Time for an operation

The death toll rose to 81 on the morning of September 23 and more are expected to die of their injuries, and there are reported to be 131 injured as a result of the suicide bombing at a Christian church in Peshawar on September 22. Not only did the bombers kill and maim innocent people, they put a sword through the heart of the peace process the government was pursuing. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif acknowledged this in his London stopover en route to the US and addressing the UN General Assembly. The decision of the All Parties Conference to talk to the Taliban now stands null and void and in a considerable understatement, the PM said “such incidents do not augur well for negotiations.” Indeed they do not and the option of talking to the Taliban has been cancelled by the Taliban themselves — which calls into question whether there was ever any serious peaceful intent on either side.



The government has had its wrist slapped by the military for appearing to accede to the preconditions the Taliban attached to talks and is now in the awkward position of having to come up with Plan B to counter terrorism. The terrorists are not going to lay down their arms nor are they going to stop killing at will. The Junood ul-Hifsa group, linked to the Taliban, has claimed the bombing saying it was to avenge drone strikes and the killing of al Qaeda operatives in the tribal areas close to the Afghan border. A spokesman for the group was quoted in several reports on September 23 as saying that the killings will continue as long as drone strikes keep happening. The government has no other choice but to fight back and appeasement was never a viable option no matter what self-deluded politicians might think. The prime minister rightly said in his London statement that the terrorists are “enemies of Pakistan” — a statement of the blindingly obvious. With the scales fallen from his eyes at last, can we expect decisive action? After all, if the past can provide us one lesson about ‘peace deals’ with the Taliban, it is that they usually are used by them to consolidate and regroup.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 24^th,  2013.

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