Pakistan : Terrorist Wahabi Islamic Rep Pakistan 6

[Naresh]

[quote name='ramana' date='01 February 2011 - 04:53 AM' timestamp='1296515751' post='110494']

Nareshji, Looks like the US employee walked into an ISI trap to free Siddiqa!

[/quote]



ramana Ji :



The Pakis have Uncle Sam by the "Short and Curlies" and I am sure Ombaba has to "yeild" this time!



Cheers

[Guest]

[url="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110206/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan"]Pakistani woman attempts suicide after US shooting[/url]

LAHORE, Pakistan – The wife of a Pakistani man shot and killed by a U.S. official tried to commit suicide by eating rat poison Sunday, explaining that she was driven to act by fears the American would be freed without trial, a doctor said.

...



The shootings have stoked anti-American sentiment in Pakistan, feelings that could be further inflamed by Shumaila Kanwal's suicide attempt, especially if she dies. Her condition was steadily deteriorating after ingesting the rat poison, said Ali Naqi, the doctor treating her in Faisalabad city.



"I do not expect any justice from this government," said Kanwal in a statement recorded by the doctor. "That is why I want to kill myself."

Kanwal also spoke to reporters after arriving at the hospital, saying "I want blood for blood."

"The way my husband was shot, his killer should be shot in the same fashion," she said

[Naresh]

.



[url="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/07/AR2011020705790.html"]U.S.- Pakistan relations strained further with case of jailed diplomat[/url]



The Obama administration has suspended all high-level dialogue with Pakistan, a key U.S. partner in the Afghanistan war, over the case of an American diplomat the Pakistanis have detained on possible murder charges, U.S. and Pakistani officials said.



The case of Raymond Allen Davis, who has admitted he fatally shot two Pakistanis he said threatened him from a motorcycle while he was driving in Lahore on Jan. 27, has severely strained relations between the two governments and threatens to scuttle a planned summit among U.S., Afghan and Pakistani leaders scheduled for the end of this month in Washington.



Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton canceled a meeting last weekend with Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi at an international security conference in Munich to protest Allen's detention, according to officials from both countries who were not authorized to discuss the situation on the record.



The administration has twice summoned Pakistani Ambassador Husain Haqqani to the White House for formal complaints and demands that Pakistan recognize Davis's diplomatic immunity and release him immediately. The message was repeated in a meeting in Islamabad Monday between Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and U.S. Ambassador Cameron Munter.



Davis, 36, holds a diplomatic passport and is a member of the "technical and administrative staff" at the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad "entitled to full criminal immunity in accordance with the Vienna Convention," the State Department said Monday.



The administration and Congress, the statement said, "have repeatedly made clear at the highest levels that this matter must be resolved by the Pakistan government or it could impact other bilateral initiatives."



In Pakistan, the issue has become embroiled in widespread anti-Americanism and suspicions, fanned by the Pakistani media and used for political advantage, that U.S. spies and intelligence contractors are secretly operating in the country. It has also posed a challenge to Pakistan's weak civilian government as it struggles to wrest control of national security policy from the powerful military and fends off opposition political parties.



The most powerful opposition group, the Pakistan Muslim League headed by former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, rules Punjab province and its capital, Lahore, where Davis is being held and several hearings have taken place in the case.



Although the administration has been unequivocal in its insistence that Davis has diplomatic status, it has been less than clear on the nature of his job in Pakistan over the last two years. An early embassy statement said it was "security" related, while officials in Washington have said that he vetted questionable visa applicants. The CIA has declined to comment on the case.



On Thursday, the Lahore court extended Davis's detention for another eight days. The U.S. Embassy complained that it was given no notice of the hearing, that Davis had no attorney present, and that he was not provided with an interpreter.



"He was denied due process and a fair hearing," the statement said. "His continued detention is a gross violation of international law."



Although Zardari's Pakistan People's Party government has close relations with the administration, and depends on the billions of dollars in U.S. military and economic assistance, it fears being painted as a U.S. lackey.



A foreign ministry official said that the government itself is divided over the case. The ministry has determined that Davis is immune from prosecution based on his passport and diplomatic visa, and the fact that Pakistan "accepted" that when Davis first arrived in the fall of 2009, the official said.



Other parts of the government, he said, see some advantage in using the situation to prove the government's independence from Washington. But the Americans, he said, "have dropped hints they could go to any extent" to get Davis released.



Further complicating the situation, a Pakistani intelligence official said that the two men Davis killed were not, as he has said, armed robbers intent on stealing money, his telephone and perhaps his car, but intelligence agents assigned to tail him. This official said the two intended to frighten Davis because he crossed a "red line" that the official did not further define.



Both the military's Inter-Services Intelligence service and the Interior Ministry's Intelligence Bureau regularly use motorcycle tails to track the movement of U.S. officials, another Pakistani official said.



The Pakistani media has also suggested that Davis is being held hostage to a wrongful-death case brought in New York by family members of four Americans killed in the 2008 terrorist attack in Mumbai, India. U.S. and Indian officials have blamed the attack on the Pakistani organization Lashkar-i-Taiba, which has long-standing ties to ISI. Four senior ISI officials, including the organization's director, Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha, have been called as witnesses in the case.



According to his 2009 visa application, Davis was born in Wise, Va. He gave an address in Las Vegas, where he is listed in Nevada state registration records as the co-owner of a firm called Hyperion Protective Services.



On Sunday, the widow of one of the men killed by Davis committed suicide in the city of Faisalabad. According to a doctor at the hospital where she was admitted after ingesting rat poison, she said she did it because she feared Davis would be released without facing trial.



Cheers

[Naresh]

.

[url="http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011/02/09/story_9-2-2011_pg3_4"]Choosing sovereignty over servitude —C. Christine Fair[/url]



What does it mean for a state to be sovereign? Apart from exercising monopoly of force and writ of law more or less homogenously over the state territory, one of the most important elements of state sovereignty is the ability to pay its own bills. While Pakistan is making strides in the former, [color="#FF0000"]it has made no progress in the latter[/color]



Pakistanis are outraged by US Ambassador Munter’s reported assertion that the US government is entitled to influence Pakistan’s internal affairs in exchange for US assistance. The US is Pakistan’s largest source of economic support either directly or through international financial institutions. [color="#FF0000"]These funds enable the government of Pakistan — if not the state — to survive.[/color]



Pakistanis naturally resent this situation because they have no leverage in Pakistan’s relationship with Washington and thus are beholden to Washington’s diktat. They are right: [color="#FF0000"]this funding renders Pakistan answerable to the US taxpayer (e.g. me)[/color] rather than Pakistanis (e.g. you).



But this anger towards Washington is misplaced. Pakistanis should ask why it is that their state — including its massive, nuclear-armed military — requires outside assistance on the scale it does when Pakistan in fact has considerable national wealth.



Pakistan is not a Somalia. Why is that neighbouring India can pay its way, having transformed itself from an aid-receiving to an aid-granting state, [color="#FF0000"]while Pakistan must grovel at the table of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other multilateral and bilateral donors?[/color] Indeed it is India’s financial success that has drawn global capitals to its doorstep seeking to sell India’s state and central governments weapon systems, surveillance technology, power plants, and other needed infrastructure and commodities needed and demanded by the growing country and its millions. It is India’s growing economic heft that gives it leverage in the strategic partnerships it forges — including those with the US and Israel.



There is no reason why Pakistan cannot step out of the shadow of its servitude [color="#FF0000"]and into the light of sovereignty.[/color] After all, Pakistanis are hardworking and proud patriots.



What does it mean for a state to be sovereign? Apart from exercising monopoly of force and writ of law more or less homogenously over the state territory, one of the most important elements of state sovereignty is the ability to pay its own bills. While Pakistan is making strides in the former, it has made no progress in the latter.



To free Pakistan of international meddling, Pakistan’s political leaders need only to subject themselves and their patronage networks to an agricultural and industrial tax, a move which Pakistan’s leadership has steadfastly avoided throughout the state’s entire history. Of course, it must improve income tax compliance too.



Given this refusal to expand its tax net, the state relies upon an admixture of international assistance and punitive and regressive domestic sales and income taxes to pay its bills. Sales taxes are especially regressive because they affect the poor far more than the wealthy. Government servants — whose income tax is deducted from their wages — and other honest income tax payers pay their way while the wealthy agriculturalists and business elite abscond. Bangladesh has a better tax compliance record than Pakistan.



The sad truth is that Pakistan’s elites –many of whom sit and have sat and will sit in parliament—have chosen to subjugate their country for their own personal accumulation and preservation of wealth. This should be the focus of public outrage: not Washington’s expectation that its massive investment in Pakistan yield some return for the interests of its taxpayers.



Some readers of this missive may counter that China and Saudi Arabia help Pakistan without such expectations. These cherished myths are rubbish.



What has China done for Pakistan? It did not help Pakistan in any of its wars with India in 1965, 1971 or the Kargil crisis of 1999, when it took the same line as the US and even India. It did little to help Pakistan in the 2001-2002 crisis with India and it even voted in the UN Security Council to declare Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) a terrorist organisation in 2009 in the wake of the Mumbai terror outrage.



The roads and ports and other infrastructure that the Chinese are building in Pakistan principally benefit China. Pakistanis are an afterthought. The Chinese obtain contracts on favourable and profitable investment terms, use their own employees, and contribute little to the local economy ultimately to build projects that facilitate the movement and sales of cheap (but also dangerous and poorly crafted) Chinese goods and products into and through Pakistan.



It is a sad fact that China uses Pakistan for its foreign policy aims as well. It provides Pakistan nuclear assistance and large amounts of military assistance to purchase subpar military platforms in hopes of sustaining Pakistan’s anti-status quo policy towards India. By encouraging Pakistani adventurism towards India, Beijing hopes that India’s massive defence modernisation and status of forces remain focused upon Pakistan — not China. China wants to sustain the animosity between India and Pakistan but it certainly does not want an actual conflict to ensue as it would then be forced to show its hand again — by not supporting Pakistan in such a conflict.



What about Saudi Arabia? The increasingly broke US citizen provided more assistance to Pakistan’s flood victims than Pakistan’s Islamic, oil tycoon brethren in Saudi Arabia. While the US government has not figured out how to give aid in a way that minimises corruption and maximises benefit, Pakistanis should note that at least the US tries to do so in contrast to Saudi Arabia, which simply abdicates.



Saudi Arabia does fund madrassas, albeit of a highly sectarian variety. Yet, Pakistan does not need more madrassas. In fact, the educational market shows that Pakistani interest in madrassa education is stagnant while interest in private schooling is expanding. Unfortunately, those madrassas and Islamic institutions that Saudi Arabia does support have contributed to a bloody sectarian divide in Pakistan that has killed far more innocent Pakistanis than the inaccurately reviled US drone programme a thousand times over.



In short, Saudi Arabia too uses Pakistan to isolate Shia Iran and to promote the dominance of Wahabiism over other Sunni maslaks (sub-sects) and over all Shia maslaks. Pakistan has paid a bloody price for the Saudis’ assistance.



There is no such thing as “friends” in international relations. Any country will help Pakistan because it expects that doing so will advance its interests, not necessarily those of Pakistan and its citizenry. Pakistan will never be free of the “nok” of donors until it raises its own revenue from its own domestic resources.



There is another important reason why all Pakistanis should pay local and federal taxes according to their means: it is the bond that ties the governed to the government. When the state extracts taxes from its citizenry, the citizens demand services in return. When the government fails to perform at either local or federal levels, the citizens have the opportunity to vote the miscreants out of office. The incoming elected officials learn, over the course of several electoral cycles, to be responsive to the voters, not dismissive of the same. Within constitutional democracies, payment of taxes is the most important mechanism by which citizens exert control over their government.



If Pakistanis genuinely want to toss off the yoke of financial servitude and gain a genuine stake in their government, they should stop howling at the US government. Instead, the street power mobilised to support a flawed law and a murderer should be redirected to policy issues that are critical to the state’s survival. And rest assured, financial sovereignty is one such issue.



The writer is an assistant professor at Georgetown University, Peace and Security Studies Programme. She can be reached by Christinefair.net



Cheers

[Guest]

[url="http://www.dawn.com/2011/02/09/blast-in-gujranwala-one-wounded.html"]Four blasts reported in Gujranwala[/url]

[Guest]

[url="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110210/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan"]Suicide bomber kills 27 soldiers in NW Pakistan[/url]

PESHAWAR, Pakistan – A young suicide bomber in a school uniform attacked soldiers during morning exercises at a Pakistani army training camp Thursday, killing 27 troops and wounding 40 others, police and the military said.



The attack in the northwest town of Mardan showed that despite years of army operations against their hideouts along Pakistan's border with Afghanistan, Taliban and al-Qaida-linked fighters retain the ability to strike back. It was one of the worst attacks on security forces in recent months.



Senior police official Abdullah Khan said 27 soldiers died and around 40 were wounded, some critically. The army, which tends to release information much slower, put the death toll in an earlier statement at 20 and confirmed the general circumstances.

[Guest]

Happy days are here again

[url="http://www.dawn.com/2011/02/10/militants-blow-up-gas-pipeline-in-balochistan-2.html"]Militants blow up gas pipeline in Balochistan[/url]

[Naresh]

.



Pakistan wants Aafia freed if US demands release of Davis : Babar





LAHORE/GUJRANWALA: The US president has demanded the release of US citizen Raymond Davis [color="#FF0000"]while the Pakistani government wants the release of Dr Aafia Siddiqui in return[/color], Law Minister Dr Babar Awan said on Sunday. Talking to reporters about the issue of Davis after his visit to the Mian Mir Shrine, Babar said, “His case is in the court”. However, when asked about giving the facility of a mobile phone to the US citizen during his arrest, the law minister told the media to ask this question to the Punjab government. He added that Shah Mehmood Qureshi was no longer the foreign minister so there was no validity of his statement about the US citizen. Separately, while addressing the lawyers’ community at the Punjab Bar Council, the minister promised implementation of the arrest warrants issued by the court for former president General ® Pervez Musharraf, saying that nobody can pressurise the government on the issue. staff report/app



Cheers

[Guest]

No surprise, as expected. <img src='http://www.india-forum.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />

[Naresh]

.



[url="http://pakobserver.net/detailnews.asp?id=76109"]Two Chinese Engineers killed in mine collapse[/url]



Qila Saifullah—Two Chinese engineers were killed when an avalanche fell on a chromite mine in Bagha Wala area of Qila Saifullah district some 200 kilometers off Quetta, the provincial capital of Balochistan province on Sunday.



“An avalanche fell on a chromite mine in Bagh Wala area of Qila Saifullah district which resulted in collapsing of the mine,” an official of district administration told APP adding the mine collapse caused death of two Chinese engineers working inside the mine.



Assistant Commissioner Qila Saifullah Hamidullah Khan Nasar confirmed the incident.



The area Bagh Wala where the incident took place is located some 50 kilometers in north of Muslim Bagh tehsil of Qila Saifullah district, sources said adding that the region had received three-days heavy rains and snowfall which caused landsliding in the chromite mines area causing collapsing of some mines.



The bodies of the Chinese engineers had been shifted to the provincial capital Quetta. The district administration is looking into the matter. It is pertinent to mention here that a Chinese firm is functioning in the chromite mines area of northern Balochistan for mining purpose.—APP



Cheers

[Naresh]

.



[url="http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011/02/16/story_16-2-2011_pg1_2"]Raymond Davis is a diplomat : Foreign Ministry[/url]



LAHORE : The Foreign Ministry has declared Raymond Allen Davis, an American national who murdered two civilians in Lahore, a US diplomat, a private TV channel reported on Tuesday. In a letter, which it wrote to the Interior Ministry, the Foreign Ministry maintained that Raymond Davis was a diplomat who enjoyed immunity under the Vienna Convention. “The letter also states that Raymond Davis was appointed as a diplomat in the US Embassy in Islamabad,” the channel said. daily times monitor



Cheers

[Naresh]

.



[url="http://tribune.com.pk/story/118594/valentine-gifts-for-mumtaz-qadri/"]Valentine gifts for Mumtaz Qadri[/url]



[center][/center]





RAWALPINDI : Students brought Valentine’s cards and flowers on Monday to the detained self-confessed killer of one of Governor Punjab Salmaan Taseer.



Supporters of Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri gathered outside the high-security prison in Rawalpindi, where he was to appear before an anti-terrorism court.



Outside Adiyala prison, about 140 people rallied in support of Qadri, joined by 10 students from a government college who turned up with posters, Valentine’s cards and flowers.



“Celebrating Valentine’s Day with Mumtaz Qadri,” read one placard.



They handed over flowers and cards to jail officials who said they would give them to Qadri, as students from religious schools shouted “Free Qadri!”.



“We admit it is not our tradition and it is wrong to celebrate Valentine’s Day, but it is now widely celebrated and the media is full with Valentine’s Day activities,” student Hussain Ahmed, 22, told AFP at the jail.



“We love Qadri because he loves the Holy Prophet (PBUH) and that is why we have brought flowers and Valentine’s Day cards for him,” Ahmed said.



Qari Hanif Qureshi, a firebrand speaker and apparent inspiration for Qadri, also said Valentine’s Day was not Muslim.



“It is wrong to celebrate it, but since these students have come to express their love and support for Qadri, we cannot turn them away,” Qureshi told AFP



Cheers

[Guest]

[url="http://www.kforcegov.com/Services/IS/NightWatch/NightWatch_11000036.aspx"]Night Watch[/url]

Pakistan: Update. The Lahore High Court will be informed by the U.S. Embassy that Raymond Davis, accused of murdering two Pakistanis, qualifies for diplomatic immunity by being a member of embassy administrative and technical staff, under the Vienna Convention, an official said, Dawn News reported.



The Pakistani government will inform the court that the domestic law and Foreign Ministry's regulations require Davis to be registered with authorities as a diplomat, which could not be done because of unresolved queries, an official said. The system of accreditation followed was not in accordance with international law nor prevalent in many countries, including the United States, and the matter should be left up to judicial interpretation, according to the official.

[Guest]

11:59 AM Pak court adjourns Davis hearing till March:

A Pakistani court today adjourned until March 14 a decision on whether the American, Raymond Davis, who killed two local men had diplomatic immunity in a case that has strained ties between Islamabad and Washington.

[Naresh]

.



[url="http://www.sbp.org.pk/ecodata/Summary.pdf"]Table - 1: Pakistan's Debt and Liabilities-Summary : End Decembr 2010[/url]



Total Debt and Liabilities = Pak Rs. 11,054.7 Billion



Pakistan’s 2009 – 2010 : GDP (Market Prices) = Pak Rs.14,668.428



[color="#FF0000"]Thus Pakistan’s Total Debt and Liabilities equate to 75.36% of the GDP[/color]



Cheers

[Guest]

They just have to catch some diplomat and they will get $3 billion .

[Naresh]

[quote name='Mudy' date='18 February 2011 - 01:57 AM' timestamp='1297973942' post='110806']

They just have to catch some diplomat and they will get $3 billion .

[/quote]



Mudy Ji :



Obama wants to give the Terrorristanis over US$ 3 Billion Next Year!



Cheers

[Naresh]

.



[url="http://www.thefridaytimes.com/18022011/page32b.shtml"][center][color="#0000FF"][size="6"]Such Gup[/size][/color][/center][/url]





[center]Fashion houses[/center]



The new Punjab Guv’s lady (he has several, we refer to the senior wife) has decided to go into business. We hear she is setting up a boutique and when asked how she thought it would fare in these recessionary times, she said she had thought of a way to maximize sales. She says her fashion house is going to be divided into three further houses – there’s going to be a “House of Lords” for the richest ladies. This House will stock apparel worth Rs 100,000/ and upwards. Then there’s going to be a “House of Commons” which is going to offer clothes between the range of Rs 20,000/ and Rs 100,000/. And then finally, the Guv’s lady is also going to have a House with an egalitarian touch – a “House of Servants” (we kid you not) for women of a lower order, whose pocket allows them only to buy clothes priced from Rs 5,000/ to Rs 20,000/.



[center]Offers accepted[/center]



Ever wondered why there’s not a squeak out of the family of that poor boy Ibadurrahman, who was run over and killed by the speeding American Consulate vehicle that was chasing after Raymond Davis that fateful day in Lahore? Well, we have it from the horse’s mouth that Ibad’s family have been given four American passports and Rs 1 crore in compensation and that they have accepted both the passports and the money. They’ve signed on the dotted line and agreed to keep quiet. They will be leaving Lahore for the US shortly. An important personage of the Punjab Government went and personally made the offer to Ibad’s family and saw it through, notwithstanding the government’s pious denials to all and sundry that “the law would take its own course”. Something similar also happened to the late Fahim’s family (Fahim being one of the men shot dead by Raymond Davis), except that they fell out with each other. Apparently, Fahim’s mother was reluctant to share some of the spoils with his widow, who in a fit of desperation killed herself. Since then, the same mother and other relatives of Fahim have accepted the American offer.



[center]Mind your language[/center]



Our new Min of Inf, that outspoken Iron Lady, had a spat with a woman anchor in a recent TV interview. Accused of gender insensitivity in the TV interview, the Iron Lady let rip once again. Lest we forget, the same Iron Lady had accused a fellow woman politician of having scaled the heights “via the bedroom”, and that too on television, for all to hear and see. This time, asked about that incident, the Iron Lady lost it, as she often does, and made a similar sexist comment aimed at the anchor. Later, we hear she complained to the management about the producer of the show. The Iron Lady had better learn to live with a free media. And she should mind her language.





Cheers

[HareKrishna]

The Threat of Civil Unrest in Pakistan and the Davis Case



On Feb. 13, the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) issued a statement demanding that the government of Pakistan execute U.S. government contractor Raymond Davis or turn him over to the TTP for judgment. Davis, a contract security officer for the CIA, has been in Pakistani custody since a Jan. 27 incident in which he shot two men who reportedly pointed a pistol at him in an apparent robbery attempt.



Pakistani officials have corroborated Davis’ version of events and, according to their preliminary report, Davis appears to have acted in self-defense. From a tactical perspective, the incident appears to have been (in tactical security parlance) a “good shoot,” but the matter has been taken out of the tactical realm and has become mired in transnational politics and Pakistani public sentiment. Whether the shooting was justified or not, Davis has now become a pawn in a larger game being played out between the United States and Pakistan.



When one considers the way similar periods of tension between the Pakistanis and Americans have unfolded in the past, it is not unreasonable to conclude that as this current period plays out, it could have larger consequences for Davis and for American diplomatic facilities and commercial interests in Pakistan. Unless the Pakistani government is willing and able to defuse the situation, the case could indeed provoke violent protests against the United States, and U.S. citizens and businesses in Pakistan should be prepared for this backlash.



Details of the Case



One of the reasons that the Pakistanis have been able to retain Davis in custody is that while he may have been traveling on a “black” diplomatic U.S. passport, not everyone who holds a diplomatic passport is afforded full diplomatic immunity. The only people afforded full diplomatic immunity are those who are on a list of diplomats officially accredited as diplomatic agents by the receiving country. The rest of the foreign employees at an embassy or a consulate in the receiving country who are not on the diplomatic list and who are not accredited as diplomatic agents under the Vienna Convention are only protected by functional immunity. This means they are only protected from prosecution related to their official duties.



As a contract employee assigned to the U.S. Consulate in Lahore, Davis was likely not on the diplomatic list and probably did not enjoy full diplomatic immunity. He was probably considered a member of the administrative or technical staff. Protecting himself during a robbery attempt would not be considered part of his official function in the country, and therefore his actions that day would not be covered under functional immunity. So determining exactly what level of immunity Davis was provided will be critical in this case, and the information provided by the Pakistani Foreign Ministry will have a big impact on the Pakistani judge hearing the arguments.



In all likelihood, Davis was briefed regarding his legal status by his company and by the CIA prior to being assigned to post. He also would have been told that, while he had limited immunity, the U.S. government would do its best to take care of him if some incident occurred. However, it would have been made clear to him that in working as a protective contractor he was running a risk and that if there was an incident on or off duty, he could wind up in trouble. All security contractors working overseas know this and accept the risk as part of the job.



At the time of the shooting, of course, Davis would not have had time to leisurely ponder this potential legal quagmire. He saw a threat and reacted to it. Undoubtedly, the U.S. government will do all it can to help Davis out — especially since the case appears to be a good-shoot scenario and not a case of negligence or bad judgment. Indeed, on Feb. 15, U.S. Sen. John Kerry flew to Islamabad in a bid to seek Davis’ release. However, in spite of American efforts and international convention, Davis’ case is complicated greatly by the fact that he was working in Pakistan and by the current state of U.S.-Pakistani relations.



Tensions



Over the past few years, relations between the United States and Pakistan have been very strained. This tension has been evidenced not only by public opinion but also by concrete examples. For example, in mid-December, the CIA station chief in Islamabad was forced to leave the country after his name was disclosed in a class-action lawsuit brought by relatives of civilians killed by unmanned aerial vehicle strikes in the Pakistani tribal badlands.



It was no coincidence that the Pakistani lawsuit against the CIA station chief occurred shortly after the head of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence directorate, Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha, was accused in a civil lawsuit of being involved in the 2008 attacks in Mumbai. The suit was brought in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn by family members of the American rabbi killed alongside his wife in Mumbai by Pakistan-based Islamist militants.



Like Iraq, Pakistan is a country that has seen considerable controversy over American security contractors over the past several years. The government of Pakistan has gone after security contractor companies like DynCorp and its Pakistani affiliate InterRisk and Xe (formerly known as Blackwater), which has become the Pakistani version of the bogeyman. In addition to the clandestine security and intelligence work the company was conducting in Pakistan, in 2009 the Taliban even began to blame Xe for suicide bombing attacks that killed civilians. The end result is that American security contractors have become extremely unpopular in Pakistan. They are viewed not only as an affront to Pakistani sovereignty but also as trigger-happy killers.





ASIF HASSAN/AFP/Getty Images

Activists from the Pakistani Islamist party Jamaat-e-Islami during a protest rally in Karachi on Feb. 11

And this is the environment in which the Davis shooting occurred. Even though some Pakistani civilians apparently came forward and reported that they had been robbed at gunpoint by the men Davis shot, other Pakistani groups like the Jamaat-ud-Dawah (JuD) — the successor to the Lashkar-e-Taiba, which was presumably banned by the Pakistani government — have demanded that Davis be hanged. The Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI), an Islamist political party, has also demanded that Davis be hanged and has called for large protests if he is released without a court order. As noted above, TTP spokesman Azam Tarik made a statement demanding that the Pakistani government either hang Davis or hand him over to them. Interest in this issue is not just confined to Islamist groups. There are some right-wing conservative nationalists and even some secular liberals who are asking: “If the United States can give CIA shooter Mir Amal Kansi the death penalty, why can’t Pakistan do the same thing to Davis?”



The result is that the Davis case has aroused much controversy and passion in Pakistan. This not only complicates the position of the Pakistani government but also raises the distinct possibility that there will be civil unrest if Davis is released.



Civil Unrest in Pakistan



Like many parts of the developing world, civil unrest in Pakistan can quickly turn to extreme violence. One example that must certainly be on the minds of the security personnel at the U.S. Embassy and the U.S. consulates in Pakistan is the November 1979 incident in which an enraged mob seized and destroyed the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad. While there were only two Americans killed in that incident — a Marine security guard shot as he stood on the roof of the embassy and an Army warrant officer who died when an apartment building on the embassy compound was torched — the fire that the mob set inside the building very nearly killed all the employees who had sought shelter in the embassy’s inner safe-haven area. Two local Pakistani staff members were also killed in the fire.



The 1979 attack was said to have been sparked by reports that the U.S. government was behind an assault on the Grand Mosque in Mecca by Saudi militants the day before. In reality, the mob that stormed and torched the U.S. Embassy was at least tolerated, if not orchestrated, by the Pakistani government, which was angry that the United States cut off financial aid to the country in April 1979. Not only did the Pakistani government facilitate the busing of large numbers of protesters to the U.S. Embassy, its security forces also stood aside and refused to protect the embassy from the onslaught of the angry mob. The embassy assault was Pakistan’s not-so-subtle way of sending a message to the U.S. government.



But U.S. diplomatic facilities have not been the only targets of civil unrest in Pakistan. Following the assassination of former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, angry mobs attacked not only security forces but also foreign businesses, banks, shops and gasoline stations in the cities of Karachi, Rawalpindi, Islamabad and Quetta and throughout the province of Sindh, Bhutto’s home province.



Similarly, in February 2006 during the unrest generated by the Mohammed cartoon fiasco, mobs in Islamabad, Peshawar, Karachi and Lahore attacked a wide range of Western business targets. The worst of this violence occurred in Lahore, where a rampaging mob burned down four buildings housing the four-star Ambassador Hotel, two banks, a KFC restaurant franchise and the regional office of Telenor, a Norwegian cell phone company. The protesters also damaged about 200 cars and several storefronts and threw stones through the windows of a McDonald’s restaurant, a Pizza Hut and a Holiday Inn. Lahore, incidentally, is where the Davis shooting occurred.



Forecast



Based on this history, the current tension between the United States and Pakistan, public sentiment in Pakistan regarding U.S. security contractors and the possibility of groups like JuD and JeI attempting to take advantage of the situation, there is a very real possibility that Davis’ release could spark mob violence in Pakistan (and specifically Lahore). Even if the Pakistani government does try to defuse the situation, there are other parties who will attempt to stir up violence.



Due to the widespread discontent over the issue of U.S. security contractors in Pakistan, if protests do follow the release of Davis, they can be expected to be similar to the protests that followed the Mohammed cartoon case, i.e., they will cut across ethnic and sectarian lines and present a widespread threat.



Physical security measures such as concrete barriers, standoff distances and security cameras can add to a facility’s defenses against a terrorist attack, but they really do not pose much of an obstacle to an angry mob intent on overrunning a property — especially if local and indigenous security forces are unwilling or unable to intervene in a timely fashion and the mob has the time and latitude to assault the facility for a prolonged period. The protesters can scale barriers and their overwhelming numbers can render most security measures useless. Barriers such as hard-line doors can provide some delay, but they can be breached by assailants who possess tools and time.



Additionally, if protesters are able to set fire to the building, as happened at the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad in 1979, a safe-haven can become a death trap, especially if the mob can take control of the secondary escape hatch as it did in that incident, trapping the Americans inside the safe-haven.



Commercial facilities are, by their very nature, far more accessible — and far more vulnerable — to mob violence than diplomatic facilities. A commercial facility can present a tempting soft target to those who wish to attack a symbol of America without tackling a hard target like a U.S. diplomatic facility, which is designed and built to comply with stringent security standards. If a mob storms a hotel, the local staff will be unable to protect the guests, and conceivably could leave the guests to fend for themselves in the confusion and chaos of a riot. Even worse, they could even facilitate attacks against Americans by pointing them out or providing their room numbers.



Any person identified as an American by such an angry mob could quickly find himself or herself in dire danger. While Americans working for the U.S. government can expect to have some security assistance in getting back to the embassy or to another secure location, non-officials may be left to fend for themselves, especially if they are not registered with the embassy. Non-officials are also not required to abide by the same security rules as officials. While many non-officials consider the U.S. State Department’s security rules to be onerous at times, during troubled periods these conservative security rules often serve to keep diplomats out of harm’s way.



Once a mob attacks, there often is little that can be done — especially if the host government either cannot or will not take action to protect the facility being attacked. At that point, the focus should be on preventing injuries and saving lives — without regard to the physical property. In most cases, when a mob attacks a multinational corporation, it is attacking a symbolic target. KFC restaurants, for example, have been frequent targets of attacks in Pakistan because of the company’s association with the United States. In many cases, multinational franchises such as KFC and even some hotels are owned by locals and not Americans, but that does not matter to the mobs, which see nothing but a U.S. symbol.



When an issue such as the Mohammed cartoons, the Bhutto assassination or the release of Raymond Davis spirals into violent protests, the only real precaution that many companies can take is to escape the area and avoid loss of life. The best defense is to use good intelligence in order to learn about the protests in advance, to track them when they occur and then to evacuate personnel before they can be affected by the violence.



U.S. diplomatic facilities and business interests in Pakistan are almost certainly reviewing their contingency plans right now and planning for the worst-case scenario. During such times, vigilance and preparation are vital, as is a constant flow of updated intelligence pertaining to potential demonstrations. Such intelligence can provide time for an evacuation or allow other proactive security measures to be taken. With the current tension between Pakistan and the United States, there might not be much help coming when the next wave of unrest erupts, so keeping ahead of potential protests is critically important.



http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20110216-...7264e00e11

[Guest]

Offers accepted

This sound bogus. At this moment, US will never give 4 passport and 1 Crore to Paki. Giving citizenship of US is not that easy.

Now we may see Pakistan killing themselves with US diplomat cars. <img src='http://www.india-forum.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/laugh.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':lol:' />