- Martyr toll mounts in recent months
Terrorists are seemingly making gains in the tribal belt. Their game is ‘soft-target’ civilians, law enforcement agencies and the peace committees, not always in that order. Their favoured modes of attack are deadly improvised explosive devices, cross-border attacks, including sniper firing from across the border, remote-control bombs and ambushes. Recently, such tragic incidents have multiplied, with four occurring in North Waziristan (cleared by Operation Zarb-e Azb), four in Bajaur, one in Rajgal Valley, the latest two occurring on December 22 in Mohmand Agency which took three soldiers’ lives in firing from across the border, and in North Waziristan on December 24, resulting in martyrdom of three Frontier Constabulary soldiers in an IED explosion. Simultaneously, terror attacks in Kabul have also risen in frequency and audacity, with the latest on December 24 outside NDS office, causing six deaths. It would appear that the terrorists are taking full advantage of the sour relations existing between the two countries, eagerly fanned by the eastern neighbour and by bitterness worsened by constant US whining over alleged terrorist safe havens in Pakistan.
Pakistan has repeatedly pointed out that the root problem lies in lack of Afghan forces’ writ in the contiguous border belt, a Wild West region that facilitates terrorist regrouping and these murderous forays. Still, the terror graph this year has been a see-saw affair, with the violent incidents jumping up by 72 percent in January–March 2017 over the previous quarter and the period July-September 2017 showing a downward trend in terror attacks by 44 percent. Somewhat surprisingly, the graph has risen again at this juncture when the harsh winter makes mobility and movement onerous. The recently concluded six-nations Speakers Conference in Islamabad and the trilateral China-Pakistan-Afghanistan meeting in Beijing from December 26 are alternate avenues for the most affected nations to take matters in their own hands and seek new ‘inter-regional connectivity’ paths to settlement of the unending US war on terror, as the latter’s true intent regarding Daesh is also now suspect in Russian, Chinese, Iranian and Turkish eyes. The ongoing debate on the KP-FATA merger also needs to factor in and seriously consider the uneven security aspect.
