03-10-2007, 09:27 PM
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>US-Iran conflict sucks Pakistan in </b>
Imtiaz Gul FT.com
It is a very tight ropewalk for the Pakistani establishment right now, balance as it needs to its relationship both with Washington as well as TehranÂ
Embroiled in the aftermath of its role in the US-funded anti-Soviet war in Afghanistan and in the âun-winding of Jihadâ through the war against terrorism, Pakistan currently finds itself in the eye of yet another storm: the US-Iran tiff over uranium enrichment and the apparent American attempt to fan sectarian trouble inside Iran as a pressure tactic.
Some important developments in the last two weeks of February underscore the trouble brewing in Pakistan; one, the Sunday Telegraph, London reported on February 25 that the United States is âsecretly funding militant ethnic separatist groups in Iran in an attempt to pile pressure on Tehran to give up its nuclear programmeâ; and two, the bomb blasts in Tehran and Zahedan in the third week of February triggered a spate of criticism of Pakistan. Thirteen Revolutionary Guards were killed on February 17th last month when militants set off a car bomb in Zahedan, and security forces clashed with them in the city when a percussion bomb exploded.
In the past year there has been a wave of unrest in ethnic minority border areas of Iran, with bombing and assassination campaigns against soldiers and government officials.
<b>âCIA officials are said to be helping opposition militias among the numerous ethnic minority groups clustered in Iranâs border regions,â said the Telegraph report. âOperations are controversial because they involve dealing with movements that resort to terrorist methods in pursuit of their grievances against the Iranian regime.â</b>
Quoting a former high-ranking CIA official in Washington, the Telegraph said such incidents have been carried out by the Kurds in the west, the Azeris in the north-west, the Ahwazi Arabs in the south-west, and the Baloch in the south-east. Funding for their separatist causes comes directly from the CIAâs classified budget but is now âno great secret,â the ex-official told the paper. His claims were backed by Fred Burton, a former US State Department counter-terrorism agent, who said: âThe latest attacks inside Iran fall in line with US efforts to supply and train Iranâs ethnic minorities to destabilise the Iranian regime.â
The paper also quoted John Pike, the head of the influential Global Security think tank in Washington, as saying that âthe activities of the ethnic groups have hotted up over the last two years and it would be a scandal if that was not at least in part the result of CIA activityâ.
The Iranian foreign ministry has also been accusing the United States and Britain of provoking Sunni insurgents, and sowing the seeds of discord among Sunnis and Shiites in the country.
The second development was the bomb blasts in Tehran and Zahedan which triggered criticism of Pakistan. On February 27, four policemen were also killed, one abducted and another wounded in Sistan-Balochistan by rebels who then allegedly fled towards Pakistan.
<b>âFollowing the first incident, the Iranian Foreign Ministry summoned the Pakistani ambassador in Tehran to explain what happened,â Mohammad Ali Hosseini, a spokesman for the ministry, said at his weekly news conference. âBoth sides will suffer from insecurity and we decided to set up a committee to raise the security at the borders.â</b>
<b>Soon after the second incident, Hojatoleslam Ahmad Khatami quickly said that though âPakistan is our neighbour, little by little it is losing its neighbourly manners. Pakistan has become a sanctuary of terrorists who kill people in Zahedanâ¦Pakistan should be careful not to fall into the US trap, since it will be the loser, undoubtedlyâ.</b>
An objective look at the series of violent events suggests that the Iranian leadership has good reasons to be sceptical of Pakistan; Zahedan is the capital of the south-eastern province of Sistan-Balochistan, which is home to a population of minority Baloch Sunni Muslims. It borders Pakistan to the south and Afghanistan to the north.
<b>âIran is angry at the spiralling violence and believes it is the handiwork of Pakistan-based Jondullah. Thatâs why it has shut down the border at Taftaan and started raising a concrete wall plus a fence stretching as far as 700 kilometres along the border to Pakistan,â says an observer. </b>
The Balochistan-based Jondollah, Brigade of God, which last year kidnapped and killed eight Iranian soldiers, is a volatile Sunni organisation which many fear could easily turn against Washington. A row has also broken out in Washington over whether to âunleashâ the military wing of Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MK), an Iraq-based Iranian opposition group with a long and bloody history of armed opposition to the Iranian regime.
That a few Pakistan journalists met with Jondollah activists on the Pakistani side of the border and the partyâs head Abdullah Regi phoned a couple of media organisations the next day provides a clear indication of the whereabouts of the group. âThe Iranians are quite justified, then, in raising alarm over Jondollahâs activities inside Iran,â says an analyst.
In an interview with the Voice of America, Jondollah leader Abdol-Malek Regi said his group would continue its struggle until the âliberation of Sistan-Balochistanâ from Iran. Interestingly, the Pakistani government has been mum about border closure and journalists who visited the border region spoke of âunusual pace of work on the security wall and the fenceâ.
<b>âIranian border officials are pretty convinced that Jondollah operates out of Pakistani Balochistan and the Americans might be funding them to destabilise Iran,â a journalist who recently visited Taftaan told TFT. âPakistan at the moment is caught between the compulsion to cooperate with US and NATO in the anti-terror war and the desire to improve relations with all neighbours including those with Moscow through the SCO.â </b>
Pakistanâs desire to have the IPI gas pipeline also stands in conflict with American posturing vis-Ã -vis the Iranian nuclear programme. If Iran can conclusively prove that the United States is using Pakistani soil or funding the opposition groups based there against Iranian interests, it certainly will put the pipeline project on hold, if not torpedo it altogether. It is a very tight ropewalk for the Pakistani establishment right now because it needs to balance its relationship both with Washington as well as Tehran.
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Imtiaz Gul FT.com
It is a very tight ropewalk for the Pakistani establishment right now, balance as it needs to its relationship both with Washington as well as TehranÂ
Embroiled in the aftermath of its role in the US-funded anti-Soviet war in Afghanistan and in the âun-winding of Jihadâ through the war against terrorism, Pakistan currently finds itself in the eye of yet another storm: the US-Iran tiff over uranium enrichment and the apparent American attempt to fan sectarian trouble inside Iran as a pressure tactic.
Some important developments in the last two weeks of February underscore the trouble brewing in Pakistan; one, the Sunday Telegraph, London reported on February 25 that the United States is âsecretly funding militant ethnic separatist groups in Iran in an attempt to pile pressure on Tehran to give up its nuclear programmeâ; and two, the bomb blasts in Tehran and Zahedan in the third week of February triggered a spate of criticism of Pakistan. Thirteen Revolutionary Guards were killed on February 17th last month when militants set off a car bomb in Zahedan, and security forces clashed with them in the city when a percussion bomb exploded.
In the past year there has been a wave of unrest in ethnic minority border areas of Iran, with bombing and assassination campaigns against soldiers and government officials.
<b>âCIA officials are said to be helping opposition militias among the numerous ethnic minority groups clustered in Iranâs border regions,â said the Telegraph report. âOperations are controversial because they involve dealing with movements that resort to terrorist methods in pursuit of their grievances against the Iranian regime.â</b>
Quoting a former high-ranking CIA official in Washington, the Telegraph said such incidents have been carried out by the Kurds in the west, the Azeris in the north-west, the Ahwazi Arabs in the south-west, and the Baloch in the south-east. Funding for their separatist causes comes directly from the CIAâs classified budget but is now âno great secret,â the ex-official told the paper. His claims were backed by Fred Burton, a former US State Department counter-terrorism agent, who said: âThe latest attacks inside Iran fall in line with US efforts to supply and train Iranâs ethnic minorities to destabilise the Iranian regime.â
The paper also quoted John Pike, the head of the influential Global Security think tank in Washington, as saying that âthe activities of the ethnic groups have hotted up over the last two years and it would be a scandal if that was not at least in part the result of CIA activityâ.
The Iranian foreign ministry has also been accusing the United States and Britain of provoking Sunni insurgents, and sowing the seeds of discord among Sunnis and Shiites in the country.
The second development was the bomb blasts in Tehran and Zahedan which triggered criticism of Pakistan. On February 27, four policemen were also killed, one abducted and another wounded in Sistan-Balochistan by rebels who then allegedly fled towards Pakistan.
<b>âFollowing the first incident, the Iranian Foreign Ministry summoned the Pakistani ambassador in Tehran to explain what happened,â Mohammad Ali Hosseini, a spokesman for the ministry, said at his weekly news conference. âBoth sides will suffer from insecurity and we decided to set up a committee to raise the security at the borders.â</b>
<b>Soon after the second incident, Hojatoleslam Ahmad Khatami quickly said that though âPakistan is our neighbour, little by little it is losing its neighbourly manners. Pakistan has become a sanctuary of terrorists who kill people in Zahedanâ¦Pakistan should be careful not to fall into the US trap, since it will be the loser, undoubtedlyâ.</b>
An objective look at the series of violent events suggests that the Iranian leadership has good reasons to be sceptical of Pakistan; Zahedan is the capital of the south-eastern province of Sistan-Balochistan, which is home to a population of minority Baloch Sunni Muslims. It borders Pakistan to the south and Afghanistan to the north.
<b>âIran is angry at the spiralling violence and believes it is the handiwork of Pakistan-based Jondullah. Thatâs why it has shut down the border at Taftaan and started raising a concrete wall plus a fence stretching as far as 700 kilometres along the border to Pakistan,â says an observer. </b>
The Balochistan-based Jondollah, Brigade of God, which last year kidnapped and killed eight Iranian soldiers, is a volatile Sunni organisation which many fear could easily turn against Washington. A row has also broken out in Washington over whether to âunleashâ the military wing of Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MK), an Iraq-based Iranian opposition group with a long and bloody history of armed opposition to the Iranian regime.
That a few Pakistan journalists met with Jondollah activists on the Pakistani side of the border and the partyâs head Abdullah Regi phoned a couple of media organisations the next day provides a clear indication of the whereabouts of the group. âThe Iranians are quite justified, then, in raising alarm over Jondollahâs activities inside Iran,â says an analyst.
In an interview with the Voice of America, Jondollah leader Abdol-Malek Regi said his group would continue its struggle until the âliberation of Sistan-Balochistanâ from Iran. Interestingly, the Pakistani government has been mum about border closure and journalists who visited the border region spoke of âunusual pace of work on the security wall and the fenceâ.
<b>âIranian border officials are pretty convinced that Jondollah operates out of Pakistani Balochistan and the Americans might be funding them to destabilise Iran,â a journalist who recently visited Taftaan told TFT. âPakistan at the moment is caught between the compulsion to cooperate with US and NATO in the anti-terror war and the desire to improve relations with all neighbours including those with Moscow through the SCO.â </b>
Pakistanâs desire to have the IPI gas pipeline also stands in conflict with American posturing vis-Ã -vis the Iranian nuclear programme. If Iran can conclusively prove that the United States is using Pakistani soil or funding the opposition groups based there against Iranian interests, it certainly will put the pipeline project on hold, if not torpedo it altogether. It is a very tight ropewalk for the Pakistani establishment right now because it needs to balance its relationship both with Washington as well as Tehran.
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