Pakistan

India and Pakistan: the Engagement Must Go On

Rosheen Kabraji — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 21:30:03 +0000

It took about ten phone rings before I picked up.

“Good morning, ma’am”, said the very apologetic voice, “so sorry to bother you but the police are here and they need to speak to you”.

I begrudgingly opened my eyes to look around my hotel room and remembered the city I had woken up in. So in my best ‘I wasn’t asleep at 11 am’ voice I said “could you please ring room 212 they will take care of it’.

“Sure ma’am, no problem. So sorry to disturb you.”

I was lying in bed at the Taj President hotel in Bombay (or Mumbai if you prefer) two weeks after the terror attacks in November 2008. The occasion: a family wedding–it is South Asia after all, the wedding must go on. I had just told the very polite duty manager to call my parents room as all our passports were together and my father would have to sit with a few Indian policemen whose task it is to check that every Pakistani national who enters India is who they are and are staying at the address they gave on their immigration form.

If I hadn’t been fortunate enough to have been issued a non-police reporting visa I would have had to have gone down to the police station atleast twice during my five day trip. Having seen my home city of Karachi reel from dozens of terrorist attacks, I was curious to see what the atmosphere would be like in Bombay. Visiting a city in the days after a horrific terrorist attack teaches you a great deal about that city and its inhabitants; the good, the bad and the political opportunists all rise to the surface and battle it out before any dust has settled. Apart from the hysteria on the television channels (I hadn’t realised India and Pakistan were close to war again until I landed in the subcontinent) the city was, as expected, getting on with things. The new wing of the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel opened its doors again the day after I arrived as a symbol of the city’s resilience. I expected nothing less.

It is odd to think that with all this global communication there is still an element of mystery as to how and what people over the border think. I gather there is probably less curiosity about India in Pakistan but you can never evade talking politics when Pakistanis and Indians meet. And you generally avoid talking cricket.

India-Pakistan relations suffered a major set back in the wake of the terror attack in Bombay. For ordinary Pakistanis the most practical gauge of relations is answered by the following: ‘how difficult is it to get a visa’? Most of the traffic is Pakistanis wanting to visit India, not so much the other way around. In 2007 there were roughly 1 million Pakistani tourists visiting India. After the terror attacks, not only has the Indian government made it more difficult for applicants from Pakistan to apply but even the US, UK and other countries. Pakistan in turn makes it difficult for Indians to apply for visas as well. Better known as tit-for-tat engagment.

As talks between the Foreign Ministers took place in Delhi in February it was no surprise that there were no substantial outcomes. This was the primer meeting before potential talks at the level of heads of state, possibly in April at the sidelines of the UN conference on nuclear security. While no one would downplay the importance of India and Pakistan engaging at the negotiating table again, the outlook for future talks which would address key issues of terrorism, territory, Kashmir and water is limited. While India still reprimands Pakistan for not doing enough to counter terrorism in Kashmir and elsewhere in India, Pakistan holds India accountable for insurgent activity in Baluchistan. Moreover, since the attacks in Bombay, Afghanistan has been brought into focus as another area of contention between the two countries.

India and Pakistan have fought four wars and held dozens of talks since parition in 1947. As India assumes a more prominent role on the world stage it will only reinforce its stance of dealing with the conflict bi-laterally. Yet, after over 60 years of on and off bi-lateral dialogue there has been limited progress made in their relations, let alone them being really close to solving the pivotal issue of Kashmir (although Musharraf has stated they had come close when he was in power). While the US has reiterated it will not mediate between the two countries (at India’s behest, Pakistan has frequently asked for mediation), it begs the question of whether the countries really can sort things out bi-laterally and have ‘composite dialogue’?

The stability of the region is of paramount importance not just to India and Pakistan but the global community. But there is also substantial money to be made via increased trade links and perhaps most importantly (if superficially), there is joy to be had in being able to go to Bombay for the weekend from Karachi instead of dusty, colourless Dubai; the possibilities in peace would be endless.

Photo of Taj Mahal Palace

Photo of Indian and Pakistani Foreign Ministers by Dawn

Must-read Pakistani Novel

Rosheen Kabraji — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 18:11:34 +0000

There has been an explosion of Pakistani authors writing about all kinds of issues from politics, identity, immigration and belonging. It has taken me a shamefully long time to read this novel, but I’m glad I saved it to read over the holidays.

Daniyal Mueenuddin’s collection of short stories, In Other Rooms Other Wonders, is a maginificant encapsulation of the diversity of Pakistani life. Very simply, I read a lot about Pakistan in a historical or political context or Pakistanis in disapora, and now we have a beautifully written novel about Pakistanis from the mud-walled huts of the Punjab to the apartments of Paris. If you want to understand Pakistan in a truly nuanced way beyond op-eds read this novel, if you haven’t already.

Here’s a snippet of reviews:

NYT: Reading Daniyal Mueenuddin’s mesmerizing first collection, “In Other Rooms, Other Wonders,” is like watching a game of blackjack, the shrewd players calculating their way beyond their dealt cards in an attempt to beat the dealer. Some bust, others surrender. But in Mueenuddin’s world, no one wins.

The Telegraph: The writing here has a clarifying beauty: two labourers climb on a pile of wheat, “their bare feet digging into the hot grain, sinking to their knees”; a middle-class woman has a laugh that “while it did not seem entirely genuine, by its musicality caused the hearer to join her in a heightened response”. This is a marvellous collection.

The Wall Street Journal: Much as Isaac Bashevis Singer recreated the lost Jewish shtetl in many of his short stories, Mr. Mueenuddin unveils a nuanced world where social status and expectations are understood without being stated, and where poverty and the desire to advance frame each critical choice.

Pakistan: A Country of Interest

Rosheen Kabraji — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 16:19:13 +0000

When you travel on a Pakistani passport there is no airport in the world, even in Pakistan, where you are not subject to some kind of interrogation. So putting Pakistan on America’s “country of interest” list only means there is now a publicly acknowledged policy that endorses profiling. It’s nothing new, but being on that list is only going to make things more difficult for those of us with green passports. If you haven’t traveled very much you are scrutinized. Now if you are a regular traveler with a Pakistani passport you are also scrutinized for traveling ‘too much’.

Do I blame these countries for a policy designed to protect themselves? No. Because I don’t want to be on a plane with a lunatic who is going to blow it up. Or on a tube, or a bus, or a tower, or a bazaar or a volleyball game. The Nigerian ‘pants bomber’ as he is now come to be known went to the same university as I did in London. Even while I was at University College London I heard stories about how British Islamist militants were targeting young Muslim students who had come to the UK; those who were away from home for the first time in their lives with no idea of what to expect of the British undergraduate experience. It typically began under the lure of community, prayer and food. While at university I recall a controversial episode between the UCL Islamic Society and the Jewish Society whereby the email account of the President of the UCL Islamic Society was hacked into and an email sent out to all its members that riled against the Jewish society and its presence on campus. The Nigerian, Abdulmuttalab, was president of the UCL Islamic Society, not at the time I was at university but a few a years later. It wasn’t unusual to see flyers from banned Islamist groups around campus either.

Could universities in the UK do more? Perhaps. Rshad al-Alimi, Yemen’s Deputy Prime Minister for Defense and Security, has said that Abdulmutallab was recruited by al Qaeda in Britain. Peter Neumann, an expert on radicalization who teaches at London’s King’s College, said pro-al Qaeda militants were present in some British campuses but disentangling their activities from legitimate student debate was very difficult. UCL has set up an independent review of Abdulmutallab’s time at the university. A university lobby group, Universities UK, is examining how all universities can protect academic freedom whilst taking “appropriate action” to prevent violent extremism. “There is a narrow line that we must walk between securing freedom of speech on the one hand, and safeguarding against its illegal exercise on the other, such as in the incitement of religious or racial hatred,” said Malcolm Grant, president of University College, London.

More significantly it needs to be recognized that often it is those militant Islamists with British, American or European passports that do the recruiting because they aren’t subject to the same profiling that those with passports from ‘countries of interest’ are-and al-Qaeda obviously exploit this. Again, it comes down to an issue of integration, not just of foreign students in western cities they come to for education but in their own societies in Nigeria, Yemen, Saudi Arabia or Pakistan. There is clearly a need to direct more resources and intelligence toward integration not just interrogation.

Postcard from Pakistan: Bombs to Bracelets

Rosheen Kabraji — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 19:44:44 +0000

October has been a horrifically violent month in Pakistan. The militants have targeted the rich and the powerful establishment, and the vulnerable poor. They have targeted women and children indiscriminately. They have attacked schools and universities. They have attempted to cut through the social fabric that binds Pakistanis in the hope that fear will consume the population and paralyse it.

Yet in the midst of bomb blasts life continues, admittedly not quite as ‘normal’ even by Pakistani standards. Children go to schools that resemble foreign embassy security with barricades and barbed wire, and people have begun avoiding some public places like shopping malls and restaurants as when it comes down to it “it’s just not worth the risk”.

After the terrorist attacks in New York, London and Madrid western politicians and commentators frequently spoke of “our way of life being under threat”. The people of Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad feel no differently. Pakistan may be a country full of contradiction and chaos but it also one of creativity and culture. And this week at Pakistan’s first-ever fashion week at the Marriott Hotel in Karachi, under the watchful guard of paramilitary troops, Pakistani designers and models captured the defiant mood of a city which, so far, has remained unscathed in the recent wave of militant attacks that have hit other cities across the country.

‘This is our gesture of defiance to the Taliban,’ said Ayesha Tammy Haq, the CEO of Fashion Pakistan Week. ‘There is a terrible problem of militancy and political upheaval … but that doesn’t mean that the country shuts down. That doesn’t mean that business comes to a halt.’

Here’s a look at the variety of styles and models that hit the runway:

Photo by AP

Photo by DAWN

Photo by

Photo by Reuters

Photo by AP

Photo by Reuters

Photo by AP

Photo by AFP

A Long Bloody Week in Pakistan

Rosheen Kabraji — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 10:02:52 +0000

It may have taken slightly longer than anticipated, but the militants and the Taliban regrouped, unleashing carnage in four cities across Pakistan this past week in which they hit the military, the international community, and regular Pakistanis.

The raids are part of an apparent campaign to deter a planned army offensive against Taliban strongholds in the Waziristan region along the Afghan border.

The most recent attack on Monday hit a military convoy that was passing through a busy market in Shangla in Swat, where the army had been fighting the Taliban and had declared the area clear of militants. Most of the 41 people who lost their lives were ordinary Pakistanis.

Last Saturday the militants struck at the heart of the Pakistani establishment in a 22 hour long hostage situation at the Pakistan Army headquarters in Rawalpindi. Like the attack at the UN the previous Monday, up to 10 militants had obtained army uniforms and also carried fraudulent identity documents as they drove through a key entry point to the army’s general headquarters. After penetrating the outer defences they took about 42 hostages in an assault and demanded the release of around 100 militants. Commandos eventually stormed the building Sunday. The army said nine militants and 14 other people were killed, mostly members of the security forces.

Five of the militants came from Punjab, Pakistan’s most populous and wealthy province, while the other five were from South Waziristan, a Taliban stronghold at the southern end of the tribal belt, along the Afghan border.

From the AP:

Taliban spokesman Azam Tariq said the attack that killed 20 people was only the first in a planned series of strikes intended to avenge the killing of their leader Baitullah Mehsud in a CIA drone attack in August.

He said the raid on army headquarters was carried out by a Punjabi faction of the militant group and it had given orders to other militant branches across the country to launch similar operations.

He also warned the army that if it launched a planned offensive into Waziristan it would be its undoing.

On Friday a suicide bomber struck at a crowded market in the city of Peshawar killing 49 people. This came only two weeks after another suicide bombing that killed 11 in Peshawar.

And finally on Monday, October 5, a suicide bomber, dressed in the uniform of the Pakistan Frontier Corps, entered the UN office of the World Food Programme in Islamabad under the pretense of wanting to use the toilet and then proceeded to blow himself up and kill five more innocent people.

With the impending attack on militants in Waziristan, these attacks are a clear signal from the Taliban, al-Qaeda and other militants that they still have the ability and the will to cause destruction, instil fear and strike at the heart of the Pakistani Army. Additionally the close geographic proximity of the attacks in Islamabad, Peshawar and Rawalpindi indicates a growing strength of militants outside of the tribal areas and North West Frontier Province (NWFP) into Punjab, the most populous and wealthy Pakistani province.

The growing importance of the Punjabi factor in local and international militancy has placed the army under pressure to extend its crackdown beyond the tribal belt. Although most of the terrorist masterminds may be in the tribal areas, the attacks in the past weeks have only underscored the role Punjab plays in providing the foot soldiers for operations both within and outside Pakistan. Ajmal Kasab, the sole surviving gunman from the Mumbai terror attack last November, hails from a village in southern Punjab and serves as an ever-present reminder of the reach of the Taliban and other militant groups. While the Pakistani Army has been willing to take on the militants on their western border with Afghanistan, the military option in Punjab is unlikely to materialize, particularly given the proximity of Punjab to India. Any intervention there which would undoubtedly add to the already strained relations between India and Pakistan.

Today’s editorial in Pakistan’s leading English daily newspaper, Dawn, sums up the questions plaguing Pakistanis in their countries fight against militancy:

Unfortunately, the history of Pakistan’s fight against militancy is a case study in missed opportunities and warning signs ignored until the damage is already caused. Why must we wait for militants in south Punjab to set fire to that part or other parts of Pakistan before we act against them? And why must we only try and kill or capture the militants that are attacking the state rather than shut down the pipeline that is churning out such elements? Unless the apparatus that creates the militants is shut down, there will always be new militants to take the place of those killed or captured.

See a timeline of militant attacks in Pakistan for 2009.

Photo by Reuters

Bomb Blast Rocks UN in Islamabad

Rosheen Kabraji — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 12:46:25 +0000

On Monday a suspected suicide bomb exploded at the World Food Programme’s (WFP) offices in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad. Reports confirm three people, including an Iraqi man, were killed and another six were wounded.

The attack comes as UK Defense Secretary, Bob Ainsworth, and Home Secretary, Alan Johnson, were due to meet Pakistani ministers in Islamabad.

The WFP office is located in one of Islamabad’s most highly secured neighbourhoods. President Asif Ali Zardari’s private residence is a few hundred metres away, while another UN office is across the street.

Visitors to the WFP office normally pass through a barricade and metal scanners but there were no signs of a forced entry. The compound is protected by a three-storey-high wall of Hesco barriers - fabric-lined mesh containers filled with sand - making it one of the most conspicuously guarded buildings in the capital.

TFT have heard unconfirmed reports that the blast took place on the second floor of the building sparking suspicion that there may have been a device planted from before hand and therefore speculation that the attack could have been an insider job.

The WFP confirmed in a statement from Rome that three of their staff members had died in the blast, with two UN employees still in a critical condition.

“It is a tragedy for WFP and for the whole humanitarian community in Pakistan,” Amir Abdulla, the WFP’s deputy director based in Rome, said in the statement. “These people were working to help vulnerable people.”

UN spokeswoman Ishrat Rizvi told AFP in Islamabad that all the UN offices in the capital “have been closed for security reasons until further notice”.

The WFP is distributing food to poor Pakistanis, including those in the northwest who have been displaced or affected by a recent Pakistan army offensive against militants in the Swat Valley.

There was a lull in bomb attacks after Baitullah Mehsud’s death in an August 5 US drone strike, but as predicted the new Taliban leadership wanted show their strength with fresh, dramatic strikes. Yesterday the group’s self-declared successor, Hakimullah Mehsud, appeared before reporters in South Waziristan, vowing to avenge the former leader’s death with strikes on both Pakistan and the US following speculation that he was killed in a drone attack.

Sources: The Telegraph, NYT, Guardian,

Pakistani Female Fighter Pilots Fly High

Rosheen Kabraji — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 15:28:34 +0000

Until 2003 opportunities to train as a combat pilot in the Pakistan Air Force was reserved exclusively for men. Six years after the rules were changed CNN reported on the seven women trained and ready to fly an F-7 supersonic fighter jet for the Pakistan Air Force. The numbers may be few but given women rarely fly in combat any where in the world this is a significant step for Pakistani women in their fight to break down boundaries.

See them in action here:

A Super Embassy Does Not An Imperial Master Make

Rosheen Kabraji — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 16:57:20 +0000

Every time there a security ‘incident’ in a major Pakistani city the violence and instability leads foreign governments to withdraw their diplomatic personnel, foreign companies recall their employees and visa applications take longer as there are fewer staff and foreign airlines suspend their services. In the end ordinary Pakistanis suffer diplomatically, socially and economically.

Yet when presence is beefed up in the form of a larger US embassy ‘the Americans are out to conquer us’. If Pakistanis should be wary of anything it isn’t really an increase in size of American embassies in Pakistan which is in line with previous policy to expand diplomatic missions. It should, hopefully, be seen of as a sign of the commitment that has been lacking thus far which has been pointed out by most Pakistanis who rightfully criticise the US for falling short (this has also been recently acknowledged by US Defence Secretary Robert Gates).

As annoying as the presence of US embassies and other foreign missions can be due to the various road blocks around the city’s main arteries and that the mere proximity to western diplomatic buildings and enclaves can be dangerous for Pakistanis going on their daily business (see picture left heavily guarded US Embassy in Karachi), what Pakistanis should be concerned about is the reported presence of certain foreign private security firms coupled with the incompetence and corruption of Pakistan’s own police force.

There are two general rules you follow in Pakistan when it comes to most policemen: first if you see a policeman go in the opposite direction. Second the cops are the robbers. I once witnessed a car-jacking in which a plain clothes policeman on a motorbike tried to steal a car from another plain clothes policeman. They didn’t have their uniforms but they had their guns.

In the 2009 corruption report on Pakistan by Transparency International the police came on top as the most corrupt government sector. For 170 million Pakistanis there is a 383,000 strong police force. I can’t say it comes as a shock that these poorly trained, ill-equipped, poorly paid policemen will turn on the very people they are meant to protect. Just for comparison sake, the UK has a police force of 239,607 for a population of roughly 60 million. I know it’s not ‘fair’ to compare but if the government’s policy is to turn Pakistan into an effective and stable democracy then law enforcement is a big part of it and there have not been tangible improvements. This is why many people from individuals to companies and businesses have turned to private security companies.

After September 2001 there was a rise in demand for private security companies in Pakistan which currently number about 600 and operate under the All Pakistan Security Agencies Association. There have been several reports of the presence of private security company Blackwater, now renamed Xe Services LLC, in Peshawar and other parts of the country. These reports have been denied by both the Pakistani and US government . As witnessed in Iraq and Afghanistan private security firms can cause irreparable damage to military and diplomatic missions trying to win over the local population. For example, this week the US government terminated security guards from ArmorGroup North America at their Kabul embassy for engaging in lewd behaviour.

Conspiracy theories are rife in Pakistan, particularly those concerning the US, and it seems plans to expand US diplomatic presence coupled with reports that there were also plans to buy the Pearl Continental Hotel in Peshawar and the building of a bomb proof Marine House with ‘no more than 20 marines’ in the diplomatic enclave in Islamabad has kept tongues wagging:

The ambassador tried to lay to rest a controversy about the number of Marines being based in Islamabad. The controversy was sparked by reports about an allocation of $112.5 million by the State Department for residential quarters for the Marines.

Ms Patterson said that from the $112.5 million allocation, $5 million was for Marine quarters, $53.5 for housing infrastructure, $18 million for improvement of general services office area, and $36 million for temporary duty quarters and community support facilities.

The duties of Marines, she said, would be to guard the embassy building and classified material inside and there weren’t any sinister designs about which fears were being expressed by certain quarters.

The ambassador was visibly shocked when someone asked if the embassy expansion was for espionage. She said: ‘I’m speechless. To spy on Pakistan we don’t need a big US embassy. And we don’t need to spy either’.

I think it may gave been better if she stayed speechless. Clarifying that the US did not need to spy on Pakistan sounds like an afterthought.

The presence of US boots in Pakistan, even if it’s just on marble floors for now, has not gone unnoticed with Pakistan’s neighbour and long-term ally, China already expressing its ‘concerns‘ over the expansion.

Photo Karachi Embassy by MSNBC

Photo Islamabad Diplomatic Enclave

Postcard from Pakistan: Pimp My Truck

Rosheen Kabraji — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 10:56:09 +0000

Even though the air-conditioning is on full blast the blaze of the midday sun is draining me and making my eyelids heavy. I look out the window and stare at a peacock. I blink again. As the truck moves along a slideshow of motifs pass me by: a lake, more colourful birds and then two very stern eyes that stare at me as the truck chugs on through the heaving afternoon traffic in Karachi.

Against the backdrop of sandy coloured buildings truck art keeps the clogged roads of Karachi colourful for its brave commuters. Modes of transport are known for being cultural icons of a city from Manhattan’s yellow cabs to London’s red double-decker buses. Whereas advertisements adorn yellow cabs and red buses only in specific cities, truck art can be found on transport vehicles all over Pakistan.

What is truck art? To give you a starting point, think ‘pimp my ride’ but Pakistan style: it combines cultural history and tradition, storytelling and passion. Take a truck built by Ford, General Motors or Hino-Pak, give it to a truck artist called Ali and six weeks later and about $2000 down ‘hey presto!’ you get a retro-psychedelic customised truck with your favourite movie star on the back or a line from your favourite poem written on the side declaring to the world you are a hopeless romantic (see photo left).

Truck art is a legacy from the days of the British Raj when bus companies decided to decorate their vehicles to attract more customers. Although the art doesn’t serve that purpose anymore it is a tradition that is deeply ingrained in Pakistani culture. Other countries like the Philippines and Indonesia as well as in South and Central America also have similar art on vehicles but it seems nowhere is it quite so prevalent and intricate as in Pakistan.

For more about Pakistani truck art see below:

http://pakistaniat.com/2008/06/18/pakistans-indigenous-truck-art/

http://www3.amherst.edu/~jjelias/truck_site/trucks.html

http://weburbanist.com/2008/11/22/truck-art-asia-pakistan/

Photo truck

Photo peacock

Photo poetry

Taliban Revenge Attack

Rosheen Kabraji — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 10:11:01 +0000

After Baitullah Mehsud, former leader of the Pakistani Taliban, was killed by a US drone earlier this month the Whitehouse spokesman Robert Gibbs made the claim that Mehsud’s death would make Pakistan safer.

In my previous post about this story I made clear that his death would not make Pakistan safer and that Pakistanis would be expecting retaliation in the form of a suicide attack. Safety has not come, but a suicide bomber has.

A spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for an attack at a security post near the Afghan border just before policeman were about to break their fast (the month of Ramadan having begun). So far 22 people have lost their lives.

‘This is our first response since the death of our chief Baitullah Mehsud,’ Azam Tariq told AFP. ‘We will continue similar attacks in the future also.’ He said ‘the victims of the suicide attack were all those supporting the United States. Anybody supporting the US is our enemy.