Afghan troops & cops training

Reports are that Indian military experts, under an agreement reached recently, have started imparting training to the Afghan National Army (ANA) and Afghan National Police (ANP) and groups of Afghan forces personnel have already been sent to India for the same purpose. In the recently concluded London Conference lobbies were made to convince the world community that the Afghan forces personnel must be trained by India to which Pakistan objected.

The Karzai government’s relations with India and in return the increasing Indian influence in Afghanistan is not only the cause of concern for Pakistan but also for the international community. In his pre-Afghan strategy report, Gen McCrystal had clearly pointed to the troubles created by the expanded role of India in Afghanistan which is causing hindrance to the smooth functioning of Nato and ISAF. My point in this regard is if Pakistan is given the role of imparting training to Afghan forces personnel, that would serve the purpose of bringing peace in the region. Because engaging Indians serves to Karzai’s anti-Pakistan stance and Indian designs against Pakistan, which has already prolonged and complicated the GWOT and in fact has resulted in the scheduled withdrawal of allied troops. The question is if growing Indian involvement in Afghanistan is agreed upon, then there seems no ray of hope in resolving the already messed up situation. Rather it would further aggravate as Pakistan would lose in words of Pakistan’s chief of army staff Gen Kayani’s words its strategic interests which would be threatened with Indian presence. Indians-trained Afghans cannot be expected to do any good for regional peace, rather they would prove to be Col Prohit’s like who used the Indian army and military intelligence cover to blow up Samjhota express and killed Pakistani passengers.

Secondly Indians have no role in quelling terrorism. Nor have they experience of fighting terrorism head-on. On the other hand the Pakistan military has proved its professionalism in the battlefield. Take Swat and South Waziristan operations as example. A similar spirit of Pakistan military if infused in the Afghan forces personnel can do wonders within days, weeks or months to fight the menace out of this region. It is on the world conscience whether to give India this role to further fuel this fire, or assign the task to Pakistan to clear the mess as early as possible.

Eschmall Sardar,

Peshawar.

Newsweek’s LeT projection

Newsweek in its March 8 issue has published a title story on Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and linked it with al-Qaeda, warning that it might conduct devastating attack – not in Mumbai, but in Manhattan or Miami. This is followed by bombing in a Kabul guest house for which an earlier claim of responsibility by Afghan Taliban was intriguingly diverted to LeT like that of Mumbai incident of hotels Maharaja and Oberoi. This smacks of conspiracy theories against Pakistan and its government not taking action against the LeT head Hafiz Saeed and its activities.

Linking LeT with al-Qaeda hardly bears any logic because al-Qaeda is involved in attacks across Pakistan and Afghanistan and is doing the TTP but LeT though happened to be a militant organisation primarily formed to fight for freedom in Indian held Kashmir has nowhere engaged in subversive activities, either in Pakistan or in Afghanistan and the claims of its involvement in Mumbai attacks or elsewhere in India have not been established as yet. What has come out of the latest investigations, the Indians have unearthed local links and patrons responsible of Mumbai mayhem and for the Samjhota express bombing the Indian army Colonel Prohit and company’s involvement has been proved. In Pakistan the LeT seems to be dysfunctional, neither it conducts any public engagements nor its brandishes weapons like other organisations had been doing. Above all, the government of Pakistan has already banned this organisation twice and particularly after the Mumbai incident, its activities are being closely monitored.

The fact that the LeT has only a role responsible for the wellbeing of the families of shuhada-e-Kashmir, it had remained focused on rehabilitation work in post-earthquake Azad Kashmir and looking after the displaced persons from Swat. The charge that it was patronised by ISI tantamounts to claiming that the ISI has links with al-Qaeda whereas the recent arrest of Quetta Shura top members and the March 7 arrest of al-Qaeda spokesman Adam Yahiye Gadahn from Karachi speaks of Pakistan government’s seriousness in handling the anti-terror war with which the world, especially the US are satisfied. Pakistan has by force eliminated the Taliban in Swat, South Waziristan, Bajaur and elsewhere, has taken heavily on the members of Quetta Shura and the campaign is going on. It seems the world leaders now conspire to push Pakistan towards acting against the LeT which is already banned and is not seemingly involved in acts of terror. LeT’s work has been IHK-specific and the hallabaloo shows Indian desire to convince America for forcing Islamabad to act against it – to get their desired results sabotaging the Kashmir freedom movement.

Abu Hasan,

Azad Kashmir.

Not releasing CSF

The defence and diplomatic circles in Pakistan must be questioning the logic of being used by the world powers under a mere ceremonial status of non-NATO ally in the global war against terror. Despite its relentless efforts and successful operations against the terrorists, Pakistan is subjected to the mounting pressure of ‘do more’, whereas the allied countries on their part have done not enough to play their role in fulfilling the defence needs of Pakistan as are required under the agreement.

Pakistan must be seemingly annoyed over the non-reimbursement of its outstanding bills worth more than 2 billion dollars due to be paid out of the Coalition Support Fund (CSF) under the agreement as major Non-NATO ally, which they have kept pending for one pretext or the other, since last one and a half years.

The Coalition Support Fund is not part of any aid; it is the reimbursement of Pakistan’s expenditures in support of US operations in Afghanistan. The bill has already been forwarded to US administration, which has not been paid for reasons unknown.

Pakistan has so far received only $450 million in the first half of year 2009; that too as reimbursement of pending bills of year 2008. The remaining one and a half years bill worth more than 2 billion dollars is still awaited. The authorities in Pakistan express their dismay as to why such an attitude is meted out while the burden of war expenditures is huge in addition to the loss of life in wake of continued suicide bombings, terror attacks and military’s engagement in the operations.

Pakistan has suffered the most since it has joined the global war against terror as a front line ally. Pakistan was declared major Non-NATO ally and a drumbeat to support Pakistan in a big way was heard all over the world. The hype of $10 billion aid to Pakistan is used to mount pressure on Pakistan. While it has suffered the most in terms of human and property losses, and economic and infrastructural damages, its expenditures in the WOT have exceeded $70 billion during the last 9 years. This US$10 billion assistance was far less than its $653 billion aid for Iraq and $172 billion for Afghanistan since 9/11.

Pakistan has deployed more than 120,000 soldiers on its western borders and using all types of equipment like jet aircraft, helicopters, tanks, guns and vehicles. The expenditures on this ongoing WOT is colossal as the President mentioned in the Friends of Pakistan meeting held in Tokyo last year that “Pakistan has spent more $34 billion on WOT. Besides that Pakistan is looking after the millions of Afghan refugees who have not yet returned to their country because of the non-cooperation of world community.

Almost 56% of the US aid ($5.64 billion) has gone to the Coalition Support Funds. The 18% ($1/81 billion) has been spent on the security assistance, 16% ($1.62 billion) to the budgetary allocations. This money was supposed to provide macroeconomic stability and to free up funds for social spending. The remaining nine percent had been given for development and humanitarian assistance.

As per Congressional Research Service (CRS) report released in July 2008, the total funding for GWOT (2001-2009) was $859 billion: $653 billion for Operation Iraqi Freedom, $172 billion for Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan – with a peanut amount of other counterterrorism operations, including Pakistan, $20 billion for enhanced security of bases and $05 billion unallocated.

A GHAFFAR,

Islamabad.