Terrorism defeated

During his visit to Pakistan from February 16 to 20, the United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres, lauded Pakistan’s unflinching efforts in eliminating terrorism. He also appreciated Pakistan’s humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan, especially for accommodating hundreds and thousands of Afghan refugees. He termed the security situation in Pakistan “absolutely remarkable”, and noted that Islamabad, which a few years back looked like a “fortress”, had now become a family station.

Mr Secretary-General highlighted two military operations, Zarb-e-Azb and Radd-ul-Fasaad, for their significant contribution to reducing terror-related incidents in Pakistan.

By 2009, Pakistan was teetering on the brink of terrorism. There was hardly any quiet moment; each day would bring a new jolt. Reconciliation efforts and Pakistan’s desire to sit down with the miscreants to resolve issues through dialogue would pull the situation further down. Finally, in 2014, Operation Zarb-e-Azb was launched by the then Pakistani army chief, General Raheel Sharif. After the Army Public School (APS) attack in December 2014, the scope of the operation was spread across the country. In a matter of three years, when a follow-up operation, Radd-ul-Fasaad was started by the new Army Chief, General Qamar Javed Bajwa, in 2017, Pakistan had largely disinfected the country from terrorism.

Radd-ul-Fasaad differed from the preceding operations in both its scope and dimension. It would be a joint civil and military initiative aimed at combing through every nook and corner of the country to take out terrorists and consolidate gains achieved from the National Action Plan (NAP).

Counterterrorism initiatives took a pace under Radd-ul-Fasaad. Since 2017, about 149,000 intelligence-based operations have been conducted. Without losing spirit to the 3,800 threats, 400 terrorist plans have been averted. All this would not have been possible had the jawans and the young military officers not shown the valour of a true soldier.

Another archetype of this new approach to defeating terrorism is the establishment of military courts. As yet, 344 accused have been sent to the gallows, while 301 accused have been sentenced to various durations of imprisonments.

Pakistan has been at the centre of counterterrorism activities since the unfolding of the war against terrorism after the attack on the World Trade Centre and Pentagon. To date, Pakistan has rolled out 350 major and 850 minor military operations — not to forget the challenge of bringing Karachi’s ranking down to 91 from number 6 on the World Crime Index.

Even open source data indicates that violence has declined considerably in Pakistan since 2017. According to the data released by the Centre for Research and Security Studies (CRSS) in Islamabad, “Pakistan witnessed a nearly 31% reduction in terror and counterterror-related fatalities in 2019. Only two militant outfits, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) splinter groups and the Islamic State (IS), claimed responsibility for 12 and one attacks, respectively, but their own ranks depleted by nearly 30%. Civilian fatalities declined by about 36%. A 30.71% drop in fatalities was observed in 2019 (from 980 in 2018 to 679 in 2019). If the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) province and the former Fata are counted as separate regions, Balochistan still remains the region’s most affected from militancy and insurgency. The largest drop in fatalities was observed in Balochistan (44.2%), followed by Fata (39%), Sindh (19%), and Punjab (11.8%).”

Pakistan also had other areas to contest while keeping its home at peace.

The relation with India grew from bad to worse in the same period. The Line of Control (LoC) has not been allowed to see a day of peace since Modi’s arrival at the helm of India’s affair. This engagement alone stretched the military thin, but never once did Pakistan feel insecure or did its sovereignty come under the hammer. After a befitting response to the Balakot attack in February 2019, Pakistan was able to balance the power scales with India, and prevented the altercation from escalating past the point of no return.

Over the last three years, Indian troops have committed 8,000 Cases of Fires (CFV), and the highest number of CFVs was reported in 2019. In terms of casualties, 2018 was the worst year.

The fencing of the Pak-Afghan border — a stretch of 2,611 kilometres — was another step towards plugging chasms that terrorists could use to infiltrate in either of the countries, to make matters worse.

It started in 2017, and so far 1,450 kilometres have been fenced and the remaining part will be completed by the end of this year. Of the 843 border forts, 343 have been completed and 61 are under construction.

In time, these military undertakings would form a part of a gamut of diplomatic efforts that improved Pakistan’s relations with Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Russia, Iran and other countries. Domestically, too, the famous one-page algorithm kept the civil-military relations in the right direction. Together these achievements enhanced Pakistan’s image at home and abroad.

A sight to behold was President Donald Trump’s appreciation of Pakistan’s efforts — that too in India and in front of Prime Minister Modi and thousands others. “Our relationship with Pakistan is a very good one. Thanks to these efforts, we are beginning to see signs of big progress with Pakistan and we are hopeful for reduced tensions, greater stability and the future of harmony for all of the nations of South Asia.”

Pakistan’s resilience against terrorism represents the cumulative success of the efforts of the civilian law enforcement agencies and the combined military force.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 27^th, 2020.

Like Opinion & Editorial on Facebook, follow @ETOpEd on Twitter to receive all updates on all our daily pieces.