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Posted by admin in CIA AGENT NAWAZ SHARIF, Corruption, CORRUPTION OF SHAHBAZ SHARIF, CRUSHING OF PAK AWAM BY PML(N) & NAWAZ SHARIF, Nawaz Sharif & Kashmiri Biradari, Nawaz Sharif Dangerous Man, NAWAZ SHARIF DICTATOR, NAWAZ SHARIF FAMILY TURPITUDE, NAWAZ SHARIF LOAN SCAM, Nawaz Sharif Massive Corruption, NAWAZ SHARIF MUZZLES PRESS, NAWAZ SHARIF SAGA OF ABSOLUTE & CHRONIC CORRUPTION on January 31st, 2014
We are in a state of war, even if Punjab and the national leadership from Punjab find it excruciatingly difficult to recognise this reality. From 1947 onwards the land of the sacred rivers didn’t prove itself very good at nation-building. Now with a different set of problems facing the country it is proving even less good at nation-saving.
The forces of disorder and ‘Islamic’ conquest are on the march and the Punjab-led state of Pakistan has gone into a trance, fervently hoping that by itself, by some miracle of the heavens, the danger will pass…leaving its prosperous trader-leaders free to expand their business and industrial empires.
Trader-politicians exist but they are for normal times. Pakistan’s current paladins have been elected for sure and with a heavy mandate too, but the fact that despite this mandate they present a picture of utter confusion, only proves what is frequently said about them: that while smart enough in some things – business and trade, for instance – giving the nation leadership and a sense of direction in these trying times is not their cup of tea.
On a war footing we should be. This is what circumstances dictate but this is where our troubles start. For, in all honesty, with the Sharifs, Dar, Nisar, and Asif sitting around the table, is this anyone’s idea of a war cabinet? Would anyone have made Churchill war leader in 1940 if he had been a baron of trade and industry as our present leaders are?
Since this lot came to power seven months have gone by and the Taliban have recovered from the death of Hakeemullah Mehsud and are once again on the offensive. And we don’t know what to do. The realisation is gaining ground that, perhaps, there is no running away from this fight and that whether we like it or not we shall have to take a stand. But our hearts are not in this enterprise. You just have to look at Nawaz Sharif and company. Do they look as if they are leading a nation at war?
Doing something is a long way off. They can’t even find the right words. So what is to be done? Or do we assume that history’s lessons are for others, not us? Don’t we remember Yugoslavia? Do we forget what happened to the Soviet Union? Don’t we have eyes to see what is happening across the Middle East, in Syria most notably where civil war rages and, but for Russian support and Bashar al-Assad’s determination, the country would long ago have splintered?
Excoriate Assad for other things as much as we may like but spirit and resolution even his detractors will have to grant him. He and his wife and children continue to stay in Damascus even as sections of the city have turned into battlefields.
Sooner or later fight we will have to. Even if we want to bury our heads in the sand the Taliban are pushing us so hard that our sleeping ghairat (honour) will have no choice but to wake up and do something. How strange the workings of this ghairat? On fire at the merest mention of drones, completely unmoved even as the Taliban make Christian martyrs of us by slapping one cheek, then the other, and from Nawaz Sharif downwards our leaders behaving like the best of Samaritans.
Incidentally, mark how diabolically clever our American friends are. All the while that the Taliban recharged under the leadership of Mullah Fazlullah are into their current offensive – striking here, there and everywhere – they haven’t carried out a single drone attack. If they had we would have forgotten the Taliban, raised the banner of Islam and rushed at the Americans, blaming them for our troubles. Since they have not, we stand deprived of our best excuse, so much so that the drone word these past couple of weeks seems to have disappeared altogether from the pulsating fury of our national discourse. Clever of our American friends.
But the question remains, who leads the national effort? Those who can’t bring themselves even to say the right words? That’s our problem…a Mustafa Kemal situation but no Mustafa Kemal, a battle for survival without plan or resolve, leaders muttering pieties, wringing their hands, their confusion deepening by the day, their hearts not in this fight, their hearts elsewhere – the price of chicken and eggs (yes, poultry one of their latest preoccupations), private trade deals with Turkey and China. So it goes on.
The Punjab leadership is concerned only about Punjab…that too that sliver of middle, prosperous, motorway Punjab, while the rest of the country burns at the edges and for lack of leadership sinks deeper into listlessness and depression.
Therein the contradiction – a nation finally ready for taking this fight to the finish but a leadership without spirit or spine. It had to take some civilians injured in the RA Bazaar bomb blast to tell the prime minister and army chief in no uncertain terms when they came visiting the Military Hospital to teach the Taliban a lesson. One of the injured used the Punjabi language’s most endearing phrase about sister relationships to describe the Taliban. But again the old problem: if your forte is bank loans and factories, how do you become a war leader? There are no switches you can pull to bring about this transformation.
That’s why we are living in a dangerous moment because the leadership problem could bring the whole edifice of our shining democracy tumbling down. I hate saying this but where there is a vacuum – in this case a vacuum of leadership – something is bound to fill it. Or disorder reigns and things fall apart. Foreign examples are telling enough but our own history is also instructive. There were many causes for the breakup of Pakistan in 1971 but inadequate leadership was one of them. Yahya Khan was an intelligent man, in his day a brilliant staff officer. But the events he was called upon to deal with were too big for him.
Our present leaders graduated from the ISI’s school of political tactics way back in the 1980s and 1990s. The bible they were taught was anti-Bhuttoism at which they proved very good. These are different times. Only Kemalism, a firm turning away from the medievalism of the past 30 years, can save Pakistan. But of that there are few signs.
One notion we should disabuse ourselves of. All-out war does not mean hitting one’s head against a wall. It does not mean an assault on North Waziristan without adequate preparation. It means, first of all, a change of national attitude, a stiffening of national resolve, a focusing on the essential instead of the secondary (a dictum of Hitler’s which he forgot when he attacked Russia without finishing matters with Britain). It also means the army bidding farewell to the complicated scripture of good and bad Taliban.
Are the Taliban fighting for municipal autonomy that the bozos of this administration and Imran Khan want to negotiate with them? Do the Taliban want provincial status for Fata that the appeasement brigade wants to talk to them? They want not a piece, they want the whole, something our political geniuses find hard to understand.
We should be studying Munich and the history of the Second World War. Chamberlain was a better politician than anyone in our appeasement brigade. But he misjudged Hitler as Chamberlain’s Pakistani successors, none more so than the Punjab-centric leadership, misjudge the Taliban.
Is Pakistan’s cause hopeless? No, it can be redeemed provided we solve the riddle of leadership. As the French anthem, the Marseillaise, proclaims: to arms, citizens, form your battalions, let impure blood drench our plains. Who infuses the armies of the republic with this spirit?
Email: [email protected]
If you see history, every invader came from the north. Less the british. So all threats come from khyber and move down through Punjab to Delhi. So what we call punjab is actually a
land of darbari folks.
Yes sir to every invader and please move on to delhi for better rewards.
This time round , the new invader has already made inroads in punjab and thats why the punjabi leadership want to close its eyes and hope they will go away
Reference
Posted by admin in "Jihadi" Outfits of Terrorism, Afghan -Taliban-India Axis, AFGHANISTAN BASED RAW TRAINED TALIBAN ACTIONS, Afghanistan-Land of Backstabbers, BABIES KILLED IN DRONE ATTACKS, BADAMI LASSI & PHAJJAY KAY KABAB, Baloch Feudal Sardars, BILAWAL BHUTTO ZARDARI-CHIP OF THE ZARDARI BLOCK, BIN LADEN DEATH HOAX, BOOT THE SCOUNDRELS OR SHOWDAZ, China, CIA AGENT NAWAZ SHARIF, CIA SUBVERSION IN PAKISTAN, CORRUPTION OF SHAHBAZ SHARIF, COWARD OF KARGIL NAWAZ SHARIF, Destroyers of E.Pakistan, DEVILS OWN ALTAF HUSSAIN, EXPATRIATE PAKISTANIS SPEAK-UP, Foreign Policy, GHADAAR-I-PAKISTAN NAWAZ SHARIF, Girah Cut, Global Islam, Global Issues, India, INDIA -US ENCIRCLEMENT OF CHINA, India -US Joint Export to Pakistan: Terrorism, India Backstabbing US, India Destroying Quietly US Economy, India Hall of Shame, INDIA SPONSORED TERRORISM IN KARACHI, INDIA STATE SPONSORED TERRORISM IN PAKISTAN, INDIA'S CASTEISM, INDIA'S HINDUISM, India's Missile Technology Proliferation, India's Nuclear Proliferation, INDIA-HO-- -- USE BUILT ON SAND AND COW DUNG, Islam: The Universal Message of Peace, ISLAMOPHOBIA, Joint Defense Developments, Makaar Dushman, MQM Terrorism, Muslim Haters, Nawaz Sharif & Kashmiri Biradari, Nawaz Sharif Dangerous Man, NAWAZ SHARIF DICTATOR, NAWAZ SHARIF FAMILY TURPITUDE, Nawaz Sharif Massive Corruption, NAWAZ SHARIF MUZZLES PRESS, NAWAZ SHARIF SAGA OF ABSOLUTE & CHRONIC CORRUPTION, OUTRAGE AGAINST MUSLIM GENOCIDE, Pakistan Fights Terrorism, Pakistan's Ruling Elite Feudals Industrialists, Politics, PPP Choor, Suppression of Women in Hindu India on October 10th, 2013
The US leaders and media often cite Pakistan as the most dangerous country in the world. If it is true, it didn’t attain this status at its own. Outsiders are responsible for making Pakistan a nursery of terrorism, or epicenter of terrorism, as recently described by Manmohan Singh, or the most dangerous country. Ironically, the ones responsible for converting a law abiding and peaceful country into a volatile country are today in the forefront censuring it. Till the onset of Afghan Jihad in 1980, Pakistan was a moderate and nonviolent country. It did suffer from the pangs of humiliation for having lost its most populous East Pakistan and grieved over non-resolution of Kashmir dispute pending since January 1948 UNSC resolution. Both wounds had been inflicted upon Pakistan by its arch rival India. Pakistan had to perforce go nuclear in quest for its security because of India’s hostile posturing and nuclearisation.
Invasion and occupation of Afghanistan by Soviet forces in December 1979 brought five million Afghan refugees in Pakistan. These refugees disturbed the peace of Frontier Province and Balochistan where bulk got permanently settled. 2.8 million Afghan refugees have still not returned to their homes and besides becoming an economic burden, have posed serious social and security hazards. Foreign agencies carrying an agenda to destabilize Pakistan have been recruiting bulk of terrorists from within them.
Once the US decided to back proxy war in Afghanistan, CIA commissioned thousands of Mujahideen from all over the Muslim world and with the assistance of ISI, motivated, trained and equipped them to assist Afghan Mujahideen in their fight against Soviet forces. Large number of seminaries imparting religious training to the under privileged children were tasked to impart military and motivational training as well and prepare them for Jihad. FATA and Pashtun belt of Balochistan contiguous to Afghanistan were converted into forward bases of operation from where young Jihadists were unleashed. For next nine years the youth were continuously recruited and launched to fight the holy war against evil empire. Saudi Arabia became the chief financer of Jihad. It provided heavy funds to Sunni Madrassahs only. ISI took upon itself as the chief coordinator of the entire war effort while CIA restricted its role to providing arms, funds and intelligence only.
The whole free world led by USA enthusiastically applauded the heroics of holy warriors and none cared about astronomical fatalities and critical injuries suffered by them. The maimed for life, widows and orphans were patted and told that it was a holy war fought for a noble cause and huge rewards awaited them in the life hereafter. The single point agenda of the US was to defeat the Soviet forces with the help of Muslim fighters. Not a single soldier of any country including Pakistan took part in the unmatched war between a super power and rag-tag, ill-clothed and ill-equipped Mujahideen.
None bothered about the ill-effects this long-drawn war will have upon this region in general and Pakistan in particular acting as the Frontline State. Although Pakistan was only supporting the proxy war and was not directly involved, but it remained in a state of war and it faced continuous onslaughts of KGB-RAW-KHAD nexus as well as attacks by Soviet trained Afghan pilots and soldiers in the form of air assaults, artillery barrages and missile/rockets attacks. Throughout the nine-year war, Pakistan faced twin threat from its eastern and western borders. By virtue of occupation of Wakhan corridor by Soviet troops, USSR had become immediate neighbor of Pakistan and had hurled repeated threats to wind up training centres and stop meddling in Afghanistan or else be prepared for dire consequences. Moscow’s age-old dream of reaching warm waters of Arabian Sea through Balochistan haunted Gen Ziaul Haq, but he stoutly held his ground. Pakistan’s relentless support ultimately enabled the Mujahideen to achieve the miracle of the 20th century. They defeated the super power and pushed out Soviet forces from Afghanistan in February 1989.
All foreign Jihadists who had come from other countries were not accepted by their parent countries. They had no choice but to stay put and get settled in Afghanistan and in FATA since they had collectively fought the war and had developed camaraderie with the Afghans and tribesmen. The US who had enticed and displaced them and used them as cannon fodder to achieve its interests was morally bounded to resettle them. It was honor bound to help Pakistan in overcoming the after effects of the war. FATA that had acted as the major base for cross border operations deserved uplift in socio-economic and educational fields. Afghanistan required major rehabilitation and rebuilding after its devastation. Nothing of the sort happened.
The US coldheartedly abandoned Afghanistan, Pakistan and Jihadists and instead embraced India which had remained the camp follower of Soviet Union since 1947 and had also partnered Soviet Union in the Afghan war and had vociferously condemned US-Pakistan proxy war. This callous act opened the doors for religious fanaticism and militarism. Pakistan suffered throughout the Afghan war and continues to suffer to this day on account of the debris left behind by Soviet forces and proxy war. By the time last Soviet soldier left Afghan soil, Pakistani society had got radicalized owing to free flow of weapons and drugs from Afghanistan and onset of armed uprising in occupied Kashmir.
Pakistan’s efforts to tackle the fallout effects of the war got seriously hampered because of harsh sanctions imposed by USA under Pressler Amendment in October 1989 and political instability throughout the democratic era from 1988 to 1999. Besides, Iran and Saudi Arabia started fuelling sectarianism in Pakistan throughout 1990s in a big way. Sipah-e-Muhammad Pakistan and Majlis-e-Wahadat ul Hashmeen were funded by Iran and Sipah-e-Sahabha Pakistan, now named as Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat (Sunni Deobandi) were supported by Saudi Arabia, which gave rise to religious extremism and intolerance and sharpened Shia-Sunni divide. Masjids and Imambargahs as well as religious clerics were incessantly attacked by the zealots of two communities. Threat of sectarian violence that had become menacing in Punjab in 1997-1998 had to be dealt with sternly. But the Punjab Police operation had to be curtailed because of severe pressure from Human Rights activists and NGOs on charges of extra judicial killings. Resultantly, the disease remained uncured.
Unseating of democratically elected heavy mandate of Nawaz Sharif led government by Gen Musharraf and the latter opting to ditch Taliban regime and to fight global war on terror at the behest of USA energized anti-Americanism, religious extremism and led to creation of Mutahida Majlis Ammal (MMA), an amalgam of six religious parties, which formed governments in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan. MMA on the quiet nurtured extremist religious groups that were also funded by foreign powers.
The fact that after 9/11, the US chose Pakistan to fight the war as a Frontline State is a clear cut indication that Pakistan at that time was viewed as a responsible and valued country and not a dangerous country. However, Pakistan’s nuclear program was an eyesore for India, Israel and USA. The planners had made up their minds to intentionally create anarchic conditions in Pakistan so that its nukes could be whisked away under the plea that it was unstable and couldn’t be trusted.
The initial attempt towards that end was to first allow bulk of Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders and their fighters to escape to FATA from Afghanistan and soon after forcing Pakistan to induct regular troops into South Waziristan (SW) to flush them out. This move created a small rivulet allowing terrorism to seep into FATA, which kept gushing in because of RAW led and CIA backed covert war at a massive scale and turning the rivulet into a river. Likewise, another rivulet was created in Balochistan. Concerted and sustained efforts were made to destabilize FATA and Balochistan and gradually sink Pakistan in sea of terrorism. Six intelligence agencies based in Kabul kept sprinkling tons of fuel on embers of religious extremism, sectarianism, ethnicity and Jihadism.
The US instead of helping in resolving Kashmir dispute misguided Gen Musharraf to forget about UN resolutions and float an out of box solution and try and resolve the dispute in accordance with the wishes of India. In order to woo India, Musharraf gave it in writing that he will not allow Pakistan soil to be used for terrorism against any neighboring country including India. While making this commitment unilaterally, he committed the fatal mistake of not imposing this condition on India. To further please USA and India and make the latter agree to sign peace treaty, he bridled all Jihadi groups engaged in Kashmir freedom struggle as well as in sectarianism. He also allowed India to fence the Line of Control. These moves did please India but angered Jihadis and sectarian outfits and in reaction, they hastened to join Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and turn their guns towards Pak security forces dubbed as mercenaries of USA fighting US war for dollars.
But for phenomenal clandestine support by foreign powers to the TTP in the northwest and to the BLA, BRA and BLF in the southwest, extremism and terrorism could have got controlled after major operations launched in Malakand Division including Swat, Bajaur and SW in 2009 and minor operations in other tribal agencies. The disarrayed network of TTP was helped to get re-assembled and regrouped in North Waziristan and that of Maulana Fazlullah in Kunar and Nuristan in Afghanistan. As opposed to good work done by Pak security forces in combating and curbing terrorism in Pakistan, the US-NATO forces operating in Afghanistan along with Afghan National Army kept making one blunder after another and in the process kept sinking deeper and deeper into the quagmire. Rather than correcting their follies, they chose to make Pakistan a scapegoat and declared it responsible for their failures. Rather than doing more at their end, they asked Pakistan to do more which was already doing much more than its capacity.
Since the aggressors underestimated their enemy they took things too lightly. Their intentions lacked sincerity and honesty and their stated objectives were totally different to their actual unspoken objectives which were commercial in nature. Above all they had no legitimate grounds to destroy a sovereign country and uproot its people which had played no role in 9/11. As a result, rather than devotedly fighting to win the war in Afghanistan, the assailants got deeply involved in drug business and other money-making schemes. The ruling regime led by Hamid Karzai became a willing partner in such shady businesses. American security contractors, defence merchants, builders and intelligence agencies started multiplying their wealth and lost their moral and professional ethics. Other than materialistic ventures, they got more involved in money-spinning covert operations against Pakistan, Iran, China and Middle East than in fighting their adversary. Taliban and al-Qaeda combine took full advantage of their self-destructive activities and opening of the second front in Iraq. After regrouping and re-settling in southern and eastern Afghanistan, they started striking targets in all parts of the country. War in Iraq helped al-Qaeda in expanding its influence in Arabian Peninsula and turning into an international organization.
The US has made a big mess in Afghanistan, in Iraq and in Libya and is now making another mess in Syria. It has lost the confidence of its most allied ally Pakistan by mistreating and distrusting it. Having lost on all fronts because of its tunnel vision and mercantile greed, it now wants the most dangerous country Pakistan to ignore the raw deal it gave all these years and to not only help ISAF in pulling out of Afghanistan safely but also to convince the Taliban to agree upon a negotiated political settlement. At the start of the Afghan venture, Pakistan was chosen by Washington to ensure success and in the endgame Pakistan is again being relied upon to bail it out of the mess. In the same breadth, the US is unprepared to cease drone attacks in FATA despite repeated requests that drones fuel terrorism. It is still focused on carving a lead role for India in Afghanistan. It is not prepared to stop its interference in internal affairs of Pakistan or to dissuade India from destabilizing Balochistan. Whatever socio-economic promises made are futuristic in nature and tied to conditions. US media and think tanks continue to demonize Pakistan. Its tilt towards India is too heavy and prejudicial behavior towards Pakistan conspicuous.
As a result of the US skewed policies with ulterior motives, Pakistan is faced with the demons of ethnicity, sectarianism, Jihadism, religious extremism and terrorism. While TTP is aligned with about 60 terrorist groups, in Balochistan there are more than two dozen terrorist groups. In Karachi, other than armed mafias, political parties have armed wings and are involved in target killings. Rangers and Police are engaged in targeted operation in Karachi and are producing productive results. 150,000 troops combating the militants in the northwest enjoy a definite edge over them. Major parts of Frontier Corps, Frontier Constabulary, Levies and Police are fighting the Baloch separatists and sectarian forces targeting Hazaras and have contained anti-state forces. All major cities are barricaded with road blocks and police piquets and yet terrorists manage to carryout acts of terror. The miscreants are fighting State forces with tenacity because of uninterrupted financial and weapons support from foreign agencies. Once external support dries up, their vigor will wane rapidly and sooner than later they will give up fighting.
With so many grave internal and external threats, most of which were invented and thrust upon Pakistan by foreign powers and duly exacerbated by meek and self-serving political leadership, Gen Ashfaq Pervez Kayani’s hands remained full. He has saddled the COAS chair for six years and during this period he had to face many a critical situations. It goes to his credit that he handled each crisis competently, astutely and honorably. During his eventful command, he tackled the challenge of terrorism, which he rightly described as the biggest threat to the security of Pakistan, boldly and produced pleasing results. Above all, he kept the morale of all ranks in the Army high and earned their respect and admiration. The list of his achievements is long and I have been highlighting those in my articles off and on. His successor has so far not been named but whosoever replaces him will find it difficult to fit into his shoes. I am sure he will breathe more freely and relax once he retires on November 29, 2013. We thank him for his laudable contributions and wish him sound health and happiness in all his future doings. Let us hope and pray that this senseless war comes to an end at the earliest, putting an end to chirping tongues deriving sadistic pleasure in describing Pakistan as the most dangerous country.
The writer is a retired Brig, defence analyst, columnist, historian and a researcher. [email protected]
Posted by admin in CORRUPTION OF SHAHBAZ SHARIF on September 22nd, 2013
PML(N) IS REWARDING HIM WITH A PERMIT FOR
SHOPPING PLAZA CONSTRUCTION
ON THE CORNER OF HALL/MALL/BEADON ROAD, LAHORE
THUS DESTROYING LAHORE’S HISTORICAL LAKSHMI MANSION
SHAHBAZ SHARIF & NAWAZ SHARIF ARE SUPPORTING MIRZA
IQBAL BAIG AS PART OF LAHORE IMPROVEMENT SCHEME
Pakistani Drug Lord Iqbal Baig has set-up shop in Lahore, specifically in the vicinity of Hall and Mall Road, in an area formerly called Lakshmi Mansion. He acquired these properties to build a Shopping Mall under blessing of Shahbaz Sharif, Nawaz Sharif, and Asif Zardari. Iqbal Baig is money laundering, by converting drug money into legitimate cash by buying properties in Lahore. He bought almost whole of Lakshmi Mansion and Hall Road properties. He is a known accomplice of Taliban and is clear and present danger to the global community including the US and Europe. He is the financier of Taliban and funnels money to every terrorist organization through money laundering in legitimate business enterprises. During the PPP government, he stayed under the radar and kept building assets to finance his patrons the Taliban. Pakistan’s ISI and US CIA should look into the activities of this dangerous criminal on par with Pablo Escobar. In 1995, Iqbal Baig, Pakistan’s most notorious drug lords was extradited to the United States, where he was charged with 100 counts of heroin and hashish smuggling. Iqbal Baig and Anwar Khattak were put on a U.S. government plane in 1995 night only hours after his appeals against extradition was turned down by the High Court in Rawalpindi.Baig and Khattak together ran one of Pakistan’s biggest heroin- and hashish-trafficking networks, according to U.S. and Pakistani officials. Both were imprisoned in Pakistan, where they had been convicted of drug smuggling.Baig and Khattak will face 102 counts of smuggling heroin and hashish into the United States. The trials are likely to take place either in Michigan or New York City, where the offenses allegedly occurred, a U.S. official said. Pakistan has been cooperating with the United States since 1993, when the Americans gave Pakistan a list of 17 suspected drug barons it wanted extradited. Seven were extradited in 1993; most others are in custody in Pakistan.
In lucid moments, Mohammed Ilyas has happy memories of life as a fisherman on one of Karachi’s deep-sea shark boats. But that was 10 years ago, before Mr. Ilyas began smoking the low-grade heroin he knows as “brown sugar,” and before home became a threadbare blanket tacked to a grimy Karachi wall as a windbreak.
Now, Mr. Ilyas’s addiction brings him to the same lonely spot each night, with a sliver of silver paper to hold the heroin bought with a day’s panhandling in the docks, and a lighted taper to heat the powder into the vapors he inhales. On either side, fellow addicts crouch in their own pitiful isolation, ignored by the police and passers-by.
“What can I do, sir?” Mr. Ilyas asked on a recent evening, between pulls on the tube of rolled paper he uses as a pipe. “I would like to do something. I would like to be back with my family. But the brown sugar tastes too good.”
The tragedy for Pakistan set in much deeper 15 years ago, when Afghan warlords, thrown into turmoil by the Soviet military intervention in their country, stepped up the growing of opium poppies as other forms of commerce collapsed. The product, as opium gum, traveled down old trade routes into the deserts and mountains along Afghanistan’s border, where Pakistani frontiersmen, who grow tons of opium themselves, took the gum and ran it through refineries, producing the cheap “brown sugar” smoked by Mr. Ilyas, as well as heroin in its purer, more lucrative forms.
Over the years, as ever larger quantities of the narcotic began flowing into Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar and other cities, the drug ate its way into the fiber of Pakistan. Political life was corrupted, to the point that one of the country’s most notorious drug barons, Ayub Afridi, sat as an elected member of Parliament from 1988 to 1990, dropping out only when an ordinance was passed barring any known drug trafficker from running in an election.
Drug barons have continued to exercise a pervasive political influence, discouraging decisive government action against them.
What’s more, the backwash from the Afghan conflict has brought a flow of weapons into Pakistan, creating a nexus between the drug barons and new generation of heavily armed gangs. In Karachi mainly, but also in other cities, these gangs have established a terror that is overwhelming the local authorities.
Along with Afghanistan, and to a much smaller extent India, Pakistan has become one of the world’s leading producers of heroin — and by some estimates, a larger producer now than the Golden Triangle countries of Southeast Asia.
With growing anxiety, Western nations, including the United States, have been looking at Pakistan in the way they have long looked at countries like Colombia and Thailand — as a place where narcotics trafficking, left to run rampant, has become a danger not only to the country itself but also to much of the world.
Pakistani leaders have made no secret of their belief that drug money was in some way linked to the March 8 attack that killed two Americans working at the United States Consulate in Karachi, and to the terrorist underground that supported Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, a 27-year-old fugitive and suspected mastermind of the World Trade Center bombing in New York in 1993. Mr. Yousef was arrested in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, in February.
These links are likely to be discussed when Pakistan’s Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto, arrives in the United States on April 5. For five years, the main stumbling block to improved ties has been Pakistan’s persistence with a covert program to develop nuclear weapons. But on this visit, Pakistan’s Prime Minister may find American leaders at least as concerned about Pakistan’s role as a center for drugs and terrorism.
When she recently met with American reporters in Islamabad, Ms. Bhutto offered a stark picture of Pakistan as a society where torrents of drugs and weapons have combined to undermine the basis for a civil society.
“We are a clean Government,” she said. “For the first time in our history, we are going to take action against drug barons, militants and terrorists.”
Western embassies that have pressed for years for a narcotics crackdown were encouraged three months ago when the Government froze $70 million in assets belonging to seven leading Pakistani drug lords, and took steps, for the first time in Pakistan, to curb money laundering by drug bosses. The Government also announced the biggest raid on a narcotics laboratory in North-West Frontier Province, site of many of the heroin refineries, seizing 132 tons of hashish and nearly half a ton of heroin.
Ms. Bhutto also promised to speed up action by Pakistani courts on United States requests for the extradition of six drug lords held in Pakistan, and for the arrest and extradition of two others, including Mr. Afridi, the former legislator.
Maj. Gen. Salahuddin Termizi, the country’s anti-drug chief, has won the confidence of Western narcotics experts. But few with experience in combatting the drug world in Pakistan are ready to congratulate Ms. Bhutto just yet.
[ In a crackdown on the eve of the Bhutto trip, two suspected drug barons, Mirza Iqbal Baig and Anwar Khattak, were flown to the United States on April 3. The extraditions were cited by General Termizi as further proof of Pakistan’s commitment to rolling back booming drug production and trafficking. General Termizi said on April 4 that Pakistan had smashed the bulk of its heroin factories and arrested all but 2 of 12 leading drug barons. ]
Top army officers have been accused in the past of conniving with the drug lords, to the extent of running heroin shipments to Karachi aboard army-owned trucks.
And even if Pakistan were to live up to all of Ms. Bhutto’s promises, it would not tackle what has always been the core of the heroin problem: Afghanistan’s role as a secure hinterland for the traffickers. Years of efforts and millions of dollars have been spent by Western governments in an effort to persuade Afghan warlords to stop growing poppies and plant other crops, but poppy acreage has increased every year.
United States officials who have seen the blaze of white, red and pink poppies that cover much of Afghanistan each spring argue that little will be achieved until Washington shifts its spending priorities. The officials say spending $80 million of the State Department’s anti-narcotics budget on efforts to combat cocaine production in South America, and barely a tenth as much on all of Asia and Africa, means that efforts against heroin have to take a back seat.
Currently, the closest thing to a United States Government anti-narcotics program in Afghanistan is a $100,000 grant to Mercy Corps, an American volunteer agency that is trying to persuade communities in a small part of Helmand Province to substitute other cash crops for poppy-growing. Narcotics experts say that their work is hampered because Washington has no embassy in Kabul, the Afghan capital, and that the Clinton Administration has played virtually no part in efforts to negotiate peace between Afghan factions that have been fighting a civil war since Soviet troops withdrew.
When Mrs. Bhutto meets President Clinton, she seems likely to argue for an American responsibility to help Pakistan and Afghanistan deal with their narcotics problems. The argument is that Washington’s decision to channel billions of dollars in weapons and financial backing to the Afghan rebel groups in the 1980′s, without close scrutiny of the some of the Afghan leaders involved, contributed to a climate in which some of those leaders turned to heroin trafficking.
“We have been getting a bad name, and it is clear that our activity needs to be geared up,” Brig. Gen. Mohammed Aslam, deputy director of the new anti-narcotics force, said at his office in Rawalpindi.
But the general smiled when he was asked what part of the blame he attributed to the United States.
“I will only say this,” he said. “I believe that we in Pakistan are doing what we can to undo our part of the crime.”
NEW DELHI — Two days before Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto leaves for a U.S. visit, her government handed over two alleged heroin kingpins to the United States and a court opened the way for more quick extraditions.
Haji Mirza Mohammed Iqbal Baig, once reputedly the head of Pakistan’s largest drug syndicate, and his lieutenant, Mohammed Anwar Khattak, were flown to the United States on Sunday night aboard an American aircraft, said officials at the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad, the capital. The two Pakistanis’ names appear in more than 100 U.S. narcotics cases.
“There is a lot of evidence that these guys are big-time heroin dealers. We’re happy to bring them to justice,” a U.S. drug official in Islamabad said.
In Washington, Justice Department officials said the men were due to arrive Monday night in Hawaii and will be flown to Travis Air Force Base in Northern California’s Solano County before being transferred to New York for arraignment.
Baig and Khattak are wanted on various federal charges, including conspiracy to smuggle heroin into the United States. They had already been convicted by a Pakistani court in the 1985 seizure of more than 17 tons of hashish in the southwestern province of Baluchistan.
The drug dealers’ extradition, which the Clinton Administration had sought since 1993, is the latest of several tough-on-crime measures by Bhutto’s government that–by design or not–have especially pleased the United States.
On Feb. 7, Pakistani and U.S. agents joined forces in Islamabad to arrest Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, the alleged mastermind of the World Trade Center bombing. He was flown to New York to stand trial.
Such actions will undoubtedly be cited by Bhutto, who leaves for the United States today, as proof of her determination to do her part in combatting the global narcotics trade and Islamic terrorism, two major U.S. security concerns.
Next Tuesday, Bhutto is scheduled to meet President Clinton at the White House. She has been seeking more U.S. help–including the lifting of a law that has barred most American aid to Pakistan since October, 1990, because of the Asian country’s nuclear weapons program.
Late last year, U.S. drug czar Lee P. Brown warned Bhutto that Pakistan could lose badly needed World Bank and International Monetary Fund loans unless the country, the world’s No. 3 opium producer, did more to stem narcotics production and trafficking.
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U.S. drug officials have praised what has happened since. On March 23, more than 2,000 paramilitary troops staged an unprecedented drug raid in the remote, lawless Khyber region bordering Afghanistan. They seized 6.3 tons of highly refined heroin, as much as Pakistan normally confiscates in a year.
Baig and Khattak had been served notice earlier this year that they could be extradited to the United States. Pakistan’s law allows citizens in such a position to file a petition in court opposing extradition.
On Sunday, their petitions were rejected and they were quickly put on a plane for the United States.
Special correspondent Jennifer Griffin in Islamabad contributed to this report.
Drug barons' extradition challenged in SC
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*From Nasir Malik
ISLAMABAD, April 4: The Supreme Court will hear arguments on Wednesday
about the admissibility ) of three petitions filed by the wives of
alleged drug lords Mirza Iqbal Baig and Anwar Khattak against the Lahore
High Court decision that cleared the way for their extradition to the
United States.
The Lahore High Court on Sunday allowed the extradition of seven drug
barons, including Baig and Khattak. The two were immediately flown to
the United States in a US military plane.
Though apparently the petitions will make little difference for Baig
and Khattak who have already been sent abroad, they can affect the
remaining five accused who are in Adiala Jail.
One of the five accused, Nasrullah Hanjera has applied to the Supreme
Court to grant an order blocking his possible extradition.
Khawaja Haris, lawyer for the accused, has maintained in his petitions
that the extraditions are in isolation of Section 5 (2) of Extradition
Act 1972 which bars extradition until an accused has been acquitted or
completed a sentence in his own country.
Interior Minister Naseerullah Babar told reporters on Monday that the
alleged drug barons were handed over to the US authorities after
completing all legal requirements.
But constitutional experts say the government acted in haste by
immediately parcelling the two accused thus denying them of their
constitutional right to appeal before the Supreme Court. They also point
out that the extradition was also contrary to Article 4 of the
Extradition Agreement signed between the two countries.
Article 4 says: The extradition shall not take place if the person aimed
has already been tried, discharged or punished or is still under trial
in the territories of the high contracting party (applied to in this
case Pakistan) for the crime or offence for which his extradition is
demanded. If the person claimed would be under examination or under
punishment his extradition shall be deferred until the conclusion of the
trial or the full execution of any punishment awarded to him."
Haris told reporters that Baig and Khattak were still serving their
five-year jail term awarded to them by a Karachi magistrate. Besides,
two cases were also pending against them.
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