A safe return

Reports that Awais Shah, son of Chief justice of Sindh, has been safely recovered in an IBO are to be warmly welcomed

Reports that Awais Shah, son of the Chief justice of Sindh, has been safely recovered in an intelligence-led operation are to be warmly welcomed. He was found chained and wearing a burqa, his mouth taped shut, between Dera Ismail Khan and Tank. Three men who were presumably his captors were killed in an exchange of fire and it is believed that they were in the process of transferring him to Afghanistan. This is a considerable coup for the intelligence services and speaks well of their coordination with other entities that also have fingers in the intelligence pie(s). What part if any the various police forces played in the recovery is unknown, but there has been considerable criticism of the police for their dilatory handling of the matter.



Tank is close to the South Waziristan tribal area and 885 Kms from Karachi where he was kidnapped. If nothing else this is indicative of the geographic reach of his captors who are said by the Interservices Public Relations (ISPR) to have been affiliated to either the TTP or one of its many franchises, or al Qaeda. In some ways whoever took him is immaterial, what matters is that high-profile kidnappings, often in broad daylight in busy cities rather than on remote or isolated roads, remains a top priority for terrorist as well as criminal gangs — and the borderline between the two is increasingly poorly defined.

High-profile kidnaps soak up vast police and intelligence resources as efforts are made to trace the victims; and for the terrorists and criminals they are an effective tactic as kidnap diverts interests and manpower from fighting them. Kidnap certainly spreads terror but we will have to await the debrief of Awais for the inside story, and even he may know little as his captors will have wanted to hide their intentions from him. It would appear that short of every high-profile person having armed, alert and uncorrupt guards on duty 24/7 there is little that can be done to completely avoid kidnapping. For now a safe and happy return, a job well done. But there will be a next time. Who knows.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 20^th, 2016.

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