More terrorism

It should not lie beyond the capacity of our security network, intelligence agencies to infiltrate the groups at work.

The same phrases, the same clauses, the same rhetoric is being heard again. Even the tone and tenor in which the words are uttered are unchanged. Following a blast targeting a Ranger’s vehicle at Gulistan-e-Jauhar in Karachi, the interior minister has ordered an inquiry and security has been placed on high alert in the city. In the past, such measures have had little impact in stopping militancy. What guarantee is there that they will work this time round? And then, what quite are our options? What can we do to stop the militants? The many questions need answers.

The latest incident, in which three Ranger’s personnel died and several others were injured, took place when a roadside bomb exploded. The paramilitary force was quite apparently the target — as it has been in the past. The toll could have been higher, we are fortunate it was not. But we also know that, in the future — other attacks will occur; other people will die. This has been the pattern in the past — there is no sign at all that there is any change in this scheme, or any alteration in the essential realities that fuel militant violence of so many kinds in our country. The unique tensions that ravage Karachi add a dangerous twist to the acts of militancy that take place so often in that city — donning at times a sectarian mask, at others, an ethnic one, or another rooted in the battle between militants and security forces.

There is, when we think rationally and with logic, only one way really to break this cycle. It should not lie beyond the capacity of our security network, and the intelligence agencies that form a part of it, to infiltrate the groups at work, to know who runs them, who funds them and what motivates them. Knowing all we can about these organisations is a crucial step in the task of stopping them and anticipating their plans, so they can be stopped before they strike again, in the process claiming more lives and inflicting more suffering of the worst possible kind.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 10^th, 2011.