Security concerns: ‘Commercial activities of the PAF base are not a threat’

However, police and other officials claim base is still insecure, open for surveillance.

KARACHI:

After the brazen terrorist attack on PNS Mehran base, there were concerns that commercial activities of the Pakistan Air Force Base Faisal - wedding ceremonies and the Pakistan Air Force Museum - will be a security threat. But navy officials overruled this argument.

A PAF official requesting anonymity said that everyone entering the museum is only allowed in after being thoroughly checked. Even their vehicles are checked and it is not possible for any terrorist to use the museum to get access to the bases, he added. The PAF Museum is open for public every day till 10 pm.

“From the museum gate at Sharae Faisal, the PNS Mehran is one-and-a-half kilometres away. If you walk through the museum, the distance increases. And the first thing you see when you reach is the base guardroom,” the official explained, reiterating that terrorists entering through the museum route is not plausible.

However, a senior police official told The Express Tribune that distance has no meaning in terrorism, adding that they are highly trained to cover long distances. “Taliban arrive in the cities from Waziristan and other tribal areas. They cover huge distances. So, how would covering a few kilometres to achieve their target be a problem for them?” In the naval base attack, the aircraft were parked at a distance, but the terrorists still got to them.

“Even if people attend weddings held here, they are properly checked,” the PAF official explained. Wedding ceremonies can only be held at the museum and the base area through a few contractors and caterers who are allowed to make arrangements. However, the Navy Public Relations director-general Irfanul Haq told The Express Tribune that no wedding ceremonies are being arranged in the naval base. He declined to comment if holding weddings and people entering the base was a threat.

Even on the day of the attack, a wedding ceremony was scheduled to be held at the PAF Museum that was affected. Another security concern is the residential area surrounding the base.  But investigators remained tight-lipped about internal security.

Easy ‘I Spy’

Surveillance seems to be pretty easy. Bridges, a railway track and other constructions make ‘keeping an eye’ on the base easy - which the terrorists are believed to have used to plan the siege.  The whole base is visible from the pedestrian crossing at Sharae Faisal. The media could see the operation clearly from that crossing. Overhead bridges, mainly the Drigh Road bridge, also has a good view of the PAF and PNS bases, which could be enough for terrorists to chalk out an attacking strategy.

Another navy official listed the Drigh Road residential area as well as the railway track along the boundary wall of the bases as potential surveillance or ‘spying’ points.

He also suggested that these could also serve as potential entry points to the bases. And there seems to be no solution. “We cannot remove the bridges, the railway track and the residential areas because of the base.”

Published in The Express Tribune, May 26^th, 2011.