Beautiful girl with poetry
Saturday, 19 March 2011
Friday, 18 March 2011
Thursday, 17 March 2011
Raymond Davis was reportedly given to the custody of the US authorities in Lahore and he was flown out of the Pakistani territory through an American aircraft already waiting for him at the airport
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Raymond Davis was reportedly given to the custody of the US authorities in Lahore and he was flown out of the Pakistani territory through an American aircraft already waiting for him at the airport
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LAHORE – In a shocking development, Additional District and Sessions Judge Muhammad Yousaf Aujla on Wednesday set free the double murder accused, American national Raymond Davis, following the grant of pardon to him by the legal heirs of both the slain in an unusual haste without involving the lawyer who was originally engaged to represent them in the trial. Minutes after the release order by the court, Raymond Davis was reportedly given to the custody of the US authorities in Lahore and he was flown out of the Pakistani territory through an American aircraft already waiting for him at the airport. The news came as a sorrowful disappointment for the Pakistani nation at large, since the people felt being betrayed under a secret deal, though the Diyat option may well be cited as a genuine, legitimate option if some, in addition to the government, are willing to overlook the context.
As many as 18 legal heirs of Fahim and Faizan, who were murdered in cold blood by Raymond Davis at a busy road of Lahore on January 27, appeared before the trial court and individually stated that they had forgiven the killer under the Diyat (blood money) law of the Shariah. The legal heirs reportedly accepted a total Rs 200million in compensation to grant pardon and absolve Davis of the offence. They presented an application under 345 CrPC besides affirming their will through an affidavit.
Advocate Asad Manzoor Butt, who was supposed to represent the victim parties, was not allowed to appear before the court. Butt says he was kept in detention for four hours in a separate room by the jail authorities on the pretext that the court will call him in. After four hour when he was set free, the proceedings were over, he told The Nation expressing strong apprehensions that the legal heirs have been coerced into accepting Diyat as till last nothing in this regard was told to him by any member of the victim families. The trial court started proceedings at around 11:30am when Raymond Davis in his presence was formally indicted for the murders. The reports coming out of the in-camera proceedings of the trial at Kot Lakhpat Jail revealed that Raymond remained silent throughout the proceedings. Immediately after the accused was charge-sheeted, Advocate Raja Irshad, a new counsel for the victim families, told the court that his clients wanted to pardon the accused and presented an application on their behalf before the court. After that court individually asked the legal heirs of both families and they affirmed what they had told the court in the application.
For the prosecution, former judge Zahid Bokhari presented another written document to the court after the legal heirs had pardoned the killer. The court proceedings continued for about five hours. US Consul General Carmella Conroy and another official from the US Justice Department were also present in the courtroom.
In the case of keeping illegal arms case, the magistrate concerned awarded Davis a jail sentence from the date of his arrest to-date and a fine of Rs 20,000, which was instantly paid by the accused represented by his counsel.
A report about Raymond A. Davis, an American who was arrested after shooting two men at a traffic stop, worked with a covert team.
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A report about Raymond A. Davis,
an American who was arrested after shooting two men at a traffic stop,
worked with a covert team.
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Wednesday, 16 March 2011
Tum se pyaar kar lya (A Excellent Song for ever)
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tum se pyaar kar lya
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Tum se pyaar kar lya
(A Excellent Song for ever)
Tuesday, 15 March 2011
Army's Influence In Politics
Army's Influence In Politics
While the army's stints at the helm of political power have been the subject of vigorous debate in Pakistan, the army still remains the most widely respected institution in the country. The army in turn views itself as the guarantor of Pakistan's internal and external stability.
Pakistan's political institutions have never had the same vigour, and have been further weakened by this pattern of alternation between military and constitutional rule. In other civil institutions - the civil service and a large network of public and private organizations - were once looked on as pillars of strength, but they too have weakened in the past three decades or so due to mixture of neglect and abuse by both military and civilian governments.
Civil society, whatever it means in Pakistan, has similarly been whittled down by decades of misrule by both the army and civilian governments. Pakistanis, however are politically aware people, and the period of elected rule they have experienced, have given them a desire for accountable and participatory government.
While Pakistan's present democratic, as all previous civilian set ups, governance is deeply flawed due to the indifference, monopoly and corruption of the ruling elite.
The army has been Pakistan's strongest institution along navy and air force since the creation of the nation in 1947, and the events since September 11 have tested and reinforced its domestic and international position. Three factors stunted the growth of other institutions while encouraging the strengthening of the army and people's confidence in this indispensable institution.
First, Pakistan was born with a chronic sense of insecurity, the product of the violent legacy of Partition and the resulting dislocation and law and order problems. Second, the India-Pakistan war over Kashmir encouraged the state to concentrate resources at the centre and, again, in the army. Finally, the death in 1948 of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of the nation, left behind a political and ideological vacuum.
When the British partitioned and left the Indian sub-continent in 1947, Pakistan faced the formidable task of building a centre and a defining national identity from scratch, while trying to deal with these challenges. The administrative and ideological challenge was further exacerbated by the fact that the two wings of Pakistan, East and West, were separated by some 1000 miles of Indian Territory as well as by differences of language and political tradition. After the assassination of Jinnah's successor Liaquat Ali Khan, Pakistan's civil institutions, still very new, struggled to provide continuity of government and ultimately were bypassed and distorted, with the military coming in to clean the mess. This scenario has been replayed with some differences on several occasions.
Intervention of Army
The roots of army's intervention date back to the early years of independence when a host of external and internal factors combined to tilt the civil-military institutional equation in favor of the military.
The reason is that the migrant political leadership of Pakistan which lacked domestic political constituency persistently used extra-constitutional tactics to remain in power. At the same time, the fledging state prioritized national defence over critical development needs because of hostile neighbourhood. Moreover, weak civilian administration routinely fell back on the well organized military to undertake even day-to-day civilian tasks. This reliance on the military gradually eroded the respect for civilian authority among the men in uniform, spurring them to 'save' Pakistan at the slightest sign of political instability. Therefore, the military eventually emerged as a domineering vested interest in state and society.
However, the critics' point of view also deserves a mention here. The superimposition of the army on vital aspects of civil and political life over the decades has stripped civilian authority of even its basic functions. Be it federal or provincial administrations, universities, examination boards, public utility corporations, state research institutions, the military has gradually but compulsively taken over in the name of accountability and reducing corruption. Militarization is just not limited to the public sector. It intervened in all the vital sectors of the economy (logistics, public works, banking, fertilizer, cement, and sugar production) by running it tax free. This inevitable army intervention clearly undermined the chances of their competition, besides crowding out scarce investment resources (due to high defence expenditure) required for private sector development.
The military's unquestioned dominance of state affairs coupled with its holy cow public image allows it to act the untainted angel while holding its civilian counterparts accountable for their actions. For instance, under the last military regime's much touted accountability process, civil officials and anti-military politicians are hauled up in the name of fair accountability. Whereas, military officers are excluded under the pretext of existing strength internal accountability mechanisms.
Reforming Pakistan's Police
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS
After decades of misuse and neglect, Pakistan’s police force is incapable of combating crime, upholding the law or protecting citizens and the state against militant violence. With an elected government taking over power after more than eight years of military rule, the importance of reforming this dysfunctional force has assumed new importance. Elected representatives will be held accountable if citizens continue to see the police, the public face of government, as brutal and corrupt. The democratic transition could also falter if deteriorating security gives the military a new opportunity to intervene, using, as it has in the past, the pretext of national security to justify derailing the democratic process on the grounds of good governance. Major reforms and reallocation of resources are required to create an effective and accountable police service.
President Pervez Musharraf claimed national security and the need to strengthen democracy justified his 1999 coup. Police reform was to form a part of the military government’s devolution scheme, the centrepiece of Musharraf’s ostensible reform agenda. He replaced the colonial-era legislation, the Police Act of 1861, which had governed the functioning of the police since independence, with the Police Order 2002. Devised after consulting senior serving and retired police officers, that order, if properly implemented, could have been an important step towards reforming a dysfunctional organisation. Yet, like other pledges of good governance made by Musharraf and his military-led government, police reform was sacrificed for political expediency.
Amendments to the Police Order have watered down provisions that held some promise of reform, including mechanisms for civilian accountability and internal discipline, as well as guarantees for autonomy and safeguards against political interference in the posting, transfer and promotion of police officials. Six years after the Police Order was promulgated, very few public safety commissions, supposedly the cornerstone of the accountability process, were even established, and those that existed lacked enforcement mechanisms. The police remained a political pawn, with transfers and promotions used to reward those willing to follow orders, no matter how illegal, and to punish the few professional officers who dared to challenge their military masters.
The new civilian government has inherited a police force with a well-deserved reputation for corruption, high-handedness and abuse of human rights, which served the military well for over eight years, suppressing Musharraf’s civilian opposition and more than willing to accept any task – from extrajudicial killings and torture to rigging elections. With public confidence in the police at an all-time low, reform will be difficult and require time, patience and resources, yet it is a task the new governments at the centre and in the provinces will ignore at their peril, as militant violence reaches new heights.
The police and civilian intelligence agencies are far more appropriate for counter-insurgency and counter-terrorism operations than a military trained to combat external enemies. The police and the intelligence agencies under police control must be given the resources needed to tackle internal threats and crime. The international community, particularly the U.S. and the European Union (EU), should realise that helping the police and civilian intelligence agencies with training and technical assistance would pay counter-terrorism dividends. However, the Pakistan government should not just increase financial support and police numbers but also enact tangible organisational and political reforms. Political appointments must end; postings, transfers, recruitment and promotions must be made on merit alone; the recommendations of police managerial bodies must be given due weight, and emphasis placed on the police serving and protecting citizens.
Above all, democratically elected rulers must resist the temptation to use the police for political, partisan ends. While they are under no compulsion to retain the Police Order, they must ensure that its replacement is not merely a change of name. They must realise that security of their constituents and their own governments will be best ensured by a police force that is professionally run, well trained, adequately paid and operationally autonomous. If it is still used for political ends, the police force may well be damaged beyond repair, at great cost to the peace in Pakistan.
RECOMMENDATIONS
To the Government of Pakistan:
1. Give the police and their affiliated intelligence organisations primary responsibility for internal security and greater capacity to do the job by:
(a) increasing the numerical strength of the police;
(b) promoting specialisation, particularly in the areas of forensic science and cyber crimes;
(c) strengthening the counter-terrorism wings of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) and the Intelligence Bureau (IB) and making the IB the country’s premier intelligence agency;
(d) abolishing the political wing of the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) and removing it from military control; and
(e) withdrawing the Pakistan Rangers and other paramilitary organisations from internal security functions, replacing them by the police.
2. Rebuild morale, reduce corruption and increase efficiency by:
(a) removing corrupt, inefficient or politically biased officers from senior positions and positions of authority over the police;
(b) increasing salaries, particularly of those at the bottom of the hierarchy;
(c) allocating more funds for improving facilities and securing the welfare of police rank and file and their families, and ensuring that increased allocations are spent on better housing and transport facilities for the rank and file, rather than the well-being of senior officers; and
(d) providing meaningful pensions to the families of police officers killed in the line of duty and publicly recognising acts of bravery.
3. Settle, in the long-term, the legal status of the Police Order by:
(a) placing the order before the national parliament for detailed debate and review;
(b) establishing a parliamentary subcommittee to examine provisions in greater detail and provide recommendations;
(c) sending the order to the provinces for further debate, review and recommendations;
(d) seeking the feedback of serving and retired police officials, as well as informed members of civil society; and
(e) evolving a national consensus on how to make the police a disciplined, efficient, modern, non-partisan, service-oriented and transparent institution and framing statutory legislation based on that consensus, instead of indefinitely extending a presidential ordinance.
4. Undertake, as an immediate first step, to make the police more accountable by:
(a) setting up a parliamentary subcommittee on policing under the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on the Interior;
(b) empowering the public safety commissions meaningfully by devising stringent enforcement mechanisms for police accountability;
(c) making the selection of independent members of the commissions completely transparent;
(d) maintaining parity between government and opposition members on the commissions; and
(e) separating police complaints authorities from public safety commissions, thus enabling them to perform their distinct roles.
5. Protect the police from political manipulation by:
(a) making the appointment of senior police officials subject to the recommendation of the relevant public safety commission;
(b) mandating the approval of the relevant public safety commission for premature transfers of senior police officials; and
(c) withdrawing the power of the district chief nazim (mayor) to write the district police officer’s annual performance evaluation report.
6. Improve police performance and redress public grievances by:
(a) empowering managerial bodies like the National Public Safety Commission, the National Police Management Board and federal and provincial police complaints authorities;
(b) facilitating the implementation of genuine community policing through Citizen Police Liaison Committees consisting of representatives of civil society, including academics, lawyers and human rights activists, with meaningful female representation; and
(c) appointing an independent police ombudsman to investigate serious cases of police abuse, including custodial deaths and sexual offences against female prisoners.
7. Ensure greater female presence in the police by:
(a) increasing the number of female police stations and cells for women detainees in regular police stations; and
(b) authorising women police officers to register and investigate cases and improving their standards of training.
8. End military interference in police affairs by:
(a) abolishing the military’s 10 per cent reserved quota of positions in the police;
(b) removing serving and retired military personnel from police positions, including in the police-run intelligence agencies such as the Intelligence Bureau (IB); and
(c) replacing the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) with the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) as the primary anti-corruption body.
To the International Community, particularly the U.S. and the European Union:
9. Increase security-related assistance to and strengthen counter-terrorism capabilities of the police and civilian security organisations, including by equipping forensic laboratories – both existing ones and new ones that should be established – and assisting the computerisation of police records.
10. Institute and expand professional development programs for police officers.
11. Assist curriculum reform, and help modernise police training, with an emphasis on community policing techniques and proceduresPakistan: The Militant Jihadi Challenge
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS
The recent upsurge of jihadi violence in Punjab, the Northwest Frontier Province (NWFP), the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and Balochistan’s provincial capital, Quetta, demonstrates the threat extremist Sunni-Deobandi groups pose to the Pakistani citizen and state. These radical Sunni groups are simultaneously fighting internal sectarian jihads, regional jihads in Afghanistan and India and a global jihad against the West. While significant domestic and international attention and resources are understandably devoted to containing Islamist militancy in the tribal belt, that the Pakistani Taliban is an outgrowth of radical Sunni networks in the country’s political heartland is too often neglected. A far more concerted effort against Punjab-based Sunni extremist groups is essential to curb the spread of extremism that threatens regional peace and stability. As the international community works with Pakistan to rein in extremist groups, it should also support the democratic transition, in particular by reallocating aid to strengthening civilian law enforcement.
The Pakistani Taliban, which increasingly controls large swathes of FATA and parts of NWFP, comprises a number of militant groups loosely united under the Deobandi Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) that have attacked not just state and Western targets, but Shias as well. Their expanding influence is due to support from long-established Sunni extremist networks, based primarily in Punjab, which have served as the army’s jihadi proxies in Afghanistan and India since the 1980s. Punjab-based radical Deobandi groups like the Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP) and its offshoot Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LJ) provide weapons, recruits, finances and other resources to Pakistani Taliban groups, and have been responsible for planning many of the attacks attributed to FATA-based militants. The SSP and LJ are also al-Qaeda’s principal allies in the region.
Other extremist groups ostensibly focused on the jihad in Kashmir, such as the Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, are also signatories to al-Qaeda’s global jihad against the West, and have been active in local, regional and international jihads. Their continued patronage by the military, and their ability to hijack major policy areas, including Pakistan’s relations with India, Afghanistan and the international community, impede the civilian government’s ongoing efforts to consolidate control over governance and pursue peace with its neighbours.
The actions of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP)-led federal government, and the Punjab government, led until recently by Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League (PML-N), against Punjab-based jihadi groups for their role in November’s attack in India’s commercial capital, Mumbai, are a step in the right direction. They must now be followed up by consolidating the evidence and presenting it in court. The two main parties, however, risk reversing the progress they have made by resorting to the confrontational politics of the past. On 25 February 2009, the Supreme Court decided to uphold a ban, based on politically motivated cases dating back to Musharraf’s military rule, on Nawaz Sharif and his brother, Shahbaz, Punjab’s chief minister, from electoral politics. President Asif Ali Zardari’s subsequent imposition of governor’s rule in Punjab has aggravated a political stalemate between the two main parties that, the longer it lasts, will allow non-democratic forces, including the military, the religious right and extremists, to once again fill the political vacuum.
The aftermath of the Mumbai attack presents an opening to reshape Pakistan’s response to terrorism, which should rely not on the application of indiscriminate force, including military action and arbitrary detentions, but on police investigations, arrests, fair trials and convictions. This must be civilian-led to be effective. Despite earlier successes against extremist groups, civilian law enforcement and intelligence agencies, including the Federal Investigation Agency, the provincial Criminal Investigation Departments, and the Intelligence Bureau, lack the resources and the authority to meet their potential. The military and its powerful Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) still dominate – and hamper – counter-terrorism efforts.
The PPP government cannot afford to enforce the law only in response to a terrorist attack or external pressure. Proactive enforcement will be vital to containing religious militancy, which has reached critical levels; this includes checks on the proliferation of weapons and the growth of of private militias, which contravene the constitution; prosecution of hate speech, the spread of extremist literature and exhortations to jihad; greater accountability of and actions against jihadi madrasas and mosques; and ultimately converting information into evidence that holds up in court. It is not too late to reverse the tide of extremism, provided the government immediately adopts and implements a zero tolerance policy towards all forms of religious militancy.
Unfortunately, on 16 February 2009, NWFP’s Awami National Party (ANP)-led government made a peace deal, devised by the military, with the Swat-based Sunni extremist Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (TNSM), a militant group allied to the Taliban. The government agreed to impose Sharia (Islamic law) in NWFP’s Malakand region, with religious courts deciding all cases after 16 February 2009; dismantle all security checkpoints and require any military movements to be pre-approved by the TNSM; and release captured militants, including those responsible for such acts of violence as public executions and rape. In return, the militants pledged to end their armed campaign.
This accord, an even greater capitulation to the militants than earlier deals by the military regime in FATA, will if implemented entrench Taliban rule and al-Qaeda influence in the area; make peace more elusive; and essentially reverse the gains made by the transition to democracy and the defeat of the military-supported religious right-wing parties in NWFP in the February 2008 elections. With the Swat ceasefire already unravelling, the federal government should refuse presidential assent required for its implementation, and renew its commitment to tackling extremism and realising long-term political reform in the borderlands.
The international response to the Swat deal has so far been mixed, with several key leaders, including U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, viewing it as an acceptable compromise. Acknowledging the failure of unconditionally supporting the Pakistani military, the international community, particularly the U.S., must reverse course and help strengthen civilian control over all areas of governance, including counter-terrorism, and the capacity of the federal government to override the military’s appeasement policies in FATA and NWFP, replacing them with policies that pursue long-term political, economic and social development.
RECOMMENDATIONS
To the Government of Pakistan:
1. Acknowledge that a credible crackdown on jihadi militants will ultimately require convictions in fair trials and take steps to:
a) vest significantly greater authority in civilian law enforcement agencies, including access to mobile phone records and other data, without having to obtain approval from the military and the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI);
b) establish through an act of parliament a clear hierarchy of civilian intelligence agencies, including the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), the provincial Criminal Investigation Departments and the Intelligence Bureau (IB), with the IB as the primary authority in anti-terrorism investigations;
c) strengthen links between law enforcement agencies and prosecutors to build strong cases in court against religious extremists;
d) enhance the capacity of federal and provincial civilian law enforcement agencies, with a particular focus on forensics capabilities and crime scene investigations; establish national and provincial crime labs with modern equipment and internationally trained scientists, under control of the federal interior ministry and provincial home departments;
e) amend the Criminal Procedure Act to establish a witness protection program, and ensure the highest level of security for anyone agreeing to provide valuable testimony against extremists; and
f) enhance the role and guarantee the autonomy of Community Police Liaison Committees to enlist the public in the fight against militancy.
2. Take robust action against jihadi militant groups and their madrasa networks, including:
a) disbanding private militias, pursuant to Article 256 of the constitution;
b) disrupting communications and supply lines, and closing base camps of jihadi groups in the tribal belt and the political heartland of Punjab; and
c) enhancing oversight over the madrasa sector, including finances and enrolment, and conducting regular inquiries into the sector by provincial authorities, as recently conducted by the Punjab government, with a view to:
i. identifying seminaries with clear links to jihadi groups, closing them and taking action against their clerics and, where appropriate, students;
ii. keeping any seminaries suspected of links with jihadi groups under close surveillance;
iii. taking legal action where seminaries encroach on state or private land; and
iv. ensuring that accommodation and facilities meet proper safety and building standards.
3. Prosecute anyone encouraging or glorifying violence and jihad, including through hate speech against religious and sectarian minorities, and the spread of jihadi literature.
4. Acknowledge that political reform is integral to stabilising FATA and NWFP by:
a) invoking Article 8 of the constitution that voids any customs inconsistent with constitutionally guaranteed fundamental rights, refusing to sign the Nizam-e-Adl Regulation Order 2009 for the imposition of Sharia (Islamic law) in the Malakand region, and refrain from entering into similar peace deals with religious militants elsewhere;
b) carrying through on its commitment to repeal the Frontier Crimes Regulations (1901), extending the writ of the state, the rule of law, including the courts and police, and ensuring FATA’s representation in the state legislature;
c) integrating FATA into the federal framework by incorporating it into the Northwest Frontier Province, with the seven agencies falling under the executive control of the province and jurisdiction of the regular provincial and national court system and with representation in the provincial assembly;
d) extending the Political Parties Act to FATA, thus removing restrictions on political parties, and introducing party-based elections for the provincial and national legislatures;
e) refraining from arming and supporting any insurgent group or tribal militia, and preventing the army from doing the same; and
f) relying on civilian law enforcement and intelligence as the primary tool to deal with extremism in FATA, limiting the army’s role to its proper task of defending the country’s borders.
5. Repeal all religious laws that discriminate on the basis of religion, sect and gender.
6. Resolve the political crisis between the PPP and the PML-N by ending governor’s rule and respecting the PML-N’s elected mandate in Punjab, and agreeing on a political and legal solution to allow for Nawaz and Shahbaz Sharif to participate in electoral politics, either through an act of parliament, or an executive order.
7. Carry through on its commitment to repeal the 17th Amendment to the constitution, and any constitutional provisions, executive orders and laws that contravene the principles of parliamentary democracy.
To the International Community, in particular the U.S. and the European Union:
8. Provide financial and logistic support to civilian law enforcement agencies to expand their capacity, including in forensics and crime scene investigations, through provision of modern equipment and training of Pakistani scientists.
9. Condition military assistance on demonstrable steps by the Pakistani armed forces to support civilian efforts in preventing the borderlands from being used by al-Qaeda, Afghan insurgents and Pakistani extremists to launch attacks within Pakistan and from Pakistani territory to its region and beyond; if the Pakistani military does not respond positively, as a last resort, consider targeted and incremental sanctions, including travel and visa bans and the freezing of financial assets of key military leaders and military-controlled intelligence agencies.
10. Expand assistance to the hundreds of thousands of civilians displaced by the conflict in FATA and Swat.UK Life (Specially for those who want to Visit aboard)
UK Life (Specially for those who want to Visit aboard)
Please see must (very bad life)
A UNKNOWN MOVIE TRAILER
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A UNKNOWN MOVIE TRAILER
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A UNKNOWN MOVIE TRAILER
BUT VERY BEST
UNTHINKABLE MOVIES TRAILER
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UNTHINKABLE MOVIES
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UNTHINKABLE MOVIE
A EXCELLENT MOVIE TRAILER
UPLOADED ON THE REQUEST OF
MS.HINA
friendship_quotes
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friendship_quotes
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Your's Comments Please.
Your's Comments Please.
COURAGE AND IGNORANCE
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COURAGE AND IGNORANCE
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COURAGE AND IGNORANCE
A BOMB BLAST LIVE VIEW,
This link sent others for saftry, plz.
Tussi se naina lage, Song
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Song,
Tussi se naina lage
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Tussi se naina lage, Song
An excellent song of the day.
Hazrat Ali (R.A) Hadrat Ali was the son of Abu Talib, a prominent Quraish chief and custodian of the Holy Ka'bah. Abu Talib was so-called because he was the father of "Talib
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a prominent Quraish chief and custodian of the Holy Ka'bah. Abu Talib was so-called because he was the father of "Talib,
Hazrat Ali (R.A) Hadrat Ali was the son of Abu Talib
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Afghan Cities
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Afghan Cities
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Helmand, Chaghai
Kabul's writ has never run strong in the remote southern plains of Helmand province. For this reason, it has emerged as the most significant Taliban stronghold in Afghanistan.
Since 9/11 this region has been in turmoil. In the Baramcha area on the Afghan side of the border, the Taliban have a major base. From there they control militant activities as far afield as Nimroz and Farah provinces in the west, Oruzgan in the north and parts of Kandahar province in the east. They also link up with groups based in the Waziristan region of Pakistan.
Commander Mansoor Dadullah, a one-time Taliban chief of the province who has since developed differences with the Taliban leadership, comes from Helmand, but he has currently shifted his operations to Zabul province and across the border into Balochistan.
Taliban from Baramcha region move freely across the border, and often take their injured to hospitals in the Pakistani town of Dalbandin in Chaghai.
The Helmand Taliban have been able to capture territory and hold it, mostly in the south of the province. They constantly threaten traffic on the highway that connects Kandahar with Herat.
Kandahar has the symbolic importance of being the spiritual centre of the Taliban movement and also the place of its origin. The supreme Taliban leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar, made the city his headquarters when the Taliban came to power in 1996. Top al-Qaeda leaders, including Osama Bin Laden, preferred it to the country's political capital, Kabul.
But the Taliban have a strong presence in the countryside, especially in southern and eastern areas along the border with Pakistan. Afghan and Western officials have in the past said the Taliban have used Quetta, the capital of the Pakistani province of Balochistan, as a major hideout as well as other Pakistani towns along the Kandahar border.
Areas on the Pakistan side stretching north-eastwards along the border from Quetta to the town of Zhob are inhabited by Pashtun tribes.
Taliban activity in Balochistan is largely related to operations inside Afghanistan and is of no immediate concern to Islamabad.
Afghanistan's Zabul province lies to the north of Kandahar, along the Toba Kakar mountain range that separates it from the Pakistani districts of Killa Saifullah and Killa Abdullah. Taliban insurgents use the Toba Kakar passes when infiltration through South Waziristan is difficult due to intensified vigilance by Pakistani and Afghan border guards.
Zabul provides access to the Afghan provinces of Ghazni, Oruzgan and Kandahar. There are few Afghan or foreign forces in the area, except on the highway that connects Qalat, the capital of Zabul, to Kandahar in the south-west, and Ghazni and Kabul in the north.
As the Pakistani military strategists who organized Afghan guerillas against the Soviets in the 1980s discovered to their delight, Kurram is the best location along the entire Pakistan-Afghanistan border to put pressure on the Afghan capital, Kabul, which is just 90km (56 miles) away.
The Taliban, with their primary interest in the war in Afghanistan, have also steered clear of Orakzai tribal district because it does not share a border with Afghanistan and is therefore of no strategic value.
Taliban sanctuaries in South Waziristan and North Waziristan directly threaten Paktika, Khost and Paktia provinces of Afghanistan. The US-led forces have large bases in the Barmal region of Paktika and in Khost, and several outposts along the border to counter infiltration. Pakistani security forces also man hundreds of border checkposts in the region.
However, infiltration has continued unabated with many hit-and-run attacks on foreign troops.
Tribal identities are particularly strong in Paktika, Khost and Paktia. During the Taliban rule of 1997-2001, these provinces were ruled by their own tribal governors instead of the Kandahari Taliban who held power over the rest of the country. In the current phase of the fighting they co-ordinate with the militants in Kandahar and Helmand, but they have stuck with their own leadership that dates back to the war against the Soviets in the 1980s.
South Waziristan, a tribal district in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata), is the first significant sanctuary Islamic militants carved for themselves outside Afghanistan after 9/11. Militants driven by US troops from the Tora Bora region of Nangarhar province in late 2001, and later from the Shahikot mountains of Paktia in early 2002, poured into the main town, Wana, in their hundreds. They included Arabs, Central Asians, Chechens, Uighur Chinese, Afghans and Pakistanis. Some moved on to urban centres in Punjab and Sindh provinces. Others slipped back into Afghanistan or headed west to Zhob and Quetta and onwards to Iran. But most stayed back and are fighting the Pakistani army.
Unofficial estimates by informed circles put the current number of these foreign fighters at "several hundred". They have concentrations in parts of South and North Waziristan and Bajaur in Fata region, and have also fanned out to conflict zones in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province (NWFP), such as Swat and Buner.
The eastern half of South Waziristan is inhabited by the Mehsud tribe and the main militant commander here is Hakimullah Mehsud, who rose to this position in August, when a suspected US missile strike led to the killing of the top Mehsud commander, Baitullah Mehsud. He heads perhaps the largest militant group in Pakistan, with an estimated strength of more than 15,000 armed men, although the "hard core" of his fighters is much smaller.
The western half, along the border with Afghanistan, is Ahmedzai Wazir territory where Maulvi Nazir commands roughly 8,000 to 10,000 militants. Again, most of these cannot be considered battle-hardened and whether they would fight to the last is unclear.
The Mehsuds only live on the Pakistani side, while the Wazirs inhabit both sides of the border. This partly explains the direction the two commanders have taken over the last few years. Maulvi Nazir's men have largely focused on the war in Afghanistan, and have only recently had some problems with Pakistani forces, apparently due to continued missile strikes by suspected US drones which they believe have tacit Pakistani support.
Tehrik Taliban Pakistan (TTP), an umbrella organisation for anti-Pakistan groups operating in Orakzai, Bajaur and Swat regions, was set up in 2006 by Baitullah Mehsud, the Taliban leader killed in 2009 by a US missile.
In early 2009 Baitullah Mehsud and Maulvi Nazir entered into a three-way partnership with another ethnic Wazir commander, Hafiz Gul Bahadur, who heads the militants in neighbouring North Waziristan. Their aim was to organise joint defence if they come under attack.
But the agreement has failed to work in the wake of a military operation that Pakistani forces launched in South Waziristan in October, months after Baitullah's death. The operation has targeted the Mehsud areas and has brought several towns under army control. But it has not been extended to the Wazir areas of South and North Waziristan, neither have the Wazir groups made an attempt to come to Hakimullah Mehsud's help.
North Waziristan is dominated by the Wazir tribe that also inhabits the adjoining Afghan provinces of Paktika and Khost. North and South Waziristan form the most lethal zone from where militants have been successfully destabilising not only those provinces but others such as Paktia, Ghazni, Wardak and Logar. Groups based in the Waziristan region are known to have carried out attacks in the Afghan capital, Kabul, as well.
Current estimates put the number of armed militants in North Waziristan at more than 10,000. A much smaller number are battle hardened. They are led by Hafiz Gul Bahadur, a veteran of the 1992-96 Afghan civil war who later joined the Taliban. Like Maulvi Nazir in South Waziristan, he has largely focused on the fighting in Afghanistan and has had little friction with Pakistani forces since a 2006 peace deal. In fact, Taliban loyal to him have confronted foreign fighters based in the eastern North Waziristan town of Mir Ali, who have been attacking Pakistani troops in the region. But he, too, is perturbed over drone attacks in the region, and considers Pakistan responsible for them.
North Waziristan is also the home base of another veteran Afghan militant, Jalaluddin Haqqani. His main responsibility has been to organise Taliban resistance to Western forces in Afghanistan, but he has wielded considerable influence over the top commanders in South and North Waziristan. He is also reported to have maintained links with sections of the Pakistani security establishment and is known to have mediated peace deals between the Pakistani government and the Wazir and Mehsud commanders in the region. Mr Haqqani is now an old man, and his son Sirajuddin has taken over most of his work.
The Afghan government has a comparatively firmer grip on the situation in Nangarhar. This is partly due to the compulsion to keep the supply route for Western forces - which connects the Pakistani city of Peshawar with Kabul and passes through Nangarhar - safe.
But there are pockets of resistance in the area. The main Taliban commander here is Anwarul Haq Mujahid, son of a former mujahideen commander, Mohammad Younus Khalis. This group was responsible for offering protection to Osama Bin Laden in the Tora Bora caves soon after 9/11. In recent months militants from the region have been linking up with the so-called Haqqani network in the Paktika-Khost-Paktia region.
Analysts have long suspected Pakistan's Bajaur tribal region to be the hiding place of Osama Bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri and other top al-Qaeda leaders. As such, it is where suspected US drones launched their earliest missile strikes. One drone strike in January 2006 was said to have narrowly missed Ayman al-Zawahiri, although it killed nearly 18 others. Another strike nine months later killed 80 people at a religious seminary which US and Pakistani officials said was training militants.
The dominant militant group in Bajaur, and those in the neighbouring Mohmand tribal region, became members of the Baitullah Mehsud-led Tehrik Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which was formed soon afterwards. Militants in both areas have since fought Pakistani forces inside their respective tribal zones, and have also carried out attacks in the cities of Peshawar, Charsadda and Mardan. They also conducted the first attacks against security forces in the Malakand region, where the Pakistani forces had to fight a fully fledged insurgency in and around the Swat valley earlier in the summer of 2009.
Maulvi Faqir Mohammad is the chief commander of the Taliban in Bajaur. He was said to lead a force of nearly 10,000 armed militants but there are indications the ranks have thinned in the wake of the operation in the TTP's home base of South Waziristan.
A year-long military operation against the militants in Bajaur ended early in 2009, followed by a peace agreement under which the dominant tribe in Bajaur, the Mamunds, agreed to surrender the entire TTP leadership to the government. But that has not happened. The Taliban are back in control in most areas outside the regional capital, Khaar, and Maulvi Faqir Mohammad continues to use his sermons, broadcast from an FM radio station, to whip up support for the Taliban.
Bajaur shares a border with the Afghan province of Kunar. Pakistani forces battling the Taliban in Bajaur have complained that US and Afghan troops on the other side of the border have not been doing enough to crack down on the Taliban there.
In Mohmand, about 5,000 militants led by Omar Khalid have been resisting attempts by the security forces to clear them from southern and south-eastern parts of the district in order to reduce pressure on Peshawar and Charsadda. In recent weeks, their activities have become infrequent and their grip on most of their erstwhile strongholds has loosened.
Initially the Taliban were unable to maintain sustained pressure on the country's south-central highlands. But with safe sanctuaries in the border region - from the Baramcha area of Helmand province in the south, to some parts of Pakistani Balochistan, Waziristan and Bajaur and Mohmand to the east - the Taliban now have the capacity to render roads in this region unsafe.
Training camps run by al-Qaeda and Taliban groups have multiplied in secure border regions over the past few years. Safe havens have also afforded the militants endless opportunities to find new recruits. The Waziristan region is also known to be a haven for young suicide bombers trained in remote camps. The Taliban also appear to have had access to sophisticated military equipment and professionally drawn-up battle plans.
The strategy appears to be the same as in the 1980s - "death by a thousand cuts". Sporadic attacks on the security forces and the police have grown more frequent over the years, and have also crept closer to Kabul. At the same time, the Taliban have destroyed most of the education infrastructure in the countryside, a vital link between the central government and the isolated agrarian citizenry.
Oruzgan has mostly come under pressure from groups in Kandahar and Helmand. These groups, as well as those based in the Waziristan-Paktika-Khost region, have also moved up the highway via Ghazni to infiltrate Wardak to the west and Logar to the east. Safe and quiet until less than three years ago, both these provinces are now said to be increasingly infiltrated by Taliban fighters.
But they still do not have the capacity to confront troops in open battle, or capture and keep towns.
Swat, a former princely state in northern Pakistan, was governed by a British-era law which a court declared unconstitutional in the early 1990s. That triggered a violent campaign for Islamic law to be introduced in Swat and other areas of the Malakand region of which it is part. The Swat insurgency was effectively put down in 1994 but it re-emerged after 9/11, attracting many battle-hardened militants from Waziristan, Bajaur and the neighbouring district of Dir.
The campaign of the Swat militants has been the most destructive anywhere in Pakistan. They have targeted security forces, police, secular politicians and government-run schools.
By early April 2009, Sharia law had been imposed as part of a deal between the authorities and the local Taliban. However, the militants failed to disarm completely in line with the accord and their fighters spread to neighbouring districts, prompting international concern.
In late April, Pakistani forces launched an operation in four districts of Malakand region, causing some three million people to flee the fighting. Most of the area has since been brought under control and peace has returned to large parts. Most of the refugees have also returned to their homes, though some scattered resistance by the militants remains.
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