South Asian Outlook : An Independent e-Monthly | South Asia: Pakistan

       (Afghanistan and Myanmar in the
         map are not members of SAARC)

Irretrievable Failure?

Kanchan Lakshman
Research Fellow, Institute for Conflict Management;
Assistant Editor, Faultlines: Writings on Conflict & Resolution

After capturing much of the Frontier and the Tribal Areas, the jihadis have now brought their war to Pakistan’s cities and the heartland. The latest instance of this insidious expansion was visible when Sri Lankan cricketers narrowly escaped an attack in the morning of March 3, 2009, when terrorists ambushed the bus carrying them to the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore for the third day’s play of the second Test. At least seven persons – six Policemen escorting the Sri Lankans and the driver of another van in the convoy – were killed and 20 others, including seven Sri Lankan players, were wounded in the attack near the Liberty roundabout, 500 metres from the stadium.

While no official determination has been made thus far regarding the group responsible for the attack, analysts and officials in Lahore and elsewhere in Pakistan opine that evidence on the ground points to the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) or some other al Qaeda affiliate, possibly including the Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) or the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ). At the time of writing, preliminary investigations into the attack have suggested that LeT militants, who went underground after an apparent crackdown on the group in the aftermath of the Mumbai terrorist attack in November 2008, may have carried out the assault. Leaks after the initial probe suggested that a group of "headstrong" LeT cadres, who went underground and hid in the garrison city of Rawalpindi after Government action against the terrorist group and its front organization, the Jama’at-ud-Da’awa, had acted on its own and carried out the attack. However, all of this remains speculative at the moment, and the character of the attack and of the Security Forces’ (SFs) response leave many suspicions unaddressed.

Apart from the fact that the Lahore attack itself reflected a humongous security failure, the incident irreversibly destroyed the immunity sports in general, and especially cricket – an enormously popular sport in the sub-continent – had hitherto enjoyed. Clearly, the militants can now attack any soft target, anywhere.

Emboldened by the state’s capitulation in Swat, the militants will certainly make similar and other demonstrations elsewhere in Pakistan in order to progressively establish their writ. The Taliban – al Qaeda combine can also be expected, in the proximate future, to increasingly attack the heartlands of Punjab, the Army’s conventional stronghold and the country’s most populous province. With Pakistan’s Security Forces gradually losing their will to fight amidst desertions, fatigue and a refusal to ‘kill their own’, the state will increasingly be forced to seek ‘compromises’. It is abundantly clear, now, that the jihadi who now dominates the NWFP and FATA, will look to control Pakistan in the proximate future.

While the guns have fallen relatively silent in the Swat Valley, there violence continues elsewhere in the NWFP and across Pakistan. Violence and subversion are now crystallizing as a natural consequence of the state of play in FATA and Swat. While the progressive collapse in NWFP and FATA is well documented, it is Punjab that is, in many ways, emerging as a jihadi hub. 304 persons, including 257 Security Force (SF) personnel and 34 civilians, were killed in 78 terrorism-related incidents in Punjab in 2008. The fact that more civilians and SF personnel were killed in Punjab than militants, gives a clear indication that the Islamist terrorist networks are securing an upper hand. Out of the approximately 78 incidents in 2008, 21 were reported from Islamabad and 22 from Lahore. 49 persons, including 34 civilians and 14 SF personnel, have died so far in Punjab in 22 incidents in 2009 (including six in Lahore and one in Islamabad. Data till March 8).

Southern Punjab has always been a base for a mélange of jihadi groups. For long, it has hosted groups such as the LeT, JeM, Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP), LeJ, Harkat-ul-Ansar, Hizbul Tahrir, Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HuM), Tehreek-e-Jaferia Pakistan (TJP) and Sipah-e-Mohammed Pakistan (SMP). Furthermore, militants from across Pakistan and outside easily find safe haven in places like Lahore and Islamabad. Peshawar, the NWFP capital which is just 150 kilometers away from Islamabad, is already under militant siege, and Lahore, Islamabad and Rawalpindi are increasingly being targeted. While one suicide attack has occurred in the current year in Punjab, there were 12 during 2008. In addition, security agencies successfully neutralized many suicide modules. At least 53 ‘potential suicide bombers’ and 16 linkmen were arrested in 2008 from places including Lahore, Sargodha, Rawalpindi, Jhang, Islamabad, and Sialkot, an indication of the substantial pool of fidayeen (suicide cadres) who could inflict mayhem not only in Punjab, but across Pakistan.

Even as the Islamist extremists hold territory and control in the NWFP and FATA, through violence or otherwise, the Taliban – al Qaeda combine is expected to activate sleeper cells in the madrassa network of south Punjab in order to increase violence in Punjab. Pakistan’s urban heartland, including the national capital Islamabad, the Punjab capital Lahore, and the garrison town of Rawalpindi, the Sindh capital, Karachi, and other towns, can be expected to come under increasing and continuous attack. An indication of the gravity of the situation was visible in the report of the Karachi Police’s Crime Investigation Department (CID) Special Branch, which stated that the Taliban "could take the city hostage at any point". The report warned that the Taliban network was spreading across Pakistan so briskly that it may be on course to strike the financial and shipping hub of Karachi. The Taliban has established hideouts in Karachi, the report said, adding that militants have "huge caches" of arms and ammunition and could strike, possibly in a manner similar to the Mumbai attacks of November 26. The report mentions Taliban hideouts and their presence in areas like Sohrab Goth and Quaidabad. Besides living in small motels in these areas, the Taliban are hiding in the hills of Manghopir and Orangi town, and in other low-income areas and slums, Daily Times quoted the Police report as stating. The Taliban’s systematic infiltration of Karachi has led to the hills on the outskirts of the city, slums and small motels, becoming militant hubs. Sources disclosed that the ‘deputy chief’ of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Hasan Mahmood, was reportedly hiding in Karachi.

Pakistan is not merely an increasingly violent state, it is also increasingly ungovernable. With the state capitulation in the Frontier and the deepening of multiple conflicts, the political stand-off between President Asif Ali Zardari and former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharief in a fragile democracy, can only complicate the situation. Any loss or diminution of state control across the board is now synonymous with jihadi ascendancy. Worse, the once-omnipotent Armed Forces have their own demons to tame, and there is already much talk about an impending Army putsch in Pakistan.

There are clearly no easy solutions in Pakistan. The rules of global engagement will have to be radically recast, if the country’s rapid collapse is to be averted. Mere declarations that Pakistan is facing a serious internal security threat and calling the Lahore attack an ‘eerie replica’ of the Mumbai attacks, as US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton did, can hardly suffice. The global community, led by USA, the most dominant interlocutor in the region, will have to recognize the dangers of ‘business as usual’ while dealing with augmenting crisis that is Pakistan. The top US diplomat in Kabul, Christopher Dell, rightly warned, on March 4, that Pakistan constituted a far greater security challenge to America and the world than Afghanistan:

From where I sit [Pakistan] sure looks like it’s going to be a bigger problem… Pakistan is a bigger place, has a larger population, its nuclear-armed… It has certainly made radical Islam a part of its political life, and it now seems to be a deeply ingrained element of its political culture. It makes things there very hard.

Dell also noted that there were signs that the rate of infiltration of insurgents across the frontier from Pakistan’s Tribal Areas had increased, possibly as a result of cease-fire deals between the Taliban and the Pakistani Government. "Every time the Pakistanis have signed a peace deal, two things happen," Dell said, adding "There is an uptick in the fighting on this [the Afghan] side, and the peace deals have fallen apart quickly. We think we’ve already seen an increase of fighters crossing the border."

Three principal militant leaders in FATA have settled their differences and formed a united front, the Shura Ittihad-ul-Mujahideen (Council of United Holy Warriors) to focus on launching attacks in Afghanistan. This front (formally announced on February 22) comprises the groups led by the ‘central chief’ of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Baitullah Mehsud, and the two reportedly pro-Government commanders, Maulvi Nazir of South Waziristan and Hafiz Gul Bahadur of North Waziristan. The three, according to sources, met at an undisclosed location and decided to resolve their differences to foil the designs of ‘external forces’ to create divisions between the various Taliban factions based in Pakistan. A 13-member executive council has been constituted to run the affairs of the new front. The Shura subsequently issued a pamphlet that vowed to target the al Qaeda’s three enemies: "Obama, Zardari and Karzai". Interestingly, the TTP subsequently announced that it would no longer fight the Pakistan Army.

Major General John MacDonald, the new deputy commander of US forces in Afghanistan, told The Guardian on March 4 that the militants were "most dangerous when they begin to collaborate with one another… We think we have already seen an increase in the number of fighters coming across the border particularly in the Kunar area right opposite Bajaur." He predicted that the coming surge in the number of coalition troops in Afghanistan would lead to an increase in fighting, "So yes, this summer you will see more violence… We’re just about to kick a beehive."

The Lahore attack underlines the reality that Pakistan is a dysfunctional state. The country’s leadership, however, remains willfully blind and, as the Pakistani newspaper Dawn noted, living in a state of denial is fast becoming "a Pakistani specialty". Ejaz Haider notes, further,

The worst thing that can happen to a state is to go into denial. How long will we deny that we have groups that have run amok and whose obvious agenda involves destroying Pakistan as a nation-state? These are ideologically motivated millenarians, ahistorical in their approach and literalist in their outlook. They are trained, and societal attitudes transformed over three decades allow them to find recruits with alarming ease. To point to India (‘khufia haath’ – hidden hand) without bothering to look at other evidence for which we now have a long trajectory, is not simply ignorance; it is deliberate perfidy.

The network of Islamist extremists in Pakistan is working to create a strategic vacuum across large areas of the country, within which they hope, eventually, to capture power. While the jihadis focus on escalating internal chaos, situational factors, including the current political stand-off, an inept and compromised leadership and a worsening economic crisis, enormously creates widening opportunities for disorder.

Pakistan has long been thought to be on the threshold of state failure. The Foreign Policy Failed State Index, for instance, showed Pakistan at the 9^th rank among nations most at risk in 2008, up from 34^th in 2005. While international efforts to stabilize the country are urgently needed, these must be located within a far more realistic framework than the well-intentioned and wishful interventions of the past, which sought a transformation through large infusions of unconditional aid. It is time, indeed, for the world to prepare for the possible and proximate collapse or radical transformation of Pakistan. Ajai Sahni notes,

Three probable scenarios present themselves in Pakistan’s menacing endgame. The first of these would see a progression along the present trajectory, towards augmenting disorders and eventual anarchy, as central power is eroded and increasingly randomised in the hands of non-state, principally Islamist, entities, contested locally by proxies of the surviving central authority. The second could result in the abrupt collapse of the central authority, with an Islamist takeover of degraded state institutions and the imposition of a Talibanised order reminiscent of much of Afghanistan in the end 1990s, with its authority contested along wide regions in unrelenting attritional warfare. The third possible outcome could see an Iran-like shift, with the overwhelming proportion of the Pakistan Army simply transferring allegiance to the mullahs, eliminating the small remaining secular segment within the military leadership, to forge a new radical partnership, once again, to create a Talibanised order, backed by the surviving power of the Armed Forces and armed Islamist militant groupings. In each of these cases, externally directed Islamist terrorism would gain tremendous momentum, even as the danger of the use of nuclear or other weapons of mass destruction augments exponentially.

The collapse of the Pakistani state and the dangerous ramifications of a Talibanesque extremist regime in control of the nuclear button are no longer figments of an overactive imagination. It is evident that the Taliban – al Qaeda combine seeks to reduce Pakistan to the status of a captive territory from where it can launch and sustain its global jihad. It is evident that the current establishment in Pakistan lacks both the capacity and the will to effectively contest and contain this enterprise. It is evident, equally, that neither the South Asian neighbourhood nor the principal external powers with capacities to intervene in the region have a coherent strategy to alter the evolving trajectory of events. Unless the entire approach to Pakistan undergoes a fundamental and decisive reinvention, Pakistan can only fulfill its manifest destiny as a global catastrophe.

[South Asia Intelligent Review]

News Briefs

26 Taliban militants killed in Mohmand Agency: Security Forces (SFs) backed by helicopter gun ships killed 26 Taliban militants in the Mohmand Agency of the FATA on March 28, 2009. An official statement issued by the Frontier Corps, NWFP headquarters, said the SFs pounded Taliban hideouts during a search operation in the Saapri area of Yakaghund tehsil (revenue division), killing 26 militants, adding that the troops had secured the area around Saapri. Daily Times, March 29, 2009.

76 persons killed in suicide bombing at mosque in Khyber Agency: 76 persons, including 16 Security Force personnel, were killed and over 125 injured in a suicide attack on a mosque at Peshawar-Torkham Highway in the Jamrud sub-division of Khyber Agency in FATA during the Friday congregation on March 27, 2009. The huge explosion reduced the single-storey roadside mosque to rubble. Witnesses said they heard a huge explosion just as the Imam (prayer leader) concluded his sermon and the people stood up for the Friday prayer. The dead included the prayer leader, his brother, four personnel of the Frontier Corps and 12 Khassadars (tribal police). The others were tribesmen belonging to the nearby villages, Pakistani and Afghan civilians traveling between Peshawar and Torkham, and drivers and conductors of trucks carrying goods to neighbouring Afghanistan. While the Khyber Agency Political Agent Tariq Hayat has confirmed that it was a suicide attack, the Associated Press reported that a Government official has accused the Taliban of carrying out the bombing in revenge for a recent offensive aimed in part at protecting the major supply route for NATO and US troops in Afghanistan that passes in front of the mosque. The News, March 28, 2009.

12 persons killed in suicide bombing in Jandola: 12 persons, including a woman, were killed and 22 others sustained injuries when a teenage suicide bomber blew himself up outside a crowded restaurant in the Jandola bazaar of Tank District in NWFP in the morning of March 26. A pro-government group of Bhittani tribesmen, led by Haji Turkistan, is believed to have been the target of the suicide attacker. Eyewitnesses told The News from Jandola - the gateway to South Waziristan - that a young boy blew himself up outside the crowded restaurant in the bazaar. The bazaar is located in front of heavily guarded British-era fort, currently inhabited by the Frontier Corps and the Army. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack. "The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan claims responsibility for the suicide attack in Jandola," spokesman Maulvi Omar said in a telephone call from an unknown place to reporters in Bajaur. He called the suicide attack a revenge for the clashes in 2008. "Turkistan Bitani’s fighters killed 35 of our people last year, and we killed his people today in the suicide attack," Omar added. The News, March 27, 2009.

Seven Arab militants killed in drone attack in South Waziristan: Seven militants, believed to be Arab nationals, were killed and three others injured when two vehicles they were traveling in, came under attack from the US drones near Makeen area of South Waziristan Agency (SWA) on March 25-afternoon. Sources close to the militants in the area told The News by telephone that the two vehicles had just left the Makeen bazaar to drop the men at their homes in Malik Shahi village of the SWA when they came under attack from the CIA-operated drone. Makeen town is on the border with Razmak sub-division of the North Waziristan Agency. The area is in control of tribal militants affiliated with Baitullah Mehsud, chief of the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). According to militant sources, the victims were junior-level Arab fighters and there was no prominent figure among them. The News, March 26, 2009.

Pakistan could collapse in six months, says CENTCOM adviser: The Pakistani state could collapse within six months if immediate steps are not taken to remedy the situation, warned a top adviser to the US Central Command. David Kilcullen, who advises CENTCOM commander General David H. Petraeus on the war on terror, urged US policymakers to focus their attention on Pakistan as a failure there could have devastating consequences for the entire international community. In an interview with The Washington Post (Sunday Edition), Kilcullen warned that if Pakistan went out of control, it would ‘dwarf’ all the crises in the world today. "Pakistan hands down. No doubt," he said when asked to name the central front in the war against terror. Asked to explain why he thought Pakistan was so important, Kilcullen said: "Pakistan has 173 million people, 100 nuclear weapons, an army bigger than the US Army, and al-Qaeda headquarters sitting right there in the two-thirds of the country that the government doesn’t control." He stated that the Pakistani military and Police and intelligence service did not follow the civilian Government; they were essentially a rogue state within a state. "Were now reaching the point where within one to six months we could see the collapse of the Pakistani state, also because of the global financial crisis, which just exacerbates all these problems," he said. The News, March 24, 2009.

15 persons killed as militants attack Army camp in Khyber Agency: The Security Forces (SFs) in Landikotal sub-division of Khyber Agency on March 19, 2009, clashed with Taliban militants after they attacked an Army camp using short-range missiles and mortars. 15 people were reportedly killed in the missile attack. The assailants targeted the military facility near the Landikotal bazaar from their hideouts in the mountains. One of the rockets missed the target and hit a warehouse close to the bazaar, killing 15 men who used to work at the warehouse and had also been using it as a makeshift residence. Following the attack, the SFs retaliated hitting the militants’ positions in the nearby mountains. A source said a madrassa (Seminary) adjacent to the Army camp was also hit in the missile attack. Daily Times, March 20, 2009.

Kabul bombings plot hatched in Pakistan, says Afghanistan’s intelligence agency: Afghanistan’s intelligence agency said on March 18, 2009, that the February 2009 attacks on Government buildings in Kabul were planned and directed from Pakistan, saying seven Afghans had been arrested. The attackers were in telephone contact with a Pakistan-based ringleader during the simultaneous attacks on the Justice Ministry, Prisons Directorate and Education Ministry, agency spokesman Saeed Ansary told reporters. The February 11 attacks, claimed by the Taliban, killed 26 Afghans. Eight of the attackers were killed, three by their suicide bombs. "Seven terrorists were arrested and one was killed during the arrest operation," Ansary said, without giving any further details about the raid. The alleged ringleader, whom Ansary identified only as Harris, was based in the Waziristan tribal area on the Afghan border and was still at large there, the official said. Some of the suspects told authorities they had received military training in Waziristan, he said. "I met Harris in Waziristan and received training in using weapons," one alleged suspect said in a video recording handed to the media. Dawn, March 19, 2009.

15 persons killed and 16 injured in suicide blast in Rawalpindi: 15 people were killed and 16 injured on March 16, 2009, when a suicide bomber blew himself up near a busy bus stand at Pirwadhai in Rawalpindi. Sources quoting investigators said the original target of the bomber could have been the participants of the ‘long march’, of the former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, which was scheduled to pass through the area. Regional Police Officer Nasir Durrani, however, told the media that it would be premature to decide whether the bomber’s original target was the ‘long march’. "The suicide bomber blew himself up on a motorbike outside a restaurant, which was set up close to the cab stand," said Durrani. Daily Times, March 17, 2009.

42 militants killed in FATA during the week: A suspected US missile strike destroyed a Taliban training camp in Kurram Agency, killing at least 24 Taliban and al Qaeda terrorists, as well as injuring another 50, security officials said on March 12, 2009. No high-value targets were believed to have died, an unnamed official said. Another security official said most of the dead were Afghan Taliban militants. "The training centre was run by local Taliban commander Fazal Saeed and training was underway at the time of the strike," the official added. The Taliban sealed off the area and retrieved bodies from the rubble of the building after the strike late on March 12.

Security Forces backed by helicopter gunships on the same day killed 18 Taliban militants and injured three others in the Gurgurai, Supri and Mulla Ghani Baba areas of Yakka Ghund sub-division in the Mohmand Agency. In addition, jet aircraft also bombed Shamsha, Bhaidmunai and Spin Ki Tangi areas in the Baizai and Khwaizai sub-divisions, without causing any casualties, the sources said. Daily Times, March 13, 2009.

Troops kill 35 Taliban militants in NWFP: Security Forces (SFs) backed by helicopter gunships killed at least 35 Taliban militants during a two-day operation in Darra Adamkhel in the NWFP, Inter-Services Public Relations sources said on March 10, 2009. The SFs targeted the militants in Buland, Mirali and Torchena areas. Three SF personnel were reportedly wounded in the operation, the sources said, adding that several Taliban hideouts had been destroyed, APP reported. Daily Times, March 11, 2009.

Next major terrorist attack on the US being planned in Pakistan, say US officials and lawmakers: The central nervous system for the next major terrorist attack on the US soil lies in Pakistan, said senior US officials and lawmakers. Two key US officials - Director of the National Intelligence and Director of the Military Intelligence - told the Senate Armed Services Committee that Pakistan had allowed Taliban to operate freely from Quetta while the tribal areas had become a "central nervous system" for al Qaeda. US lawmakers and officials also said that the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) has the ideological commitment to replace al Qaeda as the next major terrorist group in the world. They said the Pakistani establishment and intelligence agencies had taken some measures against the LeT recently but were not co-operating fully with the United States in dealing with this threat. The committee was also told that LeT had supporters among the Pakistanis living in the United States who could abet its efforts to carry out a terrorist attack in North America. "The central nervous system for the planning (of an attack on the US soil) would emanate from Fata," said Senator Evan Bayh, an Indiana Democrat, during a hearing on current and future worldwide threats to the national security of the United States. Earlier, chairman of the Senate Armed Service Committee, Senator Carl Levin, said that the Afghan Taliban forces under Mullah Omar operated with impunity from Balochistan, crossing unhampered into southern Afghanistan while al Qaeda was based in FATA from which attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan itself are launched. Lt-Gen Michael Maples, Director of US Defence Intelligence Agency, noted that while "strategic rivalry" with India drove Pakistan’s defence strategy, al Qaeda was using FATA to recruit and train operatives, plan and prepare regional and transnational attacks, disseminate propaganda and obtain equipment and supplies. General Maples warned that while Pakistan has taken important steps to safeguard its nuclear weapons, "vulnerabilities still exist". Dawn, March 11, 2009.

Seven persons killed in terrorist attack on Sri Lankan cricketers in Lahore: Sri Lankan cricketers narrowly escaped a terrorist attack in the morning of March 3, 2009 when terrorists ambushed the bus carrying them to the Gaddafi Stadium for the third day’s play of the second Test. Seven persons - six policemen escorting the Sri Lankans and the driver of another van in the convoy - were killed and 20 others wounded in the attack near the Liberty roundabout. Seven Sri Lankan players were among the wounded. Two of them - Thilan Samaraweera and Tharanga Paranavithana - were hospitalised for a few hours with bullet injuries. Doctors later reported they were out of danger. The other injured players were skipper Mahela Jayawardene, Kumar Sangakkara, Ajantha Mendis, Thilina Thushara and Suranga Lokumal. All of them escaped with minor injuries. A British coach, Paul Farbrace, and a Pakistani umpire, Ahsan Raza, were also injured in the attack. Police claimed at least 12 terrorists, who appeared to be highly trained and used rocket launchers, hand-grenades and sophisticated automatic guns in the operation lasting about 30 minutes, were involved in the attack. The attackers subsequently escaped from the incident site after commandeering a car and rickshaw. Police found a large quantity of hand-grenades, rocket launchers, suicide jackets, plastic explosives, time devices, Kalashnikov rifles, pistols and walkie-talkies left at different places in a radius of a few furlongs by the attackers. Police also seized three hand-grenades, a time device and a Kalashnikov from the backyard of the house of a retired army officer and several other weapons from near the Alfatah Departmental Store in Makka Colony and other adjacent places. They also seized a car parked near the Liberty Park with a huge-quantity of grenades and Kalashnikovs. Dawn; Daily Times, March 4, 2009.

Six persons killed in suicide attack at madrassa in Balochistan: Six people were killed and several others, mostly students, sustained injuries in a suicide attack on a madrassa (seminary) at Kili Karbala in the Pishin District on March 2, 2009. The Jamaat-Ulema-i-Islam (Fazlur Rehman faction; JUI-F) provincial chief Maulana Muhammad Khan Shirani, the Balochistan Assembly Deputy Speaker Syed Matiullah Agha and provincial ministers belonging to the party were attending a ceremony at the seminary when a 15-year-old boy blew himself up in front of the stage. However, all the JUI-F leadership escaped unhurt. District Police Officer Akbar Raisani confirmed the incident saying that the blast had occurred at a girls’ madrassa in Kili Karbala, where Shirani was scheduled to address the school’s convocation. According to eyewitnesses, two men had come to the seminary for the bombing but one of them escaped immediately after the first explosion. The News; Daily Times, March 3, 2009.

12 persons killed in drone attack in South Waziristan: Two missiles, fired by a US spy plane, killed 12 people and injured three others in the South Waziristan Agency on March 1, 2009. Sources said two missiles were fired by a drone at around 4:00 pm (PST) that hit a house in Ganra Haibatkhel village of Sararogha sub-division, a stronghold of Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud. The house was destroyed in the attack, leaving 12 people dead and three injured. Tribal sources said dozens of militants arrived there and later took control of the area besides surrounding the targeted house. Locals said all those killed and injured were native tribesmen. However, the sources claimed that foreign citizens were also among the dead. The compound had underground bunkers and was in the area controlled by Taliban commander Baitullah Mehsud’s tribe, an unnamed official said. "It was a Taliban sanctuary," he said. Citing field informants, other intelligence officials told the Associated Press the compound was a training facility. At least four of the dead were foreigners, they said. This was the fourth missile strike by unmanned US aircraft since President Barack Obama came to power. The News; Daily Times, March 2, 2009.

TNSM chief Sufi Mohammed sets deadline for implementation of Sharia: The Tehreek-e-Nafaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (TNSM) chief Maulana Sufi Mohammed warned on March 1, 2009 he wanted Islamic courts set up in two weeks. He said he was not happy over the fact that there had been no tangible progress since February 16 when the NWFP Government agreed to implement the Nizam-e-Adl Regulations 2009. "The Government announced enforcement of Sharia [Islamic law] but so far no practical step has been taken and we are not satisfied… I’m not seeing any practical steps for the implementation of the peace agreement, except for ministers visiting Swat and uttering words," Sufi told reporters in Swat’s main town Mingora. The cleric said he was also unhappy over a delay in an exchange of prisoners and urged both the Taliban and the Government to release people they were holding by March 10. "If the Government does not appoint Qazis [Islamic judges] by March 15, and the two sides do not release prisoners in their custody, we will set up protest camps," he said. He also said armed patrol by either side would not be allowed after March 1, and anybody who violated the truce would be charged and punished in line with the Sharia. Daily Times, March 2, 2009.

Taliban declares indefinite cease-fire in Swat: The Taliban in Swat declared an indefinite cease-fire in the valley on February 24, 2009. The decision was made in a meeting of the Taliban shura (executive council) on February 24, Taliban spokesman Muslim Khan said. Taliban chief Mullah Fazlullah announced the decision in a speech that was reportedly cut short when the Security Forces (SFs) blocked the transmission of his FM radio channel. A private TV channel said the SFs had imported equipment to jam the radio transmission and used it for the first time on February 24. Fazlullah asked his men to stop displaying weapons, end their armed patrols and not to attack security convoys or abduct Government officials, according to copies of the speech sent to the media. He urged the Government to restore all officials removed during the unrest in Swat. Fazlullah ordered his commanders to disband their checkpoints, which he said created "unnecessary problems" for residents. The Taliban chief also stopped all non-government organisations (NGOs) from operating in the valley until the implementation of Sharia (Islamic law). "All NGOs should leave Swat because they are creating problems for peace," Fazlullah said in the speech. But he added that emergency medical crews were exempt from the order. Fazlullah called on soldiers deployed in Swat to remain at their bases, vowing to retaliate against any troop increases. Daily Times, February 25, 2009.

[South Asia Intelligent Review]