Can the Taliban apologists provide empirical proof that victims of indiscriminate violence invariably turn into beasts with no respect for human life?
Source/Credit: The News | Pakistan
By Talat Farooq | November 9, 2013
Hakeemullah Mehsud, the self-confessed killer of thousands of men, women and children, soldiers and police has finally been droned into oblivion. As far as earthly judgement is concerned, one can philosophise that those who live by bombings die by drones.
The use of drones in Pakistan’s tribal belt resulting in civilian casualties is a clear violation of human rights and international law which cannot be condoned at any cost. Accordingly, Jemima Khan’s documentary is a commendable effort. One sincerely hopes that someone will also have the courage to make a documentary on the survivors of TTP attacks on Pakistani men, women and children outside the tribal areas. Just because they have not been droned does not make their deaths any less unlawful and poignant.
One also hopes that a documentary will exclusively revolve around the military shaheeds and their orphaned children, widows, siblings and parents. They should all be asked how they feel about the deaths of Hakeemullah, Baitullah and other high-value targets sheltered in North Waziristan. Their responses should be aired on prime time television with a ticker asking viewers to give their opinion.
Such documentaries should especially focus on the political parties whose leadership sees TTP violence as a direct outcome of drone attacks. They should be asked why they have never found it necessary to threaten – let alone conduct – long-marches or dharnas in support of the non-tribal victims of TTP’s bombings.
It is sad that the officers and jawans of the Pakistan military are sacrificing their lives in the line of duty without wholehearted support from our society. One major reason for this is that Taliban apologists have confused the nation by furthering the narrative of ‘good Taliban’, ‘bad Taliban’ and the role of drone strikes in the perpetuation of violence. (Imagine if we were fighting a conventional war with an external enemy; would we then have allowed unbridled ‘freedom’ of expression that implies support for the enemy of the state?)
Can the Taliban apologists provide empirical proof that victims of indiscriminate violence invariably turn into beasts with no respect for human life? If this was the inevitable outcome then the families of those killed by the TTP should also have turned into anti-Taliban suicide bombers and rushed to Waziristan for revenge. However, to date there are no such groups or reprisals on ground. The truth is that mono-causal or selective explanations for any social phenomenon are by definition reductionist, incomplete and misleading.
Coming back to the killing of Hakeemullah Mehsud, the government can respond in two ways. It can keep trying to hold talks with the TTP in a bid to thwart perceived foreign designs to derail talks and to stem potential TTP revenge attacks. Or the government and the military can take advantage of this moment by employing strategies to further emasculate the group. This could bring the TTP to the negotiating table as the weaker party and the government could then hold talks from a position of strength. However, neither of these options will work in Pakistan’s favour without marked improvement in state-society relations.
Reviewing our relations with the US is comparatively less important. As it is, the patron-client nature of the US-Pakistan relationship has always been unambiguous and will remain so under the circumstances, the trade-not-aid rhetoric notwithstanding. Therefore, it is not the interstate interaction that is significant at the moment but the ever-widening disconnect between the rulers and the ruled that needs a genuine and in-depth review.
It is shameful that a nuclear-armed state with one of the largest armies and active intelligence agencies in the world has failed to protect its citizens so far. The wellbeing of the people of Pakistan is the only single-point agenda that should be followed by the civilian and military decision-makers and strategists. Their welfare is neither an empty slogan for future election campaigns nor fodder for war-games.
The protection of citizens’ fundamental rights to life, justice and prosperity is the raison d'être of the state and its law-enforcement and military forces. Unfortunately, at present the civil-military leadership does not inspire any such confidence in the masses. Unless we put our own house in order US drone attacks and TTP violence will continue to destabilise Pakistan.
Pakistan must review its strategic choices and foreign policy goals vis-à-vis Afghanistan. It has no moral ground to condemn American breach of Pakistan’s sovereignty if it continues to calibrate and manipulate internal developments in Afghanistan.
The issue of the drone strikes, while genuine, is being politicised to overshadow larger, more urgent, questions. Where is the national security policy, the counter-terrorism strategy or for that matter a coherent foreign policy? Why have we failed to establish a viable mechanism to protect Pakistan since 9/11?
How come the governments of Musharraf and Zardari had all the time for double games and looting the already meagre resources of this country but lacked the political will to strengthen national security? We have been talking about such policies for the last twelve years but have nothing concrete to show.
Despite rhetorical bravado the Nawaz Sharif government appears to be just as weak and inconsistent. A government that is too scared to hang TTP murderers, too selfish to deal with corruption cases, too insecure to appoint key relevant ministers, too self-interested to net affluent tax-evaders and which is largely deficient in creative thinking will always fall short of delivering.
As for the opposition… well, one didn't expect much from other parties but one had hoped that Imran Khan would mobilise civil society to pressurise the government into taking difficult decisions to ease the day-to-day suffering of the masses. Unfortunately neither the government nor the opposition realise a simple truth: security cannot be enhanced in isolation; it will improve in tandem with improvement in the lot of the common citizen.
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Talat Farooq is a PhD student at Leicester, UK. Email: talatfarooq11@gmail.com
Read original post here: Securing Pakistan
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