjab, Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa because of their involvement in promoting extremism and other suspicious activities.
As part of the strategy to choke terror financing, the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has so far frozen Rs1 billion in 126 accounts, which have a link to banned militant organizations.
Law-enforcement agencies have also recovered around Rs251 million in cash. The money was traded through Hawala and Hundi.” This is dated Feb. 1, 2016. This is in relation to several points in NAP dealing with banned outfits and their workings. One firm step forward is with relation to registration of SIM under CNIC numbers to make tracking easy. Regarding hate literature,Zeeshan Salahuddin writes, “Sections of the NAP also call for a stop to the glorification of the jihadist elements, and promises strict action against media that promotes sectarianism, hatred, or incites violence. Action against hate literature especially is a daunting task, as there is no mechanism to monitor or control its dissemination. As an example, the government imposed a ban on 22 magazines after the 9/11 attacks. But many of these publications were back at newsstands a few weeks later, either under a different name, or in some cases, even the same name. Another example is Masood, a leader from the militant group Jaish-e-Muhammad, wanted by authorities and in hiding since 2009, yet he somehow manages to publish with alarming frequency under the pen name “Saadi.” Lacking a central command, control, tracking, and identification mechanism, this is one of the toughest points in the NAP to implement.” (Foreign Policy)
Another crucial point deals with improving the criminal justice system. This has remained neglected, relegated to the back burner.
Rehabilitation and registration of Afghan refugee issue made some progress in 2016. However, the overall view of NAP on ground undertaken imparts a distinct impression of lack of focus regarding civil mechanisms to be put in place to address the issues that desperately needed handling years ago. Even when realization of addressing the issues exist, the operative mechanisms to implement them escapes understanding of the political establishment-that seems to be on a short fuse!