South Asia Terrorism Portal
Will the Tail Wag the Dog? Ajit Kumar Singh Research Fellow, Institute for Conflict Management
For decades now, the Pakistan establishment, including both political parties and the military leadership in pursuit of their own agendas, have propped up and exploited Islamist extremist and terrorist formations. Increasingly, however, these radical groups are realizing their own power and capacity for mass mobilization and, instead of operating as proxies for others, seek a direct political role for themselves.
The 'political front' of the United Nations (UN)-designated terrorist Hafiz Muhammad Saeed-led Jammat-ud-Dawa (JuD), the Milli Muslim League (MML), will be contesting upcoming general elections scheduled to be held on July 25, 2018. The MML decided to contest on the platform of a "dormant" political entity, Allaha-u-Akbar Tehreek (AAT), registered with the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP). Ahmad Nadeem, an MML spokesperson, told PTI on June 9, 2018,
Asked if Saeed or any "significant leader" of the JuD would contest the election, Nadeem said,
He added that AAT would launch its political campaign once its candidates filed their nomination papers.
Saeed, the 'chief' of JuD, the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) front organization, and mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, launched his political party, MML, on August 7, 2017. Saeed 'nominated' Saifullah Khalid, a religious scholar and longtime 'official' of the JuD, as the President of MML. At the formal launch of MML in Islamabad, Khalid announced,
Saeed was released from house arrest at midnight on November 24, 2017.
MML applied for registration with the ECP in the same month (August). Subsequently, the ECP had sought the opinion of the Interior Ministry which, in its reply sent in September 2017, had written,
The letter reportedly mentioned that MML president Khalid had claimed ideological affiliation with Saeed's organisation.
Finally, on October 11, 2017, the ECP rejected MML's application for registration as a mainstream political party, with Pakistan's Chief Election Commissioner Sardar Raza Khan observing, "The Interior Ministry's letter mentions that the Milli Muslim League is backed by banned terrorist outfits." However, in a petition filed in the Islamabad High Court (IHC), MML challenged the October 11, 2017, Election Commission order. In March 2018, the Court set aside the Election Commission's order and directed the electoral body to pass a 'speaking order', either registering MML or giving clear cause for refusal. MML thereafter filed a contempt of court petition in the IHC against the ECP for using delaying tactics regarding its enlistment as a political party. June 11, 2018, has been fixed for the case hearing in the High Court.
Despite the ECP rejection, MML has succeeded in finding a way out to participate in the election, highlighting existing weaknesses in the electoral system in particular and the establishment as a whole. An unnamed member of JuD reportedly stated,
MML had even participated in a by-election for the Lahore National Assembly (NA) seat held on September 17, 2017. In that election, won by Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) candidate Begum Kulsoom Nawaz who secured 61,745 votes, Yaqoob Sheikh, the MML-backed candidate, bagged 5,822 votes - more than four times the votes secured by the main opposition Pakistan Peoples Party's (PPP) candidate Faisal Mir (1,414 votes). Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) candidate Yasmeen Rashid, at the second position, bagged 47,099 votes. The constituency fell vacant after the then Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was asked to vacate the seat and resign as Prime Minister subsequent to the Supreme Court's ruling on a technicality relating to the possession of an Iqama (working visa) for Dubai while he was Prime Minister, during proceedings in the Panama Papers case. The winning candidate, Begum Kulsoom Nawaz is Nawaz Sharif's wife.
As SAIR noted earlier, with the United States (US) exerting more pressure, there seems to be some urgency among terrorist formations and their individual leaders operating out of Pakistani soil, to gain 'political legitimacy'. Apart from MML, declared a "Specially Designated Global Terrorist" by the US on September 30, 2014, Maulana Fazlur Rehman Khalil, founder of the terrorist Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HuM), which operates in Indian Jammu & Kashmir, has reportedly decided to form his own political party: Islah-e-Watan Party (IWP). Khalil confirmed this decision in an August 25, 2017, report:
Media reports quoted an unnamed source in the group as saying, "Maulana (Khalil) has taken a lead from Maulana Makki's [Abdul Rehman Makki] decision to mainstream his (banned) outfit." Abdul Rehman Makki is the second in command of JuD. Khalil was reacting to US President Donald Trump's "Strategy in Afghanistan and South Asia", where he declared his intentions to forge a "Radical Redirection" in US policy towards Pakistan, declaring,
There is no further report about the current status of the Islah-e-Watan Party (IWP) in the media.
Significantly, established political parties are currently in crisis, with the erstwhile ruling party [the country is going to the elections under a caretaker Prime Minister, former Chief Justice Nasirul Mulk], Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), facing serious problems in the aftermath of the ouster of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif following the Supreme Court's ruling, purportedly in the Panama Papers case. The main opposition Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and the Imran Khan-led Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) are also not on a strong footing, each riddled with its own controversies and scandals.
Given the track record of the principal establishment parties – PML-N, PPP, PTI – there will be no surprise if they readily agree to ally with any of these 'terrorist political parties' to win the upcoming elections, or in a situation of weak or no majorities for any single formation. There is also a possibility that these mainstream political parties could help these terrorist political fronts to find ways and means to participate in the election.
Significantly, each of the major establishment parties had tried to woo Islamist extremists, and particularly the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), before the 2014 elections. Despite then-TTP chief Hakimullah Mehsud’s declaration that “democracy is the system of infidels”, Nawaz Sharif repeatedly advocated a policy of appeasement towards the Pakistani Taliban. In May 2013, he declared, “A few weeks ago, the Taliban (TTP) offered dialogue to the Government of Pakistan and said, ‘we are prepared to talk’. I think the Government of Pakistan should have taken that seriously. [It] did not take it seriously.” The LeT-JuD combine, moreover, has continuously benefited from state largesse under PML-N regimes, particularly in the Punjab Province under the Shahbaz Sharif regime. It is in Punjab that LeT-JuD has its headquarters and largest infrastructure.
Indeed, the Sharif brothers' (Shahbaz Sharif has been the longtime Chief Minister of the Punjab Province) closeness to JuD is also well known. In the most brazen move, Saeed, in April 2016, set up a Sharia’h (Islamic law) court in Lahore to dispense "speedy justice", taking up citizens' complaints and issuing summons carrying a warning of strict action in case of non-compliance. It was the first instance of such a parallel judicial system being established in the Punjab province. JuD claimed the ‘court’ only offered arbitration and resolved disputes in accordance with the Islamic judicial system, but failed to justify the summons. The impunity with which Saeed operated clearly confirms the support he receives from the ruling Pakistani establishment, in addition to the significant resources his organization has received from the state exchequer.
The then Government of Pakistan's Punjab Province, led by Shahbaz Sharif, gave about USD one million to institutions linked with the JuD, in 2009. When asked why the Punjab Government had allotted money in the budget for institutions it managed, a spokesman for JuD, Hafiz Abdur Rehman, responded: "The truth is that we are ourselves astonished at this."
Reacting to photographs featuring him with Maulana Ahmed Ludhianvi, the leader of the ‘banned’ sectarian terrorist Ahle Sunnat wal Jamaat (ASWJ), which surfaced on social media, an unrepentant the then Federal Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan stated on January 14, 2017, that the Shia-Sunni conflict dated back 1300 years and was a part of Islamic history, and it was unfair (with regard to terrorism) to “link everything with ASWJ’s Chief”. Responding to a question in the Senate about his remarks that outlawed sectarian organisations should not be equated with terrorist outfits, Nisar raised the question whether it was "a crime" to suggest that separate laws should be formed to deal with groups proscribed on sectarian basis to remedy the "confusion being created". In a reply to the criticism he faced from PPP for meeting with Maulana Ahmad Ludhianvi, Nisar inquired, "How is it fair to link everything to Maulana Ludhianvi? Which PPP leader did not meet leaders of proscribed organisations in their time?" PPP’s association with the banned Peoples' Aman Committee (PAC), a Karachi based gang, is widely known. PAC, a Lyari criminal network linked to numerous targeted killings, reportedly allegedly worked as PPP’s armed wing.
Similarly, PTI often wooed the extremists, with its leader Imran Khan continuously advocated a negotiated settlement with the TTP and its affiliates. On March 1, 2018, welcoming the Afghan Government's offer to the Taliban to hold negotiations and recognise them as a legitimate political entity, Imran stated,
Imran Khan had reportedly opposed the military action against TTP and called for dialogue with them in early 2014.
In an interview with the Sunday Times published on February 4, 2018, Imran again defended the Afghan Taliban as he attacked ‘liberals’ who support NATO’s war on the Taliban as “thirsty for blood”.
In February 2018, Imran’s party PTI-led Khyber Pakhtuunkhwa Government provided the Darul Uloom Haqqania seminary, notorious as the ‘University of Jihad’, PKR 227 million to render the controversial institution more ‘mainstream’. Earlier in June 2016, the seminary, situated in Akora Khattak town in Jehangira tehsil (revenue unit) of Nowshera District in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had received grant of PKR 300 million from the KP Government. The seminary led by self proclaimed ‘father of the Taliban’ Sami-ul Haq counts some of the world’s most dreaded terrorists among its ‘alumni’, including the now deceased Afghan Taliban chief Mullah Mohammad Omar and Jalaluddin Haqqani, the leader of the Pakistan-based Haqqani network that is allied with the Afghan Taliban. Sami-ul Haq in an interview in 2009 declared, “Give them [Taliban] just one year and they will make the whole of Afghanistan happy. The whole of Afghanistan will be with them ... Once the Americans leave, all of this will happen within a year.” The Joint Investigation Team (JIT) of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) formed to probe the murder of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto had revealed the attack on Benazir had been planned in Akora Khattak by former students of the Madrassa Darul Uloom Haqqania and one of the prime suspects in the case had revealed to investigators that she had been targeted due to her stance over the Lal Masjid operation.
Earlier, on April 22, 2013, Imran Khan observed, “the Pakistan Tehrik-e-insaf will pull the Army out of the Pashtun-dominated tribal areas and restore peace through talks if it comes to power in the May 11 (2014) general election”. Earlier, in October 2012, Imran Khan had claimed that the Taliban were fighting a 'holy war' justified by Islam in neighbouring Afghanistan: "It is very clear that whoever is fighting for their freedom is fighting a jihad… The people who are fighting in Afghanistan against the foreign occupation are fighting a jihad."
The PPP’s approach towards TTP and its affiliates was comparably accommodating. On February 4, 2013, the then Federal Minister for Interior Rehman Malik declared, “We are ready to start talks with you (TTP). You tell us what team you would like to talk to, and let’s set an agenda.” Further, PPP leader and former Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari had close ties with the Taliban. According to a June 14, 2010, media report, while meeting 50 captured Taliban leaders including Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar in a prison to assure them that their outfit had his Government’s full support and that they would be freed soon, Zardari had reportedly stated, “You are our people, we are friends, and after your release we will of course support you to do your operations.”
The infiltration of terrorist elements into mainstream politics in Pakistan now appears imminent. As they compound the power they have secured through violence and extremist street mobilization with constitutional legitimacy, the fundamentals of Pakistan’s politics can only change for the worse. Establishment parties who have long exploited these extremist groups may find that their own power is significantly compromised, or even directly challenged, by the inroads extremist formations make into the country’s electoral politics.
Choking Free Voices Tushar Ranjan Mohanty Research Associate, Institute for Conflict Management
The Media in Pakistan has long faced the brunt of the all-powerful military establishment. Of late, with elections around the corner, there has been an intensification of the crackdown against journalists and news establishments. On June 6, 2018, The New York Times thus wrote,
General Elections are scheduled to be held on July 25, 2018.
A prominent British-Pakistani journalist and activist, Gul Bukhari, known for his criticism of the military establishment, was abducted by ‘unidentified persons’ at around 11 pm [PST] on June 5, 2018, from Sherpao Bridge in the Cantonment area of Lahore, the provincial capital of Punjab. Gul Bukhari was reportedly whisked away by gunmen when she was on her way to the Waqt TV studio for a show. The driver of the Waqt TV cab told the Police that two persons came out of a vehicle and asked Bukhari to get into their vehicle. "When she refused they bundled her up in the vehicle and sped away," he said, adding that her abductors did not say anything to him. As the news of Bukhari's abduction broke out, several people took to the social media blaming the intelligence agencies for her forced disappearance because of her views about the Pakistani military. Some three hours later, Bukhari's family confirmed that she had returned home. She has refused to talk about her abductors.
Elsewhere in the city, on the same day, senior journalist and television anchor Asad Kharal was reportedly attacked by ‘masked men’ near Allama Iqbal International Airport. Kharal, who was on his way home from the airport when his vehicle was intercepted, was taken out from the car and assaulted.
On May 15, 2018, the Government of Pakistan 'blocked' the distribution of Dawn, one of the country's leading English dailies. A report by Reporters Sans Frontiers (RSF) stated that the distribution of Dawn had been blocked in most of Balochistan Province, in many cities in Sindh Province and in all military cantonments. The RSF observed,
The action followed publication by Dawn of an interview with former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on May 12, 2018. Sharif had acknowledged that the terror attacks launched on Mumbai between November 26 and November 29, 2008, were carried out by Pakistan-born terrorists. According to the RSF report, the ‘blockade’ came into effect as the Pakistani Army brass was reportedly unhappy with the newspaper's publishing of the interview.
On April 1, 2018, Geo TV, part of Pakistan's largest commercial media group, Jang, was taken off the air in many parts of the country. The ban only ended a month later after talks between the military and the network's chiefs, who reportedly pledged to make sure the network’s coverage does not cross the military’s line. Significantly, in April 2014, Geo TV’s most prominent anchor and journalist, Hamid Mir, was shot by ‘unidentified gunmen’. Mir survived his injuries and was on record blaming military intelligence agency Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) for the attack.
On March 1, 2018, Anjum Muneer Raja (40), a sub-editor at Urdu newspaper Qaumi Pukaar, was shot dead in a high-security zone in the Pakistan Army General Headquarters area in Rawalpindi in Punjab. He was on his way home from work when the incident occurred. While speaking to Dawn, Raja's uncle Tariq Mehmood asserted that his nephew did not have a personal enmity with anyone and expressed shock that Raja was murdered in such a ‘highly secured’ area.
On January 10, 2018, prominent journalist, Taha Siddiqui, who reports for France 24 and is the Pakistan Bureau Chief of the Indian television channel World Is One News (WION), escaped a kidnapping attempt on his way to the airport in Islamabad. "The Army and intelligence agencies were threatening me and I suspect the people who tried to kidnap me were from the Army," Siddiqui said, speaking to Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) from Paris, where he has relocated, "They do not like investigative reporting that uncovers the wrongdoings of those institutions.”
Press Freedom Barometer 2018 (monitored from May 1, 2017 to April 1, 2018), released by Freedom Network (FN) on May 2, 2018, observed that Islamabad was the most dangerous place to be a journalist in Pakistan, accounting for 35 per cent of the 157 violations recorded by the Report. Other areas found dangerous for journalists were Punjab, the second worst, with 17 per cent of the violations (26 cases); followed closely by Sindh with 16 per cent (25 cases); Balochistan with 14 per cent (22 cases); and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa with 10 per cent (16 cases). The Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) documented the lowest number of overall violations at eight per cent of the total with 13 cases. According to a press release issued by FN, the group has recorded over 157 cases of attacks and violations against media and its practitioners, including journalists, in Pakistan in the preceding year, "signifying a worryingly escalating climate of intimidation and harassment that is adversely affecting the freedom of expression and access to information environment". The report points to the state and its agencies and functionaries, as the most serious ‘threat actors’ targeting media in 39 per cent of the incidents, as compared to other actors, such as militant groups, political parties, religious groups and criminals.
An April 25, 2018 report by RSF revealed that Pakistani journalists were increasingly resorting to self-censorship due to pressures from intelligence agencies and extremist groups. RSF placed Pakistan at the 139th position out of 180 countries that restrained press freedom.
Pakistan’s media community is effectively under siege. The Gul Bukhari abduction came only hours after the military warned that it was monitoring those criticising Pakistan. At a press conference on June 4, 2018, Director General (DG) of Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Major General Asif Ghafoor derided the rise of social media troll accounts which, he said, spread propaganda against the Army and State, and warned that ISI was monitoring such accounts and those that engage with them, including journalists. During his presentation, Major General Ghafoor showed a graphic featuring an alleged troll account's Twitter activity and the journalists and other individuals allegedly connected to the account. Ghafoor claimed that these journalists redistributed anti-state and anti-Army propaganda from the troll's account.
Reacting to Ghafoor's warning, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ)'s Asia Program coordinator in Washington, D.C., Steven Butler stated,
The practice of bulldozing media, however, is an old phenomenon. As noted, top Pakistani journalist Hamid Mir was seriously wounded in a targeted shooting in Karachi, the provincial capital of Sindh, on April 19, 2014. Mir's car was ambushed as soon as it left Karachi's Jinnah International Airport and was on the way to his Jang group-owned Geo TV's office. Mir had earlier told his family, friends, colleagues, Army and Government officials in writing that he would hold ISI chief Lt. General Zaheerul Islam responsible if he was attacked. Hamid Mir had been relentlessly highlighting the issue of missing persons in Balochistan. The incident also demonstrated the ruthless attempts by the military establishment to silence an increasingly critical media, with the civilian Government expectedly toeing the Army's line.
In 2011, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) was accused of abducting, torturing and killing Saleem Shahzad, a journalist working as the Pakistan Bureau Chief of Asia Times Online (Hong Kong) and Italian news agency Adnkronos (AKI). Shahzad disappeared in the evening of May 29, 2011, from Islamabad and his mutilated body was recovered from a canal in Mandi Bahauddin District of Punjab on May 31. His body bore marks of severe torture. Human Rights Watch researcher, Ali Dayan Hasan, claimed he had "credible information" that Shahzad was in the custody of ISI. Indeed, Shahzad's friends and colleagues revealed that the ISI had warned Shahzad at least three times prior to his death. In October 2010, Shahzad was summoned to ISI headquarters the day after publishing a sensitive article on Afghan Taliban leader Abdul Ghani Baradar's capture.
Years
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
Total*
At least 105 media personnel have been killed in Pakistan since 2000. Another 518 have either faced assault or have been injured in attacks. At least 450 media persons have been abducted/ arrested, while another 350 have faced direct intimidation. According to the partial data compiled by SATP, 2018 has already recorded the killing of one journalist, thus far.
The punishing pressure now being applied to Dawn and other news outlets is more insidious than the outright censorship of times past, Dawn’s editor Zaffar Abbas noted. “They want to control the narrative,” Abbas claimed, without elaborating who “they” were, “And to a large extent, they are succeeding.”
Weekly Fatalities: Major Conflicts in South Asia June 4-10, 2018
Civilians
Security Force Personnel
Terrorists/Insurgents
Total
INDIA
Jammu and Kashmir
INDIA (Left-Wing Extremism)
Chhattisgarh
Jharkhand
INDIA (Total)
PAKISTAN
Balochistan
KP
Sindh
PAKISTAN (Total)
President Ashraf Ghani announces unilateral ceasefire with Taliban militants: President Ashraf Ghani on June 7 announced a unilateral ceasefire with the Taliban militants after a religious scholars meeting in Kabul on June 4 where they issued a fatwa against the ongoing war in the country. "With the ceasefire announcement, we epitomize the strength of the Afghan government and the will of the people for a peaceful resolution to the Afghan conflict," Ghani said in a video message on the Presidential Palace's Facebook page. Tolo News, June 8, 2018
Drives against militancy, terrorism, drugs to continue, says Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina: Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina speaking at an iftar mahfil for lawyers at Ganabhaban in Dhaka city on June 6 said the drives against militancy, terrorism, and drugs, will continue in order to free Bangladesh from elements detrimental to society. "The drives against militancy, terrorism, and drugs, will go on. We want to build a drug, militancy, and terrorism-free Bangladesh," she said. Dhaka Tribune, June 7, 2018
More than 1000 cases of ceasefire violations by Pakistan along border in 2018, says MEA: There have been more than 1,000 incidents of ceasefire violations along the border by Pakistan this year and India hopes that Islamabad will adhere to the 2003 truce agreement, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said on June 7. MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said ceasefire violations were being used by Pakistan to aid infiltration of terrorists. New indian Express, June 9, 2018.
Separatists are not in hurry to respond to dialogue offer by New Delhi, says APHC-M chairman Mirwaiz Umar Farooq: All Parties Hurriyat Conference-Mirwaiz (APHC-M) chairman Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, on June 8 said that separatists are in no hurry to respond to dialogue offer and will discuss and deliberate it. Speaking to a large gathering at Jamia Masjd on the occasion of Jumatul Vida (last Friday in the month of Ramzan), Mirwaiz said the leadership is in no hurry to respond to Delhi's assertions over dialogue and will discuss the matter in the coming days and after due deliberations respond. Daily Excelsior , June 9, 2018.
Presidential Elections schedule on September 23, says Election Commission: Presidential Elections schedule on September 23, says Election Commission: The Election Commission (EC) on June 8 revealed that the Presidential Elections will be held on September 23 of this year. The date was decided in meeting comprising EC members, leaders of the Political parties, and all other important stakeholders of the election. The candidacy for the Presidency would open on July 15 and the potential candidates would have a 10-day period to submit their papers to the commission, said Election Commissioner Ahmed Shareef. The Edition June 9, 2018
Constitution amendment now possible with two-third majority, says NCP Co-chairperson Pushpa Kamal Dahal: The Co-chairperson of the Nepal Communist Party (NCP), Pushpa Kamal Dahal on June 4 said that Constitution amendment now possible with two-third majority. Dahal said, "We will make an amendment to the constitution in line with past agreements as this process has been backed by a two-third majority which the government has now attained. Stable government has now been established for a period of five years in all seven provinces of the nation. Federal Socialist Forum-Nepal (FSF-N) participating in the government is an achievement, which has affirmed the formation of dynamic government in all provinces." The Himalayan Times, June 5, 2018
India will disintegrate; PM Modi will be killed, says JuD's senior functionary: Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), the frontal outfit of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), on June 8 threatened to assassinate Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi and asked Muslims to wage a "jihad" during the holy month of Ramzan. "Modi (Indian Prime Minister) will be killed. India and Israel will get disintegrated as more and more martyrs will be produced," said Maulana Bashir Ahmad Khaki, a senior JuD functionary. Khaki was speaking at Friday sermon in Rawalakot city of Poonch District in Pakistan occupied Kashmir (PoK).Times of India, June 10, 2018
Act against terrorists without distinction, says US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa: The United Sates (US) Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on June 7 asked Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa to take action against terrorist groups without any distinction. It was the first time that a high-level engagement took place between the two sides since travel restrictions were imposed by the two sides on each others' diplomats. Pompeo spoke with Bajwa over phone and their discussion was focused to advance Pak-US bilateral relations, State Department Spokesperson Heather Nauert said. Times of India, June 11, 2018.
The South Asia Intelligence Review (SAIR) is a weekly service that brings you regular data, assessments and news briefs on terrorism, insurgencies and sub-conventional warfare, on counter-terrorism responses and policies, as well as on related economic, political, and social issues, in the South Asian region.
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