July 3

BBC - At least 10 militants have died after missiles were fired by a suspected US drone aircraft at a Taliban target in Pakistan, intelligence officials say. Unnamed officials said it was an attack on a militant training facility in the South Waziristan area. It took place in an area on the Afghan border controlled by Pakistan's top Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud.

They're still not big fans of the U.S., but Barack Obama is a big improvement over W. from the poll:

Most Pakistanis now see the Pakistani Taliban as well as al Qaeda as a critical threat to the country–a major shift from 18 months ago–and support the government and army in their fight in the Swat Valley against the Pakistani Taliban. An overwhelming majority think that Taliban groups who seek to overthrow the Afghan government should not be allowed to have bases in Pakistan.

But given Sharif's numbers, this makes the tie of his to the Taliban important to make:

Asked about the nation’s leaders, a large majority–68 percent–views President Zardari unfavorably (very, 50%), but–unlike the recent past–there are multiple national leaders whom most do view favorably. Prime Minister Gilani is seems untarred by negative views of Zardari and gets favorable ratings from 80 percent of Pakistanis. The restored Chief Justice Chaudry is very popular (82%), and opposition leader Nawaz Sharif is extremely popular (87%). The leader most associated with the Pakistani Taliban, Maulana Sufi Mohammad, is viewed positively by only 18 percent of Pakistanis.

Huma Yusuf | June 30

CSM Media Roundup - Taliban militants in North Waziristan, a tribal region bordering Afghanistan, have ended a peace agreement with the Pakistani government. This development jeopardizes the military's plan to isolate and target the Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud in South Waziristan, a neighboring tribal district.

A shura, or council, on Monday decided to call off the agreement – brokered with Taliban commander Hafiz Gul Bahadur in February 2008 – because the government has failed to meet the Taliban's demands that the Pakistani Army withdraw from the region and the government put an end to US-sanctioned drone attacks, reports the BBC. A Taliban spokesman added that militants would now "carry out attacks on military targets in the region until the army left and US drones strikes were halted."

The agreement with Mr. Bahadur was meant to divide Taliban forces in the area. The Pakistani Army is waging an offensive against Mr. Mehsud in South Waziristan, and, under the agreement, Bahadur would not join Mehsud in battling Pakistani forces.

The termination of the peace agreement comes a day after militants ambushed an Army convoy, leaving 23 soldiers dead and 35 wounded, reports The Times of London.

John Lichfield | Paris | June 26

The Independent - Families of 11 engineers murdered in Karachi in 2002 point finger of blame at French government

A political scandal is gathering pace over claims that 11 French submarine engineers were murdered in a bomb attack in Karachi seven years ago to punish France for the non-payment of arms contract "commissions" to senior Pakistani officials.

Lawyers for the French victims' families believe the attack, allegedly carried out by Islamist terrorists, was in fact part of a web of financial chicanery and political manoeuvring which may yet severely embarrass senior figures, including the French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his Pakistani counterpart Asif Ali Zardari.

Pauk Tait | Islamabad | June 22

Thousands leave Waziristan before new Pakistan battle

More than 40,000 Pakistanis are moving even before a military offensive begins in the Taliban stronghold of South Waziristan and are headed for communities already stretched to the limit, officials said on Monday.

Nearly 2 million people have fled fighting in northwest Pakistan, most since early May when the military began an offensive against Taliban insurgents, prompting the United Nations to launch an appeal for $543 million in aid to avert a long-term humanitarian crisis.

** Pakistan faces challenge of cementing victory against Taliban(pic)
** Taliban gains money, al-Qaida finances recovering
** Unclear if Pakistan offensive serves US
** Pakistan says Swat push nears end as clashes flare

William Maclean | London | June 19

Reuters - Under pressure in his Pakistan enclaves, Osama bin Laden is facing a familiar quandary: Where to go next? The answer is unlikely to be Yemen or Somalia, despite their new prominence as regional al Qaeda sanctuaries.

U.S. drone attacks and a looming Pakistan army offensive against one of al Qaeda's main allies in a northwestern tribal area have stirred speculation that bin Laden's men are seeking a less risky refuge for their anti-Western campaign.

But simply leaving Pakistan's remote Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) could expose the world's most wanted man and his entourage of planners and bodyguards to satellite detection and the curious gaze of a local population of uncertain loyalty.

Related thread: Yemen could be "another Afghanistan" -EU official

Pakistani journalist Nadeem Paracha, in a superbly referenced post on The Dawn Blog, takes his colleagues in the Pakistani media to task for their self-serving coddling of Islamic extremists.

It is a rather stunning experience watching certain TV talk show hosts, journalists and assorted ‘experts’ continuing to find newer and more bizarre ways to stick to an obviously reactionary and, if I may, paranoid line in this respect, especially at a time when a majority of Pakistanis, including well known religious scholars, have started to freely exhibit anger and bitterness towards phenomenon like the Taliban and Al-Qaeda.

Saeed Shah | Islamabad | June 18

McClatchy - As Pakistan pursues delicate negotiations before launching a major military operation in South Waziristan, the United States launched a drone strike Thursday that could offend a warlord the government here is trying to win over, analysts said.

The bombing exposed the divergent priorities of Washington and Islamabad. The United States strongly backs the Pakistani offensive announced Sunday against warlord Baitullah Mehsud, leader of the Pakistani Taliban. Washington also wants to destroy the leadership of the Afghan Taliban and its Pakistani allies, however, some of whom are potential allies for the Pakistani government.

One such potential ally, who just came under attack, is warlord Maulvi Nazir, whom Pakistan is courting in hopes he'll stay out of the fight, according to a senior Pakistani security official who declined to be identified as he wasn't authorized to discuss the issue.

Mehsud is also seeking a pact with Nazir, however, in what officials and militants described as a fierce competition with the government.

Gareth Porter | Washington | June 16

Asia Times - The United States Central Intelligence Agency's (CIA's) refusal to share with other agencies even the most basic data on the bombing attacks by remote-controlled unmanned Predator drones in Pakistan's northwestern tribal region, combined with recent revelations that CIA operatives have been paying Pakistanis to identify the targets, suggests that managers of the drone attack programs have been using the total secrecy surrounding the program to hide abuses and high civilian casualties.

Intelligence analysts have been unable to obtain either the list of military targets of the drone strikes or the actual results in terms of al-Qaeda or civilians killed, according to a Washington source familiar with internal discussion of the drone strike program. The source insisted on not being identified because of the extreme sensitivity of the issue.

"They can't find out anything about the program," the source told Inter Press Service (IPS). That has made it impossible for other government agencies to judge its real consequences, according to the source.

Also see: Pentagon wavers on release of report on Afghan attack

Kamran Haider | Islamabad | June 15

Reuters - Pakistan braced for militant reprisals on Monday as the army conducted softening-up operations ahead of an assault on the stronghold of Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud, one of al Qaeda's main allies.

Military experts see the showdown in remote South Waziristan as a possible Waterloo for al Qaeda and its allies as the government has demonstrated a fighting spirit hitherto lacking in Pakistan.

"We continue to fight until the last Taliban, militant, enemy of Pakistan is flushed out of Pakistan," Interior Minister Rehman Malik told police in Islamabad on Monday.

Extra police roadblocks caused unusually long traffic tailbacks in the capital on Monday morning as Rehman feared more bomb attacks like those that killed eight people in Dera Ismail Khan on Sunday and nine in a Peshawar hotel last week.

U.S. officials say they believe the Pakistan army has started a big push into Mehsud's mountainous redoubt, and on Sunday Awais Ahmed Ghani, governor of North West Frontier Province, confirmed an operation had been ordered.

It is hard to judge what is happening in Pakistan, the only news comes from the govt and its militant body count.

Gareth Porter | Washington | June 12

IPS - The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency’s refusal to share with other agencies even the most basic data on the bombing attacks by remote-controlled unmanned predator drones in Pakistan’s northwestern tribal region, combined with recent revelations that CIA operatives have been paying Pakistanis to identify the targets, suggests that managers of the drone attacks programmes have been using the total secrecy surrounding the programme to hide abuses and high civilian casualties.

Intelligence analysts have been unable to obtain either the list of military targets of the drone strikes or the actual results in terms of al Qaeda or civilians killed, according to a Washington source familiar with internal discussion of the drone strike programme. The source insisted on not being identified because of the extreme sensitivity of the issue.

"They can’t find out anything about the programme," the source told IPS. That has made it impossible for other government agencies to judge its real consequences, according to the source.

Since early 2009, Barack Obama administration officials have been claiming that the predator attacks in Pakistan have killed nine of 20 top al Qaeda officials, but they have refused to disclose how many civilians have been killed in the strikes.

In April, The News, a newspaper in Lahore, Pakistan, published figures provided by Pakistani officials indicating that 687 civilians have been killed along with 14 al Qaeda leaders in some 60 drone strikes since January 2008 – just over 50 civilians killed for every al Qaeda leader.

A paper published this week by the influential pro-military Centre for a New American Security (CNAS) criticising the Obama administration’s use of drone attacks in Pakistan says U.S. officials "vehemently dispute" the Pakistani figures but offers no further data on the programme.

Mark Tran | June 11

The Guardian - Cash shortages and bottlenecks in delivering supplies to people uprooted by fighting in Pakistan's Swat valley have triggered the biggest humanitarian funding crisis in a decade, relief organisations warn today.

A group of nine international aid groups including ActionAid, Islamic Relief and Oxfam said efforts to help more than 1 million victims of the fighting were in jeopardy. The agencies face a cash shortfall of more than £26m.

"This is the worst funding crisis we've faced in over a decade for a major ­humanitarian emergency. Some 2.5 million people have fled their homes," said Jane Cocking, Oxfam's humanitarian director. "One month into this emergency, Oxfam is £4m short and will have to turn our backs on some of the world's most ­vulnerable people."

Irfan Ashraf & Salman Masood | Peshawar | June 9

NYT - Militants opened fire on security guards and rushed a small truck packed with explosives through the gates of a five-star hotel in this northwestern city on Friday, detonating a large bomb in the parking lot and killing at least 11 people and wounding 55, Pakistani officials.

The blast, which left a crater six feet deep and 15 feet wide, was powerful enough to be heard for miles, witnesses said. Television images showed parts of the hotel badly damaged by the blast and wounded people, with blood soaked clothes, being helped out of the smoke filled lobby of the hotel, the Pearl Continental, one of the few in the city that cater to Western visitors.

I'm not a particular fan of Foreign Affairs, but this list of recommended reading on Pakistani politics is solid:

• Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military. By Husain Haqqani
  This timely book by the veteran Pakistani journalist Husain Haqqani -- who was recently appointed Pakistani ambassador to the United States -- offers insights into the often puzzling links between the military and the Islamists, exposing the supposed "khaki bulwark against extremism" as the actual facilitator and beneficiary of radical Islamism. Haqqani shows how the Pakistani state has played the Hindu, or India, card in order to unify a multiethnic polity around an Islamic national identity. In the process, the military has sponsored and supported Islamist proxies both to nullify demands for democratic representation and to balance regional threats emanating from India in the east and a traditionally irredentist Afghanistan in the west. This historically entrenched coalition between the mosque and military, Haqqani points out, continues to pose a serious threat to regional and international security.

That ongoing tensions between Pakistan and India present a serious obstacle to long-term peace and stability in the region is well known. In addition to straining relations between two nuclear powers (Pakistan and India), the dispute over Kashmir resulted in Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) supporting Taliban and possibly al Qaeda militants in the region as a "strategic asset" in their struggles with India. This resulted in the blowback we see today, as militants shed any pretense of control by the ISI and began taking over Pakistani villages and declaring Shari'a rule.

As such, diplomats and international security experts have been long saying that an important part of a successful strategy in the Af-Pak region is to heal old wounds between Pakistan and India. While this will not come easily, it's good to see that Pakistan President Zardari is making the important move of extending a hand to India:

Nicholas Schmidle asks, Can the U.S. really trust Nawaz Sharif?. Looking at Sharif's past - a messy mix of political strongarming and kowtowing to radical Islamists - and his recent return to the political scene, Schmidle wonders whether or not American politicians are playing with fire by giving Sharif so much attention.

But as much as Sharif has been playing coy with the U.S. lately, his actions speak louder than his words. Take, for instance, his recent opposition to the use of drones in fighting the Taliban in Pakistan's tribal regions - one of the most effective tools in the war to date. What does Sharif say?

Pakistan has been hit hard by Taliban militants and is under close scrutiny by the world community. Under this pressure, the army and the government have acted swiftly to secure peace and stability, and protecting Pakistan's culture and way of life.

The tide is turning in Pakistan, and the army has turned the tables on Taliban militants, but the fight is not close to over. Speaking yesterday, Chief of Army Staff Gen. Kayani noted the success of the Pakistan army in turning around the situation in Swat, and that the military would keep pressure on Taliban forces until all safety was returned.

LaHore | June 2

Reuters - A Pakistani high court ordered on Tuesday the release of Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, the founder of an outlawed militant group accused of an assault on the Indian city of Mumbai in November, his lawyer said.

Saeed's release is likely to dismay the United States and India.

After the Mumbai attacks, in which 166 people were killed, India demanded Pakistan "dismantle the infrastructure of terrorism". The assault strained ties and led to an Indian freeze on peace talks between the nuclear-armed rivals.

The United States had also pressed Pakistan to take strong action against those responsible for the Mumbai attacks.

"The court has ordered that the detention of Hafiz Saeed was a violation of the constitution and the law of this country," lawyer A.K. Dogar told reporters outside the Lahore High Court.

Saeed was put under house arrest in early December after a U.N. Security Council committee added him and an Islamist charity he heads to a list of people and organisations linked to al Qaeda or the Taliban.

Pakistan to attack the fountainhead of extremism: Rugged Waziristan

Waziristan, the remote area that's the epicenter of Taliban and al Qaida militants in Pakistan, is set to become the next war zone in the nation's fight against Islamic extremists, where clashes between insurgents and the army erupted over the weekend.

So far, there are just skirmishes in Waziristan but the key U.S. ally plans a full-scale military offensive there this summer, according to Pakistani and Western officials, a fight that is certain to be deadlier than the current operation in Swat valley and with profound international repercussions.

Mysterious 'chip' is CIA's latest weapon against al-Qaida targets hiding in Pakistan's tribal belt

• Tribesmen plant devices to guide drone attacks

The CIA is equipping Pakistani tribesmen with secret electronic transmitters to help target and kill al-Qaida leaders in the north-western tribal belt, in a tactic that could aid Pakistan's army as it takes the battle against extremism to the Taliban heartland. disinformation?

_{** Pakistan city centre 'destroyed'
** ICRC enters Swat, finds civilians’ situation dire
** Bounty placed on heads of top Taleban commanders in Swat
** From much sought after to ‘most wanted’
** Analysis: True Swat victory won't be military
** In Pakistan, an exodus that is beyond biblical/pic}

Islamabad | May 30

AFP - Pakistan's military said Saturday troops had won back control of the main town in a key northwestern district from Taliban fighters in what would be a major achievement in a month-long offensive.

The announcement came three days after the military vowed to wipe out the Taliban from Mingora, the administrative and commercial hub of the mountainous Swat valley -- a region torn apart by a two-year Taliban uprising.

"Mingora is cleared and secured," chief military spokesman Major General Athar Abbas told AFP.

"Security forces control the city. The Mingora fight is finished," he said.

It is impossible to confirm independently information released by the army because the conflict area is a closed military zone.

Abbas said that Mingora was cleared Saturday but emphasised the battle was far from over in the mountainous district, where government forces are locked in a fight against Taliban guerrillas.

"We're only talking about Mingora. Much more fight in Swat is left," the military spokesman told AFP.

Pakistani Ambassador Husain Haqqani is telling the BBC that the Pakistani government is going all in against the Taliban:

Pakistan is absolutely determined to wipe out the Taliban militants from Malakand and the recent wave of terrorist bombings shows that insurgents are feeling the pressure of the country’s ongoing military offensive, Islamabad’s envoy in Washington said.

Pakistan is not confronted with a desperate situation as a result of militant retaliation, Ambassador Husain Haqqani stated.

“It’s not a desperate situation. It actually affirms the fact that the Pakistani government has made a decision with the support of the Pakistani people to take all extremists and terrorists on and the extremists are feeling the pressure, which is why they are hitting the government and its personnel in cities,” he told BBC America.

The envoy said the bombings are a cause of concern but added “that is the kind of retaliatory mechanisms that terrorists adopt everywhere in the world” as happened in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“When they (terrorists) come under pressure in their strongholds, they try and attack in other places. That is why there has to be a comprehensive strategy to fight terrorists.”

That is why, he continued, the United States, Pakistan, Afghanistan and NATO, are all working together to try to develop a long-term comprehensive strategy.

“The main function of this comprehensive strategy should be to deprive the terrorists of new recruits.”

In answer to a question, he said, "the fact that the intelligence services are being targeted by the terrorists is confirmation that the terrorists consider the Pakistani security service their primary target.

M Ilyas Khan | Dassu, Kohistan | May 29

BBC -

In Pakistan's north-western district of Kohistan, public discourse is dominated by security issues, not the recently enacted Sharia (Islamic) law.

The government is worried that if it fails to extend security cover to this largely ungoverned district, the Taliban will.

But the local tribes do not want either the army or the Taliban in the area.

"If the army comes in, the Taliban will follow, and vice versa," says an influential tribal elder and former member of parliament, Malik Saeed Ahmad. "In either case, it threatens our way of life.
...
..But every fresh enactment of the Sharia law has since been routinely extended to Malakand division as well as Kohistan.

Mumtaz Khan Jalkoti says this amounts to conceding a moral upper hand to the Taliban in the government's battle for influence in Kohistan.

"There is no evidence of Talibanisation in Kohistan, but by grouping us with areas like Swat and Buner, the government is exposing us to that threat."

Independent journalist Jeremy Scahill sums it up:

Ah, good thing the US quest for violent global domination was brought to a screeching halt with the November presidential election. Without Obama’s election, we’d still have an occupation of Iraq, mercenaries on the US payroll, torture of prisoners, an unending and worsening war that kills civilians in Afghanistan, regular airstrikes in Pakistan, killing civilians and an embassy the size of Vatican city in Baghdad, which was built in part on slave labor. Not to mention those crazy “Bush/Cheney” neocons running around trying to become the “CEOs” of foreign nations. Wow, glad that’s all over. Whew! And, it’s a really good thing Bush is no longer in power or else the US would come up with some crazy idea like building a colonial fortress in Pakistan to defend “US interests” in the region.

h/t Ron Beasley at Newshoggers

Pepe Escobar | May 28

Asia Times - The earth has been shaking for a few days now all across Pipelineistan - with massive repercussions for all the big players in the New Great Game in Eurasia. United States President Barack Obama's AfPak strategists didn't even see it coming.

A silent, reptilian war had been going on for years between the US-favored Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline and its rival, the Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) pipeline, also known as the "peace pipeline". This past weekend, a winner emerged. And it's none of the above: instead, it's the 2,100-kilometer, US$7.5 billion IP (the Iran-Pakistan pipeline), with no India attached. (Please see Pakistan, Iran sign gas pipeline deal, May 27, 2009, Asia Times Online.)

This whole saga started way back in 1995 - about the time
California-based Unocal started floating the idea of building a pipeline crossing Afghanistan. Now, Iran and Pakistan finally signed a deal this week in Tehran, by which Iran will sell gas from its mega South Pars fields to Pakistan for the next 25 years.

Saeed Shah & Warren P. Strobel | Islamabad | May 27

McClatchy Newspapers - The U.S. is embarking on a $1 billion crash program to expand its diplomatic presence in Pakistan and neighboring Afghanistan, another sign that the Obama administration is making a costly, long-term commitment to war-torn South Asia, U.S. officials said Wednesday.

The White House has asked Congress for — and seems likely to receive — $736 million to build a new U.S. embassy in Islamabad, along with permanent housing for U.S. government civilians and new office space in the Pakistani capital.

The scale of the projects rivals the giant U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, which was completed last year after construction delays at a cost of $740 million.

Senior State Department officials said the expanded diplomatic presence is needed to replace overcrowded, dilapidated and unsafe facilities and to support a "surge" of civilian officials into Afghanistan and Pakistan ordered by President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Other major projects are planned for Kabul, Afghanistan; and for the Pakistani cities of Lahore and Peshawar. In Peshawar, the U.S. government is negotiating the purchase of a five-star hotel that would house a new U.S. consulate.