Dawn Editorial - Crime and terrorism + Polio Cases

MILITANCY and terrorism in Pakistan is a hydra-headed monster. Experience has shown that even when the security forces achieve success in one area, their efforts do not succeed in killing the monster. By necessity, therefore, countering the threat requires concerted, multi-pronged efforts that target various aspects simultaneously, across the law and order spectrum. How crucial this last aspect is can be gauged from increasing evidence about links between the Pakistani Taliban and street crime as described in a recent news report. Increasingly, insurgents are raising funds for their activities through bank heists, kidnappings for ransom and extortion. Drawing upon a network of malcontents and for-hire criminals across the country, they are blamed for masterminding or carrying out crimes to fund their insurgency. In doing so, they add to the crime wave and contribute to further erosion of the people`s confidence in the state and intensification of fear. The Taliban hand, through the `Black Night` group, is said to have been behind a June raid on a Dera Ismail Khan bank; in Karachi, the Taliban are thought to have been behind three of four bank robberies carried out this year which netted $2.3m. Similar links have been found in numerous abduction and extortion cases.

The shift in sources is a simple equation. US and Pakistani military offensives have killed or sidelined many mid-level and senior commanders who were, in a number of cases, men with links to international funding networks. Meanwhile, greater scrutiny of money transfers has made it harder to send funds around the world. Countering this phenomenon will require cooperation and intelligence-sharing between the civil and military law-enforcement agencies. Only if both are equally well-equipped and trained, and are working in tandem to combat a common enemy, can there be any hope. Without that, both arms of the security forces will continue to address the problem in a piecemeal and ultimately ineffective fashion. As for the Taliban, the logic under which they justify their turning to crime is despicable. Although they advertise their war as being one of a religious hue, their tactics expose the hollowness of their ideology.

Source: http://www.dawn.com/2011/10/15/crime-and-terrorism.html

New polio cases

A REPORT in this newspaper on Thursday says five fresh polio cases have been detected in Balochistan, bringing the number of children affected by the virus in Pakistan this year to over 100. Balochistan leads this unfortunate count with nearly 50 cases. Another alarming development is that a boy in Karachi`s Gadap Town, who reportedly received anti-polio drops seven times, is among the recent victims. It is worrisome that there are increasing reports of children in different parts of the country contracting polio despite receiving numerous doses of the vaccine. This raises questions about the efficacy of the polio vaccine; perhaps there are issues with the way it is being stored and handled. Reports that the virus has been detec-ted in Multan, Lahore and Rawalpindi are also cause for concern.

The state`s health authorities as well as international experts need to investigate why there have been cases of infection despite the vaccine being administered multiple times. If the vaccine`s efficacy has been compromised, the problem must be rectified immediately. The state also needs to monitor migrant and mobile populations who play a major role in transmitting the virus from high-risk to hitherto `clean` zones. For example, the highest number of polio cases was reported from Balochistan`s Qilla Abdullah district which borders Afghanistan. Pakistan and Afghanistan — both endemic countries — re-infect each other due to the regular movement of people between them. The World Health Organisation has recommended that mobile and migrant populations be mapped in order to keep track of polio`s spread. The state needs to implement this recommendation to the fullest and plug the loopholes. Failure to do so will have consequences apart from the health risk: the World Bank has warned that a $40m grant will be converted into a loan due to Pakistan`s poor response to the fight against polio.

Source: http://www.dawn.com/2011/10/15/new-polio-cases.html

UK’s Liam Fox faces fresh questions on Sri Lanka links

Defence secretary, UK,  accused of running 'maverick foreign policy' in Sri Lankan Development Trust dealings involving Adam Werritty

By: Polly Curtis, Jason Burke and Rupert Neate

 faced fresh accusations of running a shadow foreign policyafter it emerged he was involved in setting up a private investment firm to operate in Sri Lanka in apparent contravention of UK government policy, with his controversial friend Adam Werritty as its key contact.

The defence secretary was intimately involved in negotiations with the Sri Lankan regime as recently as last summer, according to Lord Bell, his friend of 30 years, agreeing a deal that allows the Sri Lankan Development Trust to operate in the country in the same period in which he now says he withdrew his involvement. The trust was a venture designed to rebuild the country's infrastructure using private finance with a sideline in charitable projects for Tamil communities.

Labour urged the government to come clean on Fox's work in Sri Lanka and whether it might have contravened the government's official policy, while a senior Whitehall source said the minister had been operating a "maverick foreign policy" and it is this that will ultimately decide his political fate.

The government has adopted an arm's-length policy on Sri Lanka, calling for an independent inquiry into alleged war crimes. Since 2006 it has also had a policy to limit development work to urgent humanitarian assistance and "de-mining" areas affected by the civil war.

Fox told the Commons on Monday he had worked with "a number" of business, banking and political contacts to establish the trust in Sri Lanka.

He named only Werritty, his close friend who is at the heart of the scandal over his unofficial role as Fox's adviser. "Neither myself, Mr Werritty nor others sought to receive any share of the profits for assisting the trust," he said.

In June 2010, he met the Sri Lankan foreign minister in Singapore, along with Werritty and MoD officials. "The purpose of the meeting was to make it clear that although I would no longer be able to participate in the project, the others involved would continue to do so," he said on Monday. But Bell told the Guardian on Thursday that discussions took place last summer in which Fox agreed with the governor of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka that the trust would invest in roadbuilding and other infrastructure projects using private investment.

Bell, whose PR firm Bell Pottinger was employed by the Sri Lankan government until last year to improve the country's reputation abroad, said the deal had been struck between Fox and the head of the Sri Lankan bank: "In order for these funds to operate they would need an agreement with the country. The financial interests of Sri Lanka come under the governor of the Central Bank. My understanding is that the infrastructure development fund would be set up and have an agreement with the Sri Lankan government to invest in Tamil communities in Sri Lanka. It's a fine idea with a good sense of purpose."

He added that "of course" part of the strategy was to improve the regime's reputation abroad.

Kevan Jones, shadow defence minister, said: "Liam Fox told the house about the trust on Monday. It's clearly not a full explanation. If he was still striking deals with the Sri Lankans last summer, how does that fit with official UK foreign policy? He has to explain these negotiations. You can't have a situation where a government minister is appearing to run a completely separate foreign policy from that of the government."

Fox's parliamentary and private offices both said last night that Fox ceased to have any involvement with the trust on entering government.

The only activity the Sri Lanka Development Trust appears to have engaged in has been the payment of up to £7,500 of Fox's travel expenses, incurred on three trips to the country in 2009 and 2010.

The trust was originally registered to an address close to the Houses of Parliament in London, 40 George Street, which is also the offices of 3G, the "Good Governance Group", which is chaired by Chester Crocker, a former US politician. He also sits on the board of Bell Pottinger LLC, the US wing of Bell's publicity firm. Bell denied that there was any connection between his firm or its US subsidiary and Fox's Sri Lankan operation.

The trust has since transferred to the Lothian Road in Edinburgh, giving its address as No 50, a substantial granite and glass-fronted office block where a number of firms including the HQ of the Scottish oil exploration firm Cairn Energy and corporate offices for Clydesdale Bank are based. When the Guardian visited the building there was no sign of any physical presence of the organisation.

Two legal firms also based in the building are not believed to be connected. As a legal trust, it does not have to register either with the Charities Commission or on the register of businesses at Companies House. It does not have to publish the names of its trustees, it purpose or its beneficiaries.

Bell said that the trust consisted of two bodies, the Sri Lanka Infrastructure Development Fund, which was intended to raise money abroad from investors who would then share in the profit of ventures on the country, and the Sri Lanka Charitable Fund which would undertake charitable projects in Tamil areas in the north and east.

Inquiries in Colombo could not establish any activity the trust or its subsidiaries have so far carried out. Aid experts, senior politicians and officials in Sri Lanka said they had no knowledge of the trust. Nether the trust nor its subsidiaries are registered by the National Secretariat for Non-Governmental Organisations, a prerequisite for any such project.

On a trip in March 2009, shortly before the end of the bloody but successful government offensive, Fox called for the creation of "a special fund with the help of international partners ... to help the Sri Lankan government in handling the reconstruction and rehabilitation of the war ravaged areas in the north and east [of the country]."

Fox told local journalists he was suggesting "a new, independent, Sri Lanka construction fund". One aim of the fund, he said, would be to divert cash that had been flowing from ethnic Tamils overseas to the LTTE into reconstruction.

No activity on the ground appears to have occurred. "I have my ear pretty close to the ground and I doubt a major new reconstruction project in the north [of Sri Lanka] could get going without my knowledge and I have never heard of this trust," said one senior aid official in Colombo, the commercial capital.

The source of the trust's money for the transport to Sri Lanka for Fox is unknown. Contributions to the cost of the trips were also received from the Sri Lankan government via its London embassy.

Human rights groups have been critical of Fox's outspoken support for the government of President Mahinda Rajapaksa, who is now in his second term of office and has been accused by campaigners of repressing the press and opposition.

WikiLeaks cables revealed American diplomats' concerns at alleged government complicity in human rights abuses committed by troops and paramilitaries during the latter stages of the civil war. The United Nations has repeatedly pressed Sri Lanka for greater accountability and transparency.

Additional reporting: Severin Carrell

Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/oct/13/liam-fox-fresh-questions-over-sri-lanka?CMP=twt_gu

With new threats, US Army must reinvent itself: Panetta

WASHINGTON: The US Army won’t be fighting conventional wars against columns of tanks in the future and will have to prepare for new threats from cheaper high-tech weaponry, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Wednesday.

With budget pressures bearing down on the Pentagon, Panetta challenged the “battle-hardened” generation of army officers who had fought in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past decade to come up with new ideas on how to counter a wide range of potential adversaries, including militant groups.

Referring to the first Gulf war in 1991, Panetta said “the reality is there aren’t a lot of countries out there building massive tank armies, it is unlikely that we will be re-fighting Desert Storm in the future.

“Instead, I see both state and non-state actors arming with high-tech weaponry that is easier both to buy and operate, weapons that frustrate our traditional advantage and freedom of movement,” he told an audience of mainly retired officers at the Association of the US Army.

Panetta described what US military planners and analysts call a new “hybrid threat” that combines conventional and irregular warfare, with the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah forces in Lebanon often cited as the most vivid example.

In that conflict, Hezbollah fighters used precision-guided weapons, such as anti-tank missiles, while moving in small units akin to a guerrilla force.

New models of shoulder-launched rockets and other weapons, including drones, have become easier to use, less expensive and more threatening to US military might, analysts say.

The US Army trained for decades to fight major land wars that envisaged numerous tank battalions but then switched course in Iraq and Afghanistan to embrace counter-insurgency doctrine.

Panetta, however, said the army would need to move beyond traditional strategy and help define its role in the future, with a smaller but agile force.

“Coming up with new ideas, with operating principles to defeat these kind of enemies is a challenge that I pose to this battle hardened generation of American soldiers,” he said.

The army has shouldered much of the burden of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a rising suicide rate among its ranks has underscored the strain on the all-volunteer force.

Panetta noted that 2010 was the sixth year in a row that the suicide rate has increased for the US Army, which he called “a national tragedy.”

Source: http://www.dawn.com/2011/10/12/with-new-threats-us-army-must-reinvent-itself-panetta.html

Ten killed in slew of attacks targeting Iraq police

BAGHDAD: Iraqi officials say 10 people have been killed in a string of attacks targeting security forces in Baghdad.

Two police officials say a suicide attacker blew himself up near a police station in western Baghdad while another targeted a police station in a northern Shia neighborhood. Nine people were killed in the two bombings.

In western Baghdad, a parked car bomb targeting a police patrol exploded and killed one civilian. Another roadside bomb aimed at a police patrol in western Baghdad wounded three policemen.

A hospital official confirmed the causalities.

The officials all spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Source: http://www.dawn.com/2011/10/12/10-killed-in-slew-of-attacks-targeting-iraq-police.html

THE INDEPENDENT : Robert Fisk: Democratic governments don't deal with terrorists – until they do

In three decades, the Israelis have freed 7,000 prisoners in return for 19 Israeli prisoners

Once upon a time, we lived in a world where democratic governments did no deals with "terrorists". No country promoted this nonsense more than Israel. And no Israeli leader repeated the mantra so often as one B Netanyahu Esq. After all, America never "gave way" to "terrorists". No deals would ever be done by Britain.

Indeed, if France were to release 1,000 prisoners for one French hostage – heaven forbid – Obama, La Clinton and Cameron would be loud in their fury at French cowardice. But yesterday there came not a squeak from Washington or London about Israel's latest "deal" with its supposedly "terrorist" enemies: 1,027 Palestinians for one Israeli soldier.

Of all nations on earth, Israel regularly "gives in" or does "deals" over "terrorist" demands more than any other. A quick trip down memory lane: in 1985, Israel released 1,150 prisoners for three captured Israeli soldiers in Lebanon. In 1998, for the remains of an Israeli soldier killed the previous year, Israel released 65 prisoners and the bodies of 40 dead Hezbollah men. I watched the grim procession of the latter to a south Lebanon village where the bodies reeked so badly that families were sick at the stench as they wept in mourning.

In 2004, I watched the arrogant figure of Samir Kantar – convicted of murdering a policeman and an Israeli civilian and his four-year-old daughter – stride across the Lebanese frontier from Israel a free man (along with two tractor loads of Hezbollah bodies, released in return for an Israeli agent lured into Beirut by Hezbollah). He was proclaimed a hero in Lebanon.

And so it goes on. In three decades, the Israelis have freed 7,000 prisoners in return for 19 Israeli prisoners and the remains of four dead Israeli soldiers. Quite an exchange rate. Ironically, Israel's latest "deal" – 1,027 Palestinians for one Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, captured in Gaza in 2006 – suggests that one Israeli life equals 1,300 Palestinian lives; this was almost the exact number of Palestinians killed in Gaza in the 2008-09 invasion when 13 Israelis were killed.

Oddly, Israel never explained – and most journalists never asked – why its soldiers simply could not discover where Shalit was held in Gaza. It must have been Israeli military incompetence on a massive scale – unless the missing soldier was taken briefly through the Gaza tunnels to Egypt. Perhaps, when he is released, he will tell us.

In the past 30 years, the hostage swaps have been engineered by the International Red Cross, the German intelligence service, the United Nations and now the Egyptians. Hamas, crowing as usual at its "success", might choose to hold its tongue. Arrangements currently suggest that in return for Shalit they will receive 500 Palestinians now and 527 Palestinians "later". More than 10 years ago, the UN engineered a similar swap. Half the Lebanese prisoners came home during the hostage swap; then the Israelis decided to keep the other half.

The UN's special negotiator told me personally that when he pointed this out to then-UN Secretary General, the latter said of the remaining prisoners: "Forget them." No doubt Hamas can be equally as ruthless. Since they are now trying to force journalists and others to obtain "visas" before visiting their Republic of Gaza, we may not know.

In any case, it's a dirty and outrageous business, doing deals with "terrorists". Do not utter the word hypocrisy. And don't expect Obama to say a word. After all, the poor man is seeking re-election.

Source: http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/fisk/robert-fisk-democratic-governments-dont-deal-with-terrorists-ndash-until-they-do-2369660.html

US ‘fighting a war’ in Pakistan: Panetta

WASHINGTON: Defence Secretary Leon Panetta said Tuesday the United States is waging “war” in Pakistan against militants, referring to a covert campaign the CIA steadfastly refuses to publicly confirm.

It was Panetta’s latest comment acknowledging drone bombing raids in Pakistan, an open secret that the US government declines to discuss publicly.

Speaking to an audience at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, the former CIA director pointed to a “complicated relationship” between Washington and Islamabad.

“And admittedly, there are a lot of reasons for that. We are fighting a war in their country,” Panetta said.

“They have in fact given us cooperation in the operations of trying to confront Al-Qaeda in (tribal areas)… And they continue to work with us.”

But he said the two countries had sharp disagreements over “the relations they maintain with some of the militant groups in that country”, a reference to Washington’s demand that Islamabad crack down on the Haqqani network.

During a visit to US bases in Italy last week, Panetta made two casual references to the CIA’s use of armed drones.

“Having moved from the CIA to the Pentagon, obviously I have a hell of a lot more weapons available to me in this job than I did at CIA — although Predators aren’t bad,” Panetta told an audience of sailors at the US Navy’s Sixth Fleet headquarters in Naples.

Bombing raids by robotic unmanned US aircraft dramatically increased under President Barack Obama, with the CIA operation focusing on Al-Qaeda and Taliban figures in northwest Pakistan.

About 30 drone strikes have been reported in Pakistan since elite US Special Operations Forces killed Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden in May near the country’s main military academy in Abbottabad, close to the capital.

US officials did not notify Pakistan in advance of the raid, and Panetta — the CIA chief at the time — subsequently said the US government feared that bin Laden would be tipped off about the operation beforehand.

An American drone is also believed to have killed US-born Al-Qaeda cleric Anwar al-Awlaqi in Yemen last month.

Source: http://www.dawn.com/2011/10/12/us-fighting-a-war-in-pakistan.html