“We need a revamp” is an understatement
Pakistan’s fable of the cold war era: ‘the emergence of the Mujhaideen’ has been regurgitated through many voices and through numerous channels. The historic setup that laid out our present dilemma has triumphed over the policies that not only have deteriorated our international image but have also crumbled our domestic structure.
Under the weight of such auspices, Pakistan has to shift its policies from the preamble that makes Afghanistan a crucial for Pakistan’s survival. Recently, in one of the remote areas of Balochistan, six Afghan spies were arrested soon after the drone strike that killed the Taliban leader Mullah Mansoor – the Afghan spies were involved in terrorist activities and targeted killings in the state accentuating the contention in the Baluchistan province. The influx of Afghan refugees has not only brought a culture of perpetual discord in the country, but rather has been a crucial issue of narcotics, basic facilities, Kalashnikov, and war. Pakistan has been a habitat of the Afghan refugees since the 1980’s. Pakistan’s Afghan policy thus has not only been a major setback for the state, but also has been the cause of the subsequent issues we now see emerging in the form of dilemmas and mysteries of the spy networks.
The drone strike that killed Mullah Mansoor in the area of Balochistan is the first drone strike in the province. The furore caused over it by both the Pakistani government and the military prove the fact of the rhetoric being structured on the violation of state sovereignty. The fact that has to be addressed is the concern over which these two events lie.
Pakistan’s constant answer towards its geostrategic position and Indian intervention in the land has been the policy that significantly has violated Pakistan’s national interest and also has hindered its development. The arrest of the Afghan spies in Baluchistan, not only triggers the old animosity that has been implicitly prevalent between Afghanistan and Pakistan but also involves the Indian factor in the game. The structure of Afghanistan has been deteriorated through the clashes that have surfaced on its terrain both international and regional in context, therefore also primarily, aiming at Pakistan’s growing tension over the Indian involvement in Afghanistan. It thus is the source that implies the Indian intervention in Pakistan to destabilise and exploit the economic and ethnic fault-lines that exist in Karachi and Balochistan. Pakistan’s constant impediment is not India alone, but the decisions that the policies have been shaped throughout the itinerary of history. Expressing Pakistan’s discomfort over the regional choices, India’s involvement in Afghanistan not only stems from the development agenda reiterated by India, but also for Pakistan that is in constant intervention from India aiming at the regional approach.
Presently the killing of Mullah Mansoor and Balochistan’s home minister’s statement calling for refugees to leave Pakistan coincide. It cannot shift the fact to Afghanistan and other regional game alone. It calls to reshape the Afghan policy through constant and vigilant mechanism that would work in order to make Pakistan a state that chooses shrewdly amid the frustration that has been boiling on its borders for decades. The killing of Mullah Mansoor has sabotaged the peace talks which clearly now would be an impediment to initiate the process again. The arrest of Afghan spies has added the age old dimension of Pakistan being exploited by the contention burgeoning on its borders. But the statement calling the Afghan refugees to leave Pakistan would further add to the detriment. Pakistan’s policies to manage and handle the affairs of Afghanistan for its own security and to defend itself from India have long brought the futile results of terrorism and disruption in the state. Afghan refugees have become a security risk for the country but nonetheless our policies over the years have made it the consequential looming threat.
To ask the Afghan refugees to leave the state would trigger the onset of another war that Pakistan is in no position to handle. Thus reshaping and revising the Afghan policy over these two events might not change things overnight, but it might provide the necessary groundwork that has to be done in order to meet the index to mitigate terrorism from the soil.
