In a classified and a highly secured facility, 5 members of the a terrorist organization were taken to trial in a court in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, in what has been termed as Islamabad’s first steps towards taking concrete actions against the perpetrators who had been identified by both Indian and the United States authorities, as the plotters of the 26/11 attacks in Mumbai, that claimed 160 lives.

The five members on trial have been associated with Lashkar-e-Taiba, a terrorist outfit that is known to have been operating from within Pakistan and has been blamed for several high profile attacks on Indian soil. The trail took place in an undisclosed location, due to security reasons. Pakistan has stated that, it is completely willing to prosecute the terror outfit’s members and would shows the international community that, even its military, that was known to have ties with this organization, has nothing to do with Lashkar-e-Taiba anymore.

The Lashkar-e-Taiba is believed to have 150,000 members and according to security experts, Pakistani citizens harbor a great deal of sympathy and appreciation for this outfit’s activities, thereby making it even more difficult to materialize any plans of dismantling the organization once and for all.  According to Pakistani intelligence agency officials, ISI or Inter-Services Intelligence, that is Pakistan’s premier intelligence agency believes that Lashkar-e-Taiba and another high-profile terror outfit, Jaish-e-Muhammad together, could pose a very serious threat to the national security of Pakistan and are very much capable of destabilizing the nation.

Via New York Times.

To say that the present conflict in Pakistan’s Northwest Frontier Province is bloody is an understatement. While more than a thousand have been killed, there are at least 2 million people displaced.

All these sacrifices will be for naught if Pakistan does not restrategize its ambitions in Afghanistan and Indian Kashmir. The country also has to reform its Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) that has earned the reputation of being a double-dealing two-edged sword. Also, Pakistan should exert efforts in overhauling its educational system that promotes hatred towards non-Muslims.

In other words, Pakistan should stop existing in the service of religion while being a political entity, even if it’s the only nation on earth that was created solely out of religious reasons. The consequences are dire. Pakistan, today, is known as the heartland of terrorism that is associated with religious fanaticism. It has been harboring a conducive and fertile ground for radical Islam to be elevated to the heights of ideology.

The intense conflict in Pakistan’s Northwest Frontier will only be an exercise in futility if it does not serve as a springboard for transformation in Pakistan. Should the country rise above its personal tragedy and prove to the world that it can shun radicalism on its grounds, it would be sending off a most crucial message to the rest of the Islamist-addled world: that militant Muslims will not prosper for long if populations reject them.

Should Pakistan fail in this current campaign against militant Muslims, there is more than the possibility of nuclear armaments falling in the hands of the Taliban. There is the much-feared about morale boost among radical Islamists that have been forming contingents in other parts of the world, from Somalia to Sumatra, even to the UK.

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Via Forbes

It seems that the Taliban gets ammunition, money, and training from the people expected to eradicate them. The powerful and influential secret service of Pakistan (ISI) provides crucial support to different factions of the Taliban fighting in Afghanistan, as published by The New York Times, quoting U.S. and Pakistani sources in Washington and Islamabad.

The revelation coincides with the usual accusations of the government of Afghanistan on ISI’s involvement in attacks such as the most recent one where 10 Afghan policemen were killed. Another accusation is the attack on the embassy of India in July last year, as well as the attempt to assassinate Afghan President Hamid Karzai in April 2008.

According to information from The New York Times, the support consists of money, ammunition, fuel, and training strategy. Furthermore, the ISI allows the influx of money from Arab countries to finance the Afghan insurgency and even young recruits in the madrasas of the country to join the ranks of the Taliban. The newspaper says that U.S. authorities have evidence of meetings between officials of the ISI and the Taliban to discuss an increase in violence before the Afghan elections.

U.S. intelligence and the British are convinced that the ISI is supporting the three main groups committing attacks in Afghanistan: the Taliban led by Mullah Omar who are in the area of the Pakistani city of Queta in the south and the capital region Pashtunistán which includes parts of Afghanistan and Pakistan, the militia network led by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, and another group under the command of guerrilla leader Jalaluddin Haqqani. The newspaper also quoted the ISI’s links with the Lashkar-e-Taiba, based in Pakistan and suspected in the Mumbai bombings.

ISI’s support for the Taliban is not part of a conscious strategy of Pakistani authorities. It is also not supported by ISI leaders, according to a source quoted by The New York Times. The reason for this relationship between ISI and the Taliban is quite simple: Pakistan is afraid that if foreign troops leave Afghanistan, this creates a power vacuum that could be exploited by India, the main enemy of Pakistan in the region.

The problem is that Pakistan is supposed to be a crucial U.S. ally in the fight against the Taliban in Afghanistan, and annually receives millions of dollars in military aid from Washington.

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Via The Boston Globe

Pakistan has exhibited lackadaisical measures to stem terrorism. This has resulted in the country’s negative reputation of being a coddler of terrorists. Ergo, a hotbed of terrorism. India calls this treatment as ‘catch and release’ approach to the problem. Pakistan just goes through the motions of temporary detentions and light prosecutions, and then releases the suspects after a few months. Is Pakistan really a coddler of terrorists or is it just a case of gross ineptness?

Pakistan may yet be harboring another secret, though. The country has its own secret prisons system, much like the US Guantanamo. The prosecutions that happen in open courts may not necessarily be the only way as to how terrorists are being investigated while under lock and key. The Army and the I.S.I are said to be running an anti-terrorism campaign that is not known to the public and with no judicial ties.

That is why Pakistan has had a reputation for loose criminal justice system. Its intelligence arm sounds nefarious itself, sort of underground and vigilante in nature. So long as the pillars of the justice system are not brought up to the surface where proceedings are apparent to all, Pakistan will remain hogging a bad rep of a Third World country where justice is only aspirational. Terrorists exist in Pakistan, either using the country as their half-way point or comfortable lair. It is entirely up to the country to process the stigma that close association with terrorists has brought to it. For starters, it can overhaul its anti-criminality ranks and imbue them with credibility for a change.

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Via The New Yorker