Pakistan : Terrorist Wahabi Islamic Rep Pakistan 7

[Naresh]

.



[url="http://www.dawn.com/2011/06/21/asma-jahangir-urges-civilians-to-challenge-army.html"]Asma Jahangir urges civilians to challenge army[/url]



ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s civilian leaders should capitalise on public anger with the military and try to ease its grip on power, a leading human rights activist and lawyer said on Tuesday.



The army’s image has been dented by a number of setbacks starting with the killing of Osama bin Laden last month by US special forces on Pakistani soil. [color="#FF0000"]Traditionally seen as untouchable, Pakistan’s generals now face strong public criticism.[/color]



Asma Jahangir, a leading human rights campaigner and head of the Supreme Court Bar Association, said the mood in the country provided an opportunity to start correcting a lopsided balance of power between the army and the civilian government.



“I am hopeful that public opinion will finally embolden civil society, including politicians. But it’s not going to happen tomorrow morning,” she told Reuters in a telephone interview.



“It’s going to be a perpetual struggle. They are not just going to hand over and say ‘thank you very much we are now under civilian control’. But at least they know that’s what people want now.”



The military has ruled nuclear-armed Pakistan for more than half of its history. Generals set security and foreign policy, even when civilian governments are in power, as is the case now.



The 600,000-strong army also runs a vast business empire that includes oil and gas interests, cereals and real estate.



“Our parliament has to strengthen itself for anyone to change because nobody hands over power just voluntarily,” said Jahangir.



“The parliament will have to be more forceful and also begin to realise that they (the army) can’t hold the economy of this country hostage, foreign policy hostage.”



Pakistan’s civilian leaders don’t seem willing to stand up to the military in a country prone to army coups. Generals often orchestrate Pakistani politics from behind the scenes.



“They have selfishly overlooked the interests of the people of Pakistan. We think that it’s time to change,” said Jahangir.



The army says it does not interfere in politics and reiterated its commitment to democracy in a statement issued this month.



Jahangir said she is hopeful of change because the military has been on the defensive. The United States kept Pakistan in the dark over the raid that killed bin Laden, humiliating the army and then piling pressure on it to crack down harder on militancy.



About 25 percent of government expenditure flows to the defence budget, according to some estimates, in a country with widespread poverty and social inequalities.



“The government needs to make legislation on intelligence agencies. They need to debate the defence budget. They don’t need to cut it but at least they need to debate it,” said Jahangir.



“There are parliamentary committees that are oversight structures for them. And there needs to be more parliamentary committees which are more effective.”



To make matters worse for the military, suspicion fell on its Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) spy agency after a prominent Pakistani journalist was tortured to death and dumped in a canal. The ISI said it played no role in his death.



Then the killing of an apparently unarmed man by paramilitary forces which was caught on videotape further eroded what little public confidence remains in Pakistan’s security forces.



Jahangir said politicians and Pakistanis should move swiftly, but cautiously, to try and strengthen civilian institutions while the military seems vulnerable.



“Momentarily they are a bit worried. They are vulnerable to the extent that people are besieging them to change. It is critical,” she said.



“They have a way of overcoming it too. They know that this is momentary. They will soon start getting their civilian counterparts to change public opinion to confuse the issue, to demonise people. We have seen it happen before.”



Cheers

[ramana]

The Abortabad raid was a strategic defeat for the TSPA. I don't think massa wanted it that way but things take a course of their own once initiated. The double whammy was the PNS Mehran raid by whoever.

[Naresh]

.





[url="http://www.thefridaytimes.com/beta2/tft/article.php?issue=20110624&page=31"][center][size="7"][color="#006400"]ITTEFAQ NAMA[/color][/size][/center][/url]



We politicians are doing each others mother-sister these days. Zardari is calling me maulvi. I am calling him crupt. I sent him message that don't do this. Thought keeps hunting me that what we are doing is bad for democracy. Then don't say me, I told him. Phhirr mujhe na kehna. But Zardari is not going from tuss to muss. He is writing democracy on tip of shoe. Problem with Zardari is that he is not educated. In order to be politician, you have to know Englush, Geography, Hysteria and Science. I sent message to Zardari that you don't know alif bay of Science, haw you can be politician, hain ji? He replied that he knows everything about Science there is to know, in fact he knows universe a lot. He said he was planning to do space travel before he became President of Pakistan. Achha, I said, to which planet you were going, hain ji? He said, "Uranus". Fury climbed on me. "Why not Uranus?" I shouted. Then he slammed phoon.



I rang him and said, "You say sorry to me. We are old family from behind. I can trace my ancestry to royalty". "To whom?" he asked, "King Kong?" I did ignore of that comment. Instead I told Zardari that his lack of education showed. He should go to London and join adult literacy classes and leaf government to me. He shot back that he was expert in all fields of learning, especially medicine. Achha, I said, ok tell me what is an artery? It is study of fine paintings, he said. What is bacteria? It is back door to Presidency's cafeteria, he said. What is bowel, I asked. It is two things he said - first it is letters like a, e, i, o, u and it is also to put soup in. What is coma, I asked. It is punctuation mark, he said. Dilate? Late Princess Diana. Cat scan? Searching for Mano Billi. Cortizone? Area around Supreme Court out of bounds for PPP. Cyst? Loving short name for sister. Duodenum? Besharam and modren couple in blue jeans. Gallbladder? Bladder of a girl. Hernia? She is close by. Impotent? Distinguished person. Liposuction? French kiss. Pacemaker? Asma Jehangir of Human Rights Commission and expected winner of Nobel Peace Prize. Secretion? Hiding something from ISI. Subcutaneous? Not cute enough, example Karishma Kapoor as opposed to Kareena Kapoor who is very cute.



You may have all the right answers in medicine, I told Zardari, but you are still a prawn in the hands of the military. I am not, he shouted, I've told them I will make peace with India and I am very qualified because I have become a vegetarian. Hahaha I laughed, remember that faujis they will not let you because they are humanitarians. They eat human beings who disagree with them.



[center][size="5"]NS[/size][/center]



Cheers

[Naresh]

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[url="http://asiancorrespondent.com/57874/pakistans-india-policy-and-the-tyranny-of-arithmetic/"][center][SIZE="6"][color="#006400"]Pakistan’s India policy, and the tyranny of arithmetic[/color][/SIZE][/center][/url]



First of all, before reading any further, you should go read this excellent op-ed in Dawn by Adnan Rehmat [url="http://www.dawn.com/2011/06/20/for-pakistan-time-to-try-india-as-a-friend.html"]For Pakistan, time to try India as a friend.[/url] For me, this is the key section:



[center]The military early on crafted a national security doctrine that helped it manufacture a national security state (as opposed to a national welfare state). This is based on the supposed “clear and continuing” danger from India to unravel Pakistan. The doctrine extrapolates that this “perpetual threat” is a projection of India’s supposed “capacity” to hurt Pakistan rather than its intention to make peace.



The problem with this contention is that India may have the same stance on Pakistan, which means this is a formula for an unending arms race and not a remedy to war, which should be state’s priority. India’s ruling elites may have been averse to the idea of Pakistan and hostile to the new country in the early decades but it follows that after the acquisition of nuclear weapons by Pakistan and their testing in 1998, the deterrent has demolished any existential threat to Pakistan from India. The Lahore summit between the popularly elected civilian governments of both countries (Sharif’s in Islamabad and Vajpayee’s in New Delhi) within a year of the nuclear tests was an affirmation of this new reality. So why no let-up in the paranoia even 15 years down the line?[/center]



The issue here is very simple: rapprochement with India is a strategic necessity for the Pakistani state. This is a very simple and very correct point that sometimes gets lost in the national security discourse in Pakistan. But really, it is the point from which all other analysis should depart.



In a post last week, I showed a chart of the CINC scores of China and the U.S. As some of you may recall, the CINC score is a composite index of state power drawn by the Correlates of War project, including a country’s defense spending, industrial production, and total and urban populations. It is basically a measure of a state’s material power. You may buy its methodology or you may not, but most people will concede that trends and trajectories do reveal themselves over time with data like this.



So I got curious and plotted India’s and Pakistan’s CINC scores since 1947. This is what it looks like :



[center][/center]



And just for kicks, here’s a chart of the countries’ respective GDPs over time :



[center][/center]



[color="#FF0000"]Now, call me crazy, but that’s not a race we can win. Hell, it’s not even a race we should race.[/color]



One thing to note is that this really shouldn’t be an establishment/bloody civvies issue. It shouldn’t be a rural-urban issue. It shouldn’t be a mullah-liberal issue. It should not be a Pakistaniat-ghaddar issue. It shouldn’t be an ANP-MQM or PML(N)-PPP issue, or even an Imran-Miandad issue.



At the end of the day, this is simply a matter of numbers. It’s the tyranny of arithmetic. Look at those graphs above. Those blue and red lines are not conveying anything about ideology or identity or injustice. It’s just numbers, nothing more, nothing less. All Pakistanis should be able to look at them and agree on what they say.



Now, if we start from the proposition that we cannot win an arms race with India, then a whole bunch of other things becomes clear. For example, India’s force positions and scary-sounding battle plans like Cold Start should not be taken as a sign that we should ramp things up from our end. They should be taken as a sign to withdraw from security competition altogether, especially since the state’s external security is guaranteed with its nuclear arsenal.



You will notice that I’m leaving the whole angle of domestic politics out of this. That is to say, even without considering factors such as the military’s outsized influence in our state apparatus and society, and how the dispute with India feeds the military beast, [color="#FF0000"]it’s still a strategically sound choice to withdraw from a race we are destined to lose.[/color] On a purely interstate level of analysis, no reasonable person can call for anything else, based on the facts and empirics of the case.



It’s interesting that the upper echelons of the military establishment are spoken of, by both local and some international observers, as being cunning and Sun Tzu-ian and being inherently aware of Pakistan’s strategic needs — realists par excellence. [color="#FF0000"]But a real realist would recognize that security competition with India is the precise opposite of what our national interest calls for. There really is no way to get past this[/color].



Cheers

[Naresh]

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[url="http://www.dunyanews.tv/index.php?key=Q2F0SUQ9MiNOaWQ9MjkwNzc="]Police regain Kolachi police station : 12 cops killed[/url]



Police have regained control of Kolachi police station after hours-long shootout with terrorists.



Twelve policemen, including an SHO, were killed in the terrorist attack on the police station in DI Khan.



The police station was taken over by a group of terrorists holding positions on the rooftop of the police station. The Army and other security forces rounded up the police station and were engaged in a shootout with the terrorists holed up inside.



The terrorists, [color="#FF0000"]one of them wearing full veil or burqa[/color], entered the police station, and gun shots were heard soon after. They locked the police station from the inside and took positions on the rooftop.



The number of the terrorists holding up inside is not immediate clear. However, unconfirmed reports put their number between 7 and 20.



The takeover of the police station by militants sparked an hours-long standoff. At least two of the intruders reportedly blew themselves up in two suicide bombings.



Three explosions rocked the police station building in quick succession, setting off plumes of smoke into the sky.



At least two dozen police officers had been inside the building when the militants stormed it; two wounded officers had managed to get out.



Between seven and 20 attackers, some wearing suicide vests and others armed with grenades and guns were involved, according to local officials.



A police official said the first blast was caused by a suicide bomber who blew himself up when an armored vehicle tried to enter the compound.



At least one of the other two explosions also was caused by a suicide bomber, said regional police chief Imtiaz Shah. He said at least 10 police officers had been killed, while five others were wounded.



The Taliban meanwhile claimed reponsibility for the police station rain.



Cheers

[Guest]

Something wrong with above story, why after killing cops everyone went to rooftop to get surrounded by Army? Number 7-20 is also some fishy number. My take, one Burqa did this job and criminals escaped from holed up and went upstairs. Person who escaped with Burqa must be real reason for this action. This must be a petty rescue operation by Burqa and Paki Army is trying to show Machoness.

[Naresh]

[quote name='Mudy' date='26 June 2011 - 11:36 AM' timestamp='1309067932' post='112043']

Something wrong with above story, why after killing cops everyone went to rooftop to get surrounded by Army? Number 7-20 is also some fishy number. My take, one Burqa did this job and criminals escaped from holed up and went upstairs. Person who escaped with Burqa must be real reason for this action. This must be a petty rescue operation by Burqa and Paki Army is trying to show Machoness.

[/quote]



Mudy Ji :



You remind me of "Begani Shaadi Mein Abdulla Diwana".



It is either the Better Muslims are Cleanising the Religion of Peace, Land of the Pure and the Home of the Terrorist by getting rid of the not so "Better" Muslims OR this is some sort of Pakistani Population Control.



Any way it is their own Problem.



As Alfred E. Newman said "What, Me Worry?".



Cheers

[Naresh]

.



[url="http://www.dunyanews.tv/index.php?key=Q2F0SUQ9MiNOaWQ9MjkzMTI="][center][size="5"][color="#006400"]Pakistan won't last war with India for 45 days : Mukhtar[/color][/size][/center][/url]



In a shocker, Defence Minister Ahmed Mukhtar has opened a verbal front against his own country.



In an interview with a western broadcasting company, the worthy defence minister said Pakistan’s military might is half that of India’s. He also said Pakistan doesn’t have the capacity to fight a war with India for 45 days.



Ahmed Mukhtar went a step further to reveal that the government of Pakistan knew where the Taliban were. It’s not difficult to trace and contact them (the Taliban), he said.



He, however, added that the Abbottabad operation that killed Osama bin Laden was not security’s failure.



Note : Mukhtar Mian is "Overstepping" his brief - actually Pakistan expects every war with India to last for three weeks :



Pehlay Panga Laitay Hain… : 15m 15s Onwards



[center][Media]http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4231379743367403281#[/Media][/center]



Seminar: Relationship b/w Pakistan and India, Pakitan 2005 (Part 3 of 3)



Cheers

[Naresh]

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[url="http://www.thenews.com.pk/TodaysPrintDetail.aspx?ID=7026&Cat=13"][center][size="6"][color="#006400"]Many have left Pakistan Army or were sent home[/color][/size][/center][/url]



ISLAMABAD : Disciplinary violations in Pakistan’s defence forces have increased in the recent years, as like the ordinary public, hearts and minds in the military also are divided on the issue of the so-called US war on terror.

Despite being part of the highly-controversial US war whose targets are Muslims, the motto of the Pakistan military, however, continues to be Islam-centric i.e. Imaan, Taqwa, Jehad Fi-Sabeelillah (Faith, Fear of God, Jehad in the way of Allah).



The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) confirms that there is no change in this motto. To a question, the ISPR also said since the foundation of the Constitution of Islamic Republic of Pakistan is Islamic, so the Pakistan Army also follows the Islamic ideology. Sources within the military also said despite all pressures, there was no intention to change this particular colour of the country’s defence forces.



However, it is accepted that it is the friction between the military’s post 9/11 Washington-dictated role and its well-entrenched Islamic outlook that it has been facing growing cases of indiscipline. Brigadier Ali’s case, being the latest one, is also considered as the outcome of the same contradiction. The family of Brigadier Ali has already revealed that he was victimised by the then dictator and military chief General Musharraf, whom he confronted over the so-called US-led war on terror.



Eversince Musharraf decided to become a part of the US war on terror, numerous military officials have either opted to seek premature retirement or were sacked or forcibly retired for not willing to be part of this controversial war. The military authorities, however, never shared with the media the number of such military officials.



It was Opposition Leader Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, who in a recent statement, cautioned the military to stick to its fundamentals (Islamic ideology) to save the state and the institution of the Army from collapse. When asked about the recent arrest of Brigadier Ali, he said although he does not know the background of the case, this suffocating environment is a serious matter of concern for him. He said the basic foundation of the Pakistan defence forces is attached to the Islamic faith and that Pakistan Army was also the Army of Islam.



He warned that any effort to divide the armed forces on secular and religious lines would be disastrous for both the state and military. He added the unity of Pakistan and its armed forces were linked to the Islamic ideology and faith.



Chaudhry Nisar’s statement is seen as a clear message to the military establishment that any further toeing of the US dictates would damage Pakistan and further the divisions not only within the society, but also within the rank and file of the Army.



Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf chief Imran Khan also shares the same opinion. Instead, he was the first one to have warned the top military command in his public statement that launching a military operation in North Waziristan must be ignored to avoid serious rift within the defence forces. In Imran Khan’s view, the Pakistan military could not live on if it is secularised and detached from its Islamic vision.



Cheers

[Naresh]

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[url="http://www.dawn.com/2011/06/28/the-most-lethal-bomb.html"][center][size="7"][color="#006400"]The most lethal bomb[/color][/size][/center][/url]



Michael Kugelman



ON May 3, while Pakistanis were reeling from the immediate aftermath of the Abbottabad affair, the United Nations Population Division was releasing its updated demographic projections for the country.



Understandably, these new estimates garnered little, if any, attention in Pakistan. Yet they bear mentioning here, given how drastically they differ from previous projections. According to the revised medium-variant estimates, Pakistan will have 275 million people by 2050 — significantly less than the 335 million forecast previously. If fertility rates remain constant, the country will hold about 380 million people by that year — not the 450 million estimated earlier.



What to make of these lowered projections? Has the population bomb, in effect, been defused?



Far from it. Even if the estimates have been downgraded, Pakistan’s population growth is still soaring. The country’s total fertility rate (TFR) is currently about 3.6, significantly higher than the replacement level rate (2.1) now registering across much of the world. A quarter of Pakistan’s women wish for, but do not use, some form of contraception, which is due in part to the fact that many rural Pakistani women must travel, on average, 50 to 100 kilometres to receive family planning services. Unsurprisingly, the country’s contraception prevalence rate (CPR) registers at only 30 per cent. Little wonder Pakistan has the highest population growth, birth, and fertility rates in South Asia.



Ultimately, however, one must not let the UN estimates about future population growth detract from an essential point:



Pakistan can barely support its existing population. As much as a third of Pakistanis may lack access to safe drinking water.



Seventy-seven million are food-insecure. [color="#FF0000"]Forty million out of the country’s 70 million 5-to-19 year-olds do not attend school.[/color]



Half the population is not fully active in the labour force, while women’s labour participation rates barely crack 20 per cent.



Such statistics have a silencing effect on all the happy talk about the country’s potential to experience a “demographic dividend” in which a young, growing workforce helps usher in national prosperity and development. So does the observation of Nadeem ul Haque, the deputy chair of the Planning Commission, that Pakistan will require nine per cent GDP growth (it is now 2.4pc) to employ its nearly 100-million-strong under-20 population.



From this silence emerges a drumbeat of demographic doom. [color="#FF0000"]It warns of cities overflowing with the hungry and the homeless, nationwide natural resource scarcities, and youth radicalisation — all scenarios becoming more realistic than remote by the day.[/color]



Pakistan’s demographic conundrum arguably constitutes the country’s greatest development challenge. This is because of its sheer magnitude, but also because there is no supply-side quick-fix. Policymakers can erect dams to generate more water, or authorise more grain production to increase food supply, but (short of a China-style one-child policy) they cannot flick a switch to produce fewer people. Nor, presumably, would they wish to do so.



As a result, Pakistan’s population policies effectively boil down to a plethora of vague promises (rarely kept) about making future progress toward improving an alphabet soup of demographic indicators. While one day achieving targets for lower TFRs and higher CPRs would be lovely, the need of the moment is to devise concrete, actionable policies that ease the plight of today’s population.



These may include convening a high-level task force to oversee the development of a universal education plan; generating incentives for the private sector to ramp up investment in urban housing, jobs, and basic services; and better educating Pakistani clergy and men — groups that often oppose women’s contraception use in Pakistan — about the merits of family planning services.



To be sure, all this takes time and political will, both of which are in short supply, given Pakistan’s multitude of real-time challenges and the extreme caution prevailing in policymaking circles during such volatile times.



Admittedly, in an era of deep public scepticism toward the government, it is difficult for Islamabad to convince the Pakistani people that population policies are genuinely meant to bolster the country’s economic development and social well-being, and not to control population growth and meddle in their personal lives.



The highly politicised process of conducting this year’s national census (the first since 1998) is also problematic. The Sindh Census Monitoring Committee recently accused census workers of committing “large-scale malpractices.” How can Pakistan be in a better position to allocate scarce resources equitably among its masses if, as alleged by the committee, washrooms and electric poles are counted as houses?



Pakistan’s politicians, however, have not exactly treated the census with solemnity and respect. Last year, according to media reports, the census commissioner had to delay his announcement that the census would occur in 2011 because members of the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Economic Affairs and Statistics failed to show up. Then, once the commissioner finally began speaking, another MP left the room.



This lack of interest is as disturbing as the allegations of improprieties. In fact, discussions about broader demographics are rare in Pakistan. Other than periodic recitations of distressing statistics, occasional conferences, and an obligatory speech on World Population Day, little debate transpires. Zeba Sathar, one of Pakistan’s top demographers, has lamented how demographic issues are effectively “sidelined” by matters perceived as more pressing.



As Pakistan’s population continues to rise, as the strain on natural resources and basic services intensifies, and as the masses grow more and more restless, one shudders at the long-term implications of such inattention and inaction.



The writer is the South Asia programme associate at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and lead editor of Reaping the Dividend: Overcoming Pakistan’s Demographic Challenges.



michael.kugelman@wilsoncenter.org



Cheers

[Naresh]

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[url="http://www.thenews.com.pk/NewsDetail.aspx?ID=17782"][color="#FF0000"]PNS Mehran attackers had inside help[/color] : Navy officials[/url]



ISLAMABAD : The National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Defense has been briefed by the Navy on the PNS Mehran attack probe, Geo News reported.



According to the sources, Navy officials said that four terrorists were involved in the attack [color="#FF0000"]and evidence had also been found which indicated that the terrorists were receiving help from inside the base.[/color]



The in-camera briefing lasted for two hours. The committee was told that the internal probe of the attack was completed but the investigation into the external factors was still being conducted.



Cheers

[Naresh]

Mudy Ji & Ramana Ji :



Your take on this please!



[url="http://ww.thenews.com.pk/TodaysPrintDetail.aspx?ID=55606&Cat=9&dt=7/2/2011w"]Time to move on[/url]



The booklet Opportunities in the Development of the Oil and Gas Sector in South Asia, published by the Institute of Strategic Studies in 2004, is based on a speech by Usman Aminuddin. The former minister of petroleum and natural resources is a man of expertise and capacity who is full of ideas. I was struck by the concluding statement in the booklet: “Hydrogen and fuel-cell technology represents a strategic choice for energy deficient-countries like India and Pakistan...The launch of a South Asia hydrogen and fuel-cell technology platform through the South Asian Infrastructure Fund (SAIF) could lead to a long-term South Asian strategy for hydrogen and fuel cells to guide the transition to a hydrogen future in the next 20-30 years...This vision on which many countries of the world are working is a vital area of cooperation between the governments of India and Pakistan. This is a vision of peace and prosperity for the poor masses of both countries.”



Fast-forward to June 2011 and Dr Shireen Mazari is giving a talk from the STR platform on “The security route to cooperation.” Of the four initiatives, or CBMs as she calls them, the first is intrinsically similar in spirit to the one proposed by Mr Aminuddin back in 2004. [color="#FF0000"]After “some movement on Kashmir,” of which she discerns signs within the Indian civil society and human rights organisations, and after display of political will by the governments of India and Pakistan for settlements to the Siachin and Sir Creek issues,[/color] Dr Mazari unveils the centrepiece of [color="#FF0000"]“the security route to cooperation” between India and Pakistan: joint nuclear-power generation.[/color] She says by way of explanation: “After all, both Pakistan and India are conventional energy-deficient states and both are overt nuclear powers. So, there is no reason not to cooperate in the field of civil nuclear energy, with both countries sharing joint control of the relevant technology.” She also says that “the civil reactors built jointly for this purpose could be along the Indo-Pakistani border which would, in turn, add to their security also. Civil nuclear cooperation is not just a CBM, but an actual economic multiplier.”



Interestingly, according to Dr Mazari’s paper, the International Atomic Energy Agency has also advocated Multilateral Nuclear Approaches (MNAs) in the field of civil nuclear power generation projects. An IAEA study on the issue was published as a result of experts’ deliberations in 2005. The conclusions of this study were very interesting and useful from our perspective. Identifying the twin objectives of “Assurance of Non-Proliferation” and “Assurance of Supply and Services,” the report concluded that perhaps “the best way to satisfy both these objectives simultaneously was to adopt multilateral approaches.”



Pakistan has repeatedly projected its need for nuclear power generation. At the April 2010 Nuclear Summit in Washington, a Pakistani official stated: “Pakistan has legitimate needs for power generation to meet the growing energy demand of our expanding economy. Civil nuclear power generation under IAEA safeguards is an essential part of our national energy security plan to support sustained economic growth and industrial development...As a country with advanced fuel-cycle capability, Pakistan is in a position to provide nuclear fuel-cycle services under IAEA safeguards and to participate in any non-discriminatory nuclear fuel-cycle assurance mechanism.” Almost the same holds true for India in terms of need and competence in the nuclear field. Does it, therefore, follow that the two should proceed further with doing the obvious as a joint venture?



The requirement becomes even more urgent because, according to Dr Mazari, “the present nuclear deterrent between Pakistan and India has moved the two countries out of a zero-sum environment towards a positive-sum environment where both have everything to lose in case of a nuclear war – whatever the causes of the outbreak – and, therefore, both should recognise mutuality of interests, instead of seeking to play a game of brinkmanship with dangerous doctrines like “limited war” and “Cold Start.”



Interestingly, it is the US again that is trying to alter the rules of the game in the nuclear proliferation field by seeking India-specific alterations for ensuring its membership of the suppliers’ cartels relating to WMD. But, according to Dr Mazari, “country-specific moves for India would ultimately result in criteria-based exceptions, as otherwise such moves would be regarded as Pakistan-specific, which cannot be viable in the long run.”



The convergence of ideas between Usman Aminuddin and Dr Mazari is not just coincidental. It has enormous substance to it in terms of a genuine move towards bringing progress to this war-torn part of the world. Whether it is Usman Aminuddin’s “hydrogen vision” or Dr Mazari’s “security route to cooperation,” they add substantially to efforts already underway in the shape of “Track-11” and “Aman ki Asha.” We need to review them positively by untangling ourselves from the web of hatred that our leaderships have systematically built around us, burying us under its debris through decades. It is time to move away from enmity and embrace the desire to initiate efforts for relieving the two countries of the burden of an undesirable past and stepping into a future that would unfold the prospect of sustainable peace.



But bilateral cooperation emanates from political will. Unfortunately, of that there is enormous dearth on both sides. While the Indians are stuck with the post-Mumbai mindset and refuse to budge, the Pakistani leadership is mired in the whirlpool of deep-set corruption and its persistent efforts to save itself through means that are mostly unconstitutional and immoral. Time really has come when the right to rule has to be taken away from the traditionally corrupt leaderships which use the instruments of hatred to prolong their hold on power and, instead, pass it to a new generation of transparent and dedicated individuals who come with the desire to serve the cause of the poor and the needy by working for peace.



The writer is a political analyst. [color="#FF0000"]He is also an adviser to Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf.[/color] Email: raoofhasan@hotmail.com



Cheers

[Naresh]

.

Self Delete

[Naresh]

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[url="http://www.dunyanews.tv/index.php?key=Q2F0SUQ9MiNOaWQ9Mjk4MzM="][color="#FF0000"]Foreign troops to be deployed on Pak-Afghan border[/color][/url]



Head of Nato, US forces General David Petraeus has said there was a lot to be done in Afghanistan.



Addressing a ceremony at Bagram Airbase on the occasion of independence day he said allies were trying to gain strength on south and south western front, so that defence could be strengthened from Kabul to the tribal areas of Pakistan.



In the next few months the troops would be deployed here, he added.



General Petraeus is going to be retired soon to take over CIA as its chief.



Cheers

[Naresh]

.



Self Delete

[Naresh]

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[url="http://www.thefridaytimes.com/beta2/tft/article.php?issue=20110708&page=32"][center][size="6"][color="#006400"]Such Gup[/color][/size][/center][/url]



[center]Of paupers and princes[/center]



The scion of a wealthy industrial family went to Harrods for a spot of shopping last month and walked into the Men's Casuals department. He saw a beautifully crafted blazer and was sorely tempted to buy it. When he looked at the price tag, he saw that it was for £ 5500. He didn't think twice about it and decided immediately that it was far too expensive to even contemplate buying. Last week he returned to Pakistan and went to one of Lahore's fancy eateries for lunch where what should he see but a dude in his mid-30s sporting the same blazer and wielding a state-of-the-art Vertu Ascent mobile phone, an expensive toy which is popular with the rich. Intrigued, he asked who this prince might be in this country of paupers, and was shocked to discover that he was the son of one of the highest functionaries of the state, a man entrusted to keep a sharp eye out for corruption in high places.



[center]Paucity of manpower[/center]



For those who've been thinking how we came to be Informed by Paradise Lover, let us tell you that the buzz from on high is that the Invisible Soldiers Inc. recommended her. The mind boggles about the whys and wherefores but there you have it. The problem now is that Paradise Lover isn't taken at all seriously. So Hubby is having second thoughts. Problem is, there's nobody to replace her with, such is the paucity of manpower in the party.



[center]Getting personal[/center]



A policy recommendation by counter-terrorism expert Bruce Riedel, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, former CIA analyst, and officer of the US National Security Council, should give some people a few sleepless nights. Riedel recommends that "things should get personal" if the khakis' leadership is found to be harbouring, promoting or protecting terrorists. He says that instead of punishing Pakistan, such officers should be taken to task - put on terror lists, arrested when traveling, property seizures affected, and their families expelled from the US and UK. "Don't sanction the country", Riedel recommends, "sanction individuals. Hold them accountable". It's well known that anti-Americanism is the perfect mantra for the homeland but those who spin it, have families and fortunes safely tucked away in the West. This is true for an extremely high official who packed off his family first to the UAE and then to the UK.



Cheers

[Naresh]

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[url="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/jul/7/down-goes-the-us-pakistan-alliance/?page=all#pagebreak"]DE BORCHGRAVE : Down goes the US-Pakistan alliance[/url].



Taliban-Pakistan cooperation goes too far



Fickle friends and strong enemies at the same time is the hard-to-decipher mojo at either end of the Pakistan-U.S. strategic relationship. Each time relations are said to have reached rock bottom, someone, somewhere continues to dig.



President George W. Bush elevated Pakistan to “major non-NATO ally” in 2004. Pakistan’s homegrown terrorists and their military backers gleefully ignored the promotion as they covertly continued to back Taliban in Afghanistan.



U.S. policymakers and roving ambassadors never quite captured the essence of the misalliance. Ever since Pakistan was carved out of India 64 years ago to become an independent Muslim state, the relationship has oscillated between love and hate, seldom at the same time for both.



Section S of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency operates pretty much as a state within a state with plausible deniability. Those selected by a supersecret fraternity for service in Section S after they officially retire from ISI aren’t known to the chief of army staff, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, or the ISI chief, Gen. Shuja Pasha.



Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari speaks what he believes to be the truth when he dismisses “S” as a figment of fevered James Bondish imaginations in America.



But when a Pakistani journalist writes scathing pieces about Islamist militants in the Pakistani army, he is kidnapped, and his mutilated body is found a month later.



U.S. intelligence, which demonstrated its prowess in Pakistan by discovering Osama bin Laden’s hideaway near Pakistan’s West Point and guiding a SEAL team to kill him, soon uncovered the culprit. ISI had ordered the journalist, Saleem Shahzad, 40, of the Asia Times, executed.



That wasn’t good enough for the executioners. They inflicted 17 lacerated wounds, a ruptured liver and two broken ribs.



The message to the Pakistani media : No reporting or writing on Islamist militants in the armed forces. The supertaboo : No mention of Islamist officers possibly linked to Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal.



Pakistan’s ultrasecret assistance to the Taliban fighting U.S. and allied forces in Afghanistan is another proscribed topic for the media.



Slowly thawing after the May 2 killing of bin Laden, Washington’s relations with Islamabad took another vertiginous plunge.



ISI’s principal anti-U.S. talisman is retired Gen. Hamid Gul, who ran the intelligence service during the closing phases (1987-89) of the mujahedeen campaign against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. He became a bitter enemy of the United States after Washington walked away from the Afghan engagement and began punishing Pakistan for its secret development of nuclear weapons.



For 10 years, Washington banned Pakistani officers from U.S. staff schools and all manner of military training. Gen. Gul became their anti-U.S. mascot. He also was a close friend of bin Laden’s during the campaign against the Soviet army and again when the Saudi rebel returned to Afghanistan in 1996.



Gen. Gul was on a trip to Afghanistan, returning home two weeks before Sept. 11, 2001. He told this reporter three weeks after 9/11, in his home in Rawalpindi, that the attacks were the work of a Mossad-CIA plot in which the U.S. Air Force was involved. Today, countless millions of Pakistanis believe the monstrous canard, as do millions of others around the world, including in the United States.



President Zardari says, “Gul is more of a political ideologue of terror rather than a physical supporter.” Translation: “I don’t dare touch him lest he order me terminated.”



U.S. diplomatic documents released by WikiLeaks portray Gen. Gul as the public face of an underground Pakistani network to push the United States out of Afghanistan.



The general may yet prove useful to an Afghan denouement. He recently told Hubertus Hoffmann, president of the World Security Network: “What’s needed are direct talks between high echelons of Taliban leadership and the U.S. State Department. It shouldn’t take more than a month to set the stage. Only the U.S. should be involved with Pakistan as a facilitator. A peaceful, stable and prosperous Afghanistan automatically provides strength and depth to Pakistan.”



Gen. Gul’s appreciation of the Taliban’s fighting strength obviously is at odds with U.S. Army Gen. David H. Petraeus’ assessment as he leaves the theater and the Army to take over the CIA: “Taliban have grown from strength to strength over the years, from the failure of Operation Anaconda in 2003 to the fiasco of Operation Mushtarak at Marjah in Helmand province. They have become more confident, and their ranks have swelled to around 50,000 fighting men. Now that they are sensing victory, their morale is extremely high.



“Increasingly, the Afghan population is turning to them as an alternative to [President Hamid] Karzai’s corrupt and incompetent administration,” concludes Taliban chief Mullah Omar’s best Pakistani friend.



Asked whether the alliance of the Taliban and Pakistan will be renewed, an honest answer from Gen. Gul would be, “It was never discontinued.” Instead - and more interestingly - he replied: “The future government need not necessarily be exclusively Taliban. Pakistan will have to deal with whoever is in command in Kabul … and Taliban have reformed substantially compared to their earlier conduct in governance.”



Women’s rights - mangled in bloodshed while the Taliban was in power (1996-2001) - “can easily be resolved,” self-appointed Taliban spokesman Gul now says. “Islamic Shariah,” as practiced by Persian Gulf countries, is the answer. “It will take time before women can be in equal positions due to the orthodox nature of that society. Yet I see no difficulty for them to become doctors, teachers and working women in other vocations.”



Assuming such a deal could be worked out around a green baize-covered table with a Pakistani delegation sitting at a separate table as observers, that would still leave the big enchilada - a nuclear power that is providing covert assistance for planning, training and protection to extremist Islamist groups.



Lashkar-e-Taiba, trained, protected and guided by ISI’s Section S, attacked targets in Mumbai over three days in November 2008, killed 164 and wounded 308. India came close to unsheathing its nuclear sword.



Arnaud de Borchgrave is editor-at-large of The Washington Times and United Press International.



Cheers

[Guest]

[url="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/10/world/asia/10intel.html?_r=1"]U.S. Is Deferring Millions in Pakistani Military Aid[/url]

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is suspending and, in some cases, canceling hundreds of millions of dollars of aid to the Pakistani military, in a move to chasten Pakistan for expelling American military trainers and to press its army to fight militants more effectively. <img src='http://www.india-forum.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />



Coupled with a statement from the top American military officer last week linking Pakistan’s military spy agency to the recent murder of a Pakistani journalist, the halting or withdrawal of military equipment and other aid to Pakistan illustrates the depth of the debate inside the Obama administration over how to change the behavior of one of its key counterterrorism partners.



Altogether, about $800 million in military aid and equipment, or over one-third of the more than $2 billion in annual American security assistance to Pakistan, could be affected, three senior United States officials said.



This aid includes about $300 million to reimburse Pakistan for some of the costs of deploying more than 100,000 soldiers along the Afghan border to combat terrorism, as well as hundreds of millions of dollars in training assistance and military hardware, according to half a dozen Congressional, Pentagon and other administration officials who were granted anonymity to discuss the politically delicate matter.



Some of the curtailed aid is equipment that the United States wants to send but Pakistan now refuses to accept, like rifles, ammunition, body armor and bomb-disposal gear that were withdrawn or held up after Pakistan ordered more than 100 Army Special Forces trainers to leave the country in recent weeks.

......

[Guest]

[url="http://www.dawn.com/2011/07/10/Pakistan-asks-us-to-share-al-zawahiri-intel.html"]Pakistan asks US to share al-Zawahiri intel[/url]



<img src='http://www.india-forum.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' /> <img src='http://www.india-forum.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/biggrin.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' />

[Arun_S]

How ironic, US investing in mango farms. knowing how Zia Ul Haq was dispatched to hell by a mango crate that was loaded on the plane that crashed.





[url="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/14/arts/14iht-idbriefs14C.1.13692151.html"]Mohammed Hanif's 'A Case of Exploding Mangoes'[/url]



[url="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/14/arts/14iht-idbriefs14C.1.13692151.html"]http://www.nytimes.c...1.13692151.html[/url]

The US has invested in a number of mango orchards in Pakistan

26 May 2011

[url="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-13561282"]The unloved US investment in Pakistan[/url]

By Aleem Maqbool BBC News, Southern Punjab