Posts Tagged ‘Afghanistan’

Originally Posted at: The Friday Times Pashtuns are believed to be the largest segmentary lineage society in the world today. They have been living in their defined homeland areas since ages, in a social order loosely defined by the code of Pashtunwali. They believe in the myth that they are children of one common ancestor, Qaise, who [...]

Pakistan is finding it harder to convince outsiders it is not helping the Afghan Taliban and giving safe haven to its leaders. In effect, the accusation is that Pakistan is betting on the insurgents being the strongest power in Afghanistan and most likely ally once Nato leaves - something Islamabad of course strenuously denies. The leak of [...]

Ansar Abbasi is a very senior journalist for The News/Jang Group. While may not I agree with his views, from afar I used to assume he might be providing some intellectual strength to the right. I now think I assumed wrong. Mr Abbasi  has begun to write series of articles relating to NATO soldiers, Pakistan's blockage of supply-lines and diaper [...]

Adding to the miseries of Hazara Shias, who are already living under the severe kind of persecution and violence in Pakistani provincial capital Quetta at the hands of radical Shia haters i.e. likes of Malik Ishaq who had been released earlier this year as a result of so called peace deal between Pakistani security establishment and the banned [...]

Change Afghanistan can believe in 10 years later, life isn't just better -- it's much better. BY CHARLES KENNY After 10 years of war and reconstruction, and as tens of thousands of international troops and aid workers in Afghanistan gear up to spend yet another holiday season a long way from the comforts of home, a lot of people are [...]

Sectarian bloodshed, in Afghanistan and Egypt, is a tool to thwart democracy and diplomacy Lahore, Pakistan From a distance, the devastating attacks on Shia Muslims in three Afghan cities this week looked like the type of sectarian religious attacks which we got used to in Iraq. The faultline between Sunni and Shia is one of the greatest [...]

One might have thought a new low for Pakistan’s reputation would have been a little difficult to achieve given the attention it gets on a daily basis for ‘strategic depth’-led support for criminal and extremist elements within and without the country, corruption, misgovernance, poverty, honour killings, state terrorism in Balochistan, energy [...]

My life with the Taliban By Abdul Salam Zaeef Translated from Pashto and edited by Alex Strick van Linschoten and Felix Kuehn Hurst/Columbia University Press; Pp 331 In his foreword to Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef’s book, Professor Barnett Rubin of New York University sets the stage for the launch, ostensibly, of a refreshingly authentic work [...]

It is Ashura  Day, remembering last year, today my heart is suspended, I am breathless, and with the Shiites today, as I pray that they and their children are safe from heartless terrorists. There will be Shia processions today marking Ashura, the 10th day of Moharram. Ashura processions have been an opportunity for genocidal-type purging of [...]

A number of well coordinated attacks clearly targeting Shia Muslims in Kabul, Mazar-e-Sharif and Kandahar have killed at least 58 Shias in Afghanistan. A Pakistani anti-Shia group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi has accepted the responsibility of the attacks. (Source) A spokesman for an Pakistani extremist group called Lashkar-e-Jhangvi al Almi claimed [...]

The Bonn Conference on Afghanistan opens today, it comes 10 years after an International Conference on Afghanistan, Bonn (2001), which was resulted in the adoption of the Document of the Bonn Conference , weeks after the Taliban fell from power. The focus is squarely on security, reconciliation and long term help for Afghanistan. After the [...]

A low-intensity military conflict between Pakistan and the United States is going on in Afghanistan and along the Pak-Afghan border since the U.S. military invasion and occupation of Afghanistan. Both sides have been using proxies and guerrilla war tactics to harm each other’s interests. Nevertheless a large-scale and direct military conflict [...]

Related post: Secret Pakistan: BBC documentary on how Pakistan’s ISI trains and arms Taliban Human Rights of Pakistan Army – by Riaz Malik Urgent Petition: Stop Pakistan Army's Crimes against Humanity The world may help Pakistan through United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission on Pakistan (UNMOVICP) A [...]

By ERIC SCHMITT and DAVID E. SANGER WASHINGTON - Just a month after accusing Pakistan's spy agency of secretly supporting the Haqqani terrorist network, which has mounted attacks on Americans, the Obama administration is now relying on the same intelligence service to help organize and kick-start reconciliation talks aimed at ending the war in [...]

Related posts: On BBC’s Secret Pakistan and Ejaz Haider: Their denials and propagandists – by Abbas Daiyar A comment on Bruce Riedel’s proposed accountability of Pakistan army Appeal to international community: Impose travel restrictions on all senior officers of Pakistan army BBC's documentary Secret Pakistan is a two part series [...]

Pakistan has been accused of playing a double game, acting as America's ally in public while secretly training and arming its enemy in Afghanistan according to US intelligence. In a prison cell on the outskirts of Kabul, the Afghan Intelligence Service is holding a young man who alleges he was recruited earlier this year by Pakistan's powerful [...]

My people want to live peacefully with their neighbours. My people are poor, their wishes and desires too little and they want to live as free men, not soldiers During my extensive travels in the Pashtun heartland after a long time, I developed a feeling that the Pashtuns feel seriously marginalised and are suffering from a severe [...]

  A dear friend of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto and a supporter of the people of Pakistan, Muammar Gaddafi of Libya was killed in the most violent way by NATO and its Al-Qaeda mercenaries. The U.S. President Barack Hussein Obama and his Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed their satisfaction after the murder of Colonel Gaddafi. Reaction [...]

With many in Pakistan still wooing for Taliban victory in Afghanistan, let's glance through the decrees issued under this short yet 'glorious' rule. Here are some of the laws issued by the Taliban government in Afghanistan. ■The government declared: “A denier of veil is an infidel and an unveiled woman is lewd.” ■The veil must [...]

Related Post: Time to say good bye to strategic assets The new world is giving a high priority to diplomatic relations among different countries and nations on the basis of economic interests & human security mainly. America is the sole superpower in the world today, have been also making economic concerns central to its foreign [...]

The future of politics will be decided in Asia, not Afghanistan or Iraq, and the United States will be right at the center of the action. As the war in Iraq winds down and America begins to withdraw its forces from Afghanistan, the United States stands at a pivot point. Over the last 10 years, we have allocated immense resources to those [...]

The time has come for Pakistan to take decisive steps and needs to change policy on terrorism. Pakistani citizens who are paying taxes for human security: Health, education, protection and quality life need it now, just like any other civilized country in the world, they want a clear cut uniform national policy against terrorism & extremism for [...]

Last week our leader of the opposition felt obliged to address a press conference to reiterate his undivided allegiance to Pakistan after Wikileaks revealed that his children are US citizens. How did we get to this pass where a rational conversation about our love-hate relationship with America is no longer possible? Why is it that in their [...]

Let us assume that some American writers such as Rusty Walker are sincere in their desire to build bridges between Pakistan and the United States. It is a noble cause and Mr. Walker should be admired for his wish to clear the air of negativity and misunderstandings. However, could there be real bridges built between masters and slaves? Bridges are [...]

Unicode version   افغانستان اور پالیسی ساز اشرافیہ کے تصوّرات تحریر؛  علی ارقم پاکستان میں سول اور عسکری ہیئت مقتدرہ کے غالب کردار اور سرد جنگ کے دور کے زیر اثر چلے آرہنے والے قومی سلامتی کے [...]

Source: Pakistan Blogzine Related post: Liberal face of religious bigotry: A response to Jinnah Institute – by Farhat Taj According to a recent report by the Sherry Rehman-led Jinnah Institute in Pakistan, Pakistan foreign policy elite propose giving Taliban control of Pashtuns and Afghanistan. Title of the report: Pakistan, the United [...]

Marc Grossman, the U.S. senior representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, recently sat down at the State Department in Washington with Voice of America's Lina Rozbih to discuss a wide range of regional issues, from the future of Al-Qaeda and the Haqqani network to India-Pakistan relations and the recent instability in Afghanistan as the United [...]

  PART TWO Neither blindness nor ignorance corrupts people and governments. They soon realize where the path they have taken is leading them. But, there is an impulse within them, favored by their natures and reinforced by their habits which they do not resist; it continues to propel them forward as long as they have a remnant of strength. He [...]

By Greg Miller U.S. counterterrorism officials are increasingly convinced that the killing of Osama bin Laden and the toll of seven years of CIA drone strikes have pushed al-Qaeda to the brink of collapse. The assessment reflects a widespread view at the CIA and other agencies that a relatively small number of additional blows could [...]

The following worrisome development reflects the mindset and MCA (minimum common agenda) of imperialism in Pakistani establishment. Mullah Omar we know has blood of so many ethnic and religious groups (Tajiks, Hazaras, Shias) as well as other oppressed groups (LGBT) on his hand. He can't be part of a solution. This mindset of Pakistan's military [...]

By MARK MAZZETTI, ERIC SCHMITT and CHARLIE SAVAGE WASHINGTON — F.B.I. agents hunting for Pakistani spies in the United States last year began tracking Mohammed Tasleem, an attaché in the Pakistani Consulate in New York and a clandestine operative of Pakistan’s military spy agency, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence. Mr. [...]

In some ways the military follows the same occupant/conqueror mindset that was followed before 1947 and the British concept of ‘us’ and ‘them’ is still followed — only now it has been replaced with the ‘civilian and non-civilian’ binary The series of events that unfolded in Pakistan since the Raymond Davis incident in Lahore have [...]

Related Articles: LeJ’s Malik received monthly stipend from Punjab govt Jab Pakistan per firqawariyat ka saaya tha -by Ali Suleman Malik Ishaq, the chief of the banned Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ), who has been set free on bail after 14 years in prison, wielded clout even in jail and was specially flown to Rawalpindi by army in October [...]

Related Articles: Malik Ishaq wielded clout in jail; helped Pak army Thank you, ISI-backed Supreme Court, for releasing Malik Ishaq By Asad Kharal Malik Ishaq enjoyed Punjab government’s financial assistance ever since the Sharif’s came to power in 2008, officials on condition of anonymity told The Express Tribune. The [...]

The Mumbai attacks will be linked to Islamabad regardless of who perpetrated them. By Con Coughlin A fresh wave of terrorist attacks are launched at the heart of the Indian city of Mumbai, and immediately the finger of suspicion points towards Pakistan. And this is before Indian counter-terrorism officials have even had a chance to [...]

The latest news about war in Afghanistan, which is making headlines, is the suspension of US military aid to Pakistan. Among other things, the rationale given by the US administration is the refusal of Pakistan's military to allow further use of Shamsi Airbase for launching of drone attacks. Drone attacks have recently attracted a lot of [...]

when Pakistan cries ‘foul,’ everybody just kind of laughs at it and shrugs it off and says, ‘Good job, America.’ ” (Associated Press)"] By Rowan Scarborough The U.S. has compiled a wide body of intelligence on the locations of militant training camps in Pakistan, but has been unable to persuade Islamabad to shut them down, current [...]

By ERIC SCHMITT and JANE PERLEZ WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is suspending and, in some cases, canceling hundreds of millions of dollars of aid to the Pakistani military, in a move to chasten Pakistan for expelling American military trainers and to press its army to fight militants more effectively. Coupled with a statement from [...]

Today, most leaders say they would have stood up defiantly (dutt jata) in the face of the American request to join its war on terror. Former president Pervez Musharraf is being abominated for kowtowing to the Americans; and General Parvez Kayani is trying to make amends by going dutt and teaching the Americans a lesson 10 years later. The truth [...]

As the theatre of the U.S initiated war moves to Pakistan the Pakistani military feels cornered and its commanders are looking for internal unity and reaching out to new and old foreign friends. Interestingly, perhaps for the first time, Pakistani commanders are more worried about the U.S plans rather than the Indian threat. Also breaking from [...]