The US State Department had
declared Pakistan a safe haven for terrorists five years ago, a historical
study of its annual authoritative Country Report on Terrorism says. The annual
report for 2012 that came out in 2013 for the first time used the term “safe
haven” for Pakistan for letting terrorist groups thrive and operate from its
soil.
The 2013 Country Report on
Terrorism (for terror activities in the year 2012) used the line “a number of
these attacks were planned and launched from these groups’ safe haven in
Pakistan.” ‘These groups’ hear mean “the Afghan Taliban, HQN (the Haqqani
Network) and other AQ-affiliated groups” which continued to wreak havoc in
Afghanistan.
From next year onwards, i.e.,
2014 Country Report on Terrorism (for terror activities in the year 2013), the US
chose to generalize about Afghanistan centric terror emanating from Pakistan by
removing ‘these groups’ and adding ‘and other insurgent and terrorist groups’.
It meant the US found many more terror outfits operating from Pakistan to
perpetrate terror against US and Afghan forces in Afghanistan and it was not
just limited to the terror triad of Afghan Taliban, HQN and the AQ-affiliated
groups.
So, first few lines of the second
paragraph of Chapter 2 of the Country Report on Terrorism (on South and Central
Asia) every year would be, “Afghanistan, in particular, continued to experience
aggressive and coordinated attacks by the Afghan Taliban, including the
affiliated Haqqani Network (HQN) and other insurgent and terrorist groups. A
number of these attacks were planned and launched from safe havens in Pakistan.”
We can see the focus of the
report about describing Pakistan a safe haven for terrorists all these years
have been basically about Afghanistan. But the latest report goes a step ahead
in adding the much required dimension to it, i.e., recognizing Pakistan’s complicity
in sponsoring terror in India.
India has long been
complaining to the US on its double standards on terror emanating from Pakistan
rightly arguing that it cannot differentiate between a good terrorist from a
bad terrorist. All the US censure, all tough words to Pakistan have been about
cracking down on the terror outfits that have shifted their base to Pakistan but
continue to target Afghanistan, the US forces and interests there and the
Afghanistan’s government.
The civil war, in fact, never
ended in Afghanistan. The warring factions were previously centralized within
Afghanistan with Taliban being the last ruling faction. Now Pakistan has become
the main base for Taliban and other such groups who want to overthrow the
process of democratic transition in Afghanistan. And from Pakistan, they
continue to run amok in Afghanistan. How serious is situation can be gauged from
the fact that even Afghanistan’s most secure area, Kabul’s diplomatic enclave
that also house the seat of its government, is not safe from terror strikes. It
has seen multiple attacks.
For Pak based groups
perpetrating terror in India, the US brief had not gone beyond the routine
lines like ‘Pakistan should expedite the Mumbai or Pathankot terror probes’. The
US continued with billions of dollars in aid even if it knows that Pakistan is
harbouring terrorists who are India’s most wanted. What made it a theatre of
absurd was the fact that even if many of these terrorists like Hafiz Saeed were
carrying a heft US bounty on their heads, they were free to roam in Pakistan,
like respectable citizens.
That, seems, is changing now.
First, the US pressure left Pakistan with no other option but to house arrest
Hafiz Saeed in January this year. Though symbolic, it suggested that the US had
started putting pressure on Pakistan. It also told us that the US was coming
out of its “good and bad terrorists” mindset. In June, Pakistan had to ban the
new front of Hafiz Saeed’s terror outfit, Tehreek-e-Azadi-Jammu & Kashmir
(TAJK).
Then in June only, the US declared
Syed Salahuddin, the terror lord of Pak based umbrella groups for perpetrating
terror in Jammu and Kashmir, a global terrorist. And now in July, the world’s
only superpower has termed Pakistan a safe haven for India centric terror
groups.
The Country Report on
Terrorism 2017 (for the year 2016) says, “The Pakistan government supported political
reconciliation between the Afghan government and the Afghan Taliban, but failed
to take significant action to constrain the ability of the Afghan Taliban and
HQN to operate from Pakistan-based safe havens and threaten U.S. and Afghan
forces in Afghanistan.”
And then goes on to do the
course-correction that was long overdue by writing specifically against the
major India centric terror groups like LeT and JeM and holding Pakistan accountable
for not doing enough, “The government did not take any significant action
against LeT or JeM, other than implementing an ongoing ban against media
coverage of their activities. LeT and JeM continued to hold rallies, raise
money, recruit, and train in Pakistan.”
©SantoshChaubey
