Daily Times Editorial Jan 31, 2016

Terror-free Pakistan Presiding over a high powered meeting of the top leadership of the ruling PML-N, Prime Minister (PM) Nawaz Sharif underlined his government’s top priority as being a terror-free Pakistan. The killers of innocent children in educational institutions would be brought to justice and the Karachi operation would continue until its logical end, the PM emphasised. The war against terrorism, he vowed, would continue until the elimination of the last terrorist on Pakistani soil. He went on to claim that economic stability and the successes against the militants had created hope and optimism among the people. He repeated the assertion that Operation Zarb-e-Azb had broken the back of the terrorists and now they were focusing on soft targets in their frustration. While there is no denying that the military and security forces have made strides against the terrorist affliction, such resounding statements of success may have the inadvertent effect of lulling us into complacency, which has proved fatal, as the attack on the Bacha Khan University (BKU) after the Army Public School (APS) massacre shows. Other than that, the assertions and claims of the PM need to be assessed critically to get an accurate picture of the struggle against terrorism. The PM’s desire for a terror-free Pakistan is shared by all. However, the assertion that the war would continue until the elimination of the last terrorist implies physical elimination, which is not only difficult to assess but also ignores the equally if not more important task of the ideological elimination of the malign influence of the terrorist narrative, particularly on young and impressionable minds. Otherwise, with the narrative unscotched and no alternative to replace it in the minds of the people, it could remain a reproducible disease. This still remains the weakest, if not wholly absent, aspect of the drive against terrorism. The PM’s claim of economic stability can also be questioned on the touchstone of the unremitting energy crisis, unemployment running at 8.5 percent according to an independent think tank, capital flight and lack of investment, domestic and foreign. The economy’s inability to offer the young employment leaves them desperate and vulnerable to the message of criminals and terrorists. As to the ‘broken back’ of the terrorists, is it the case or is it that we have simply pushed the problem across the Afghan border beyond our reach? If the latter, we had better gird up our loins for a long struggle. As to attacking soft targets in desperation, with due respect to the PM, this has always been on the radar of the terrorist asymmetrical warriors. A report on the first year of the National Action Plan (NAP) reveals some telling facts. Seminaries numbering 182 have been sealed for fanning extremism. While this is long overdue and therefore welcome, the thousands of seminaries still untouched present the potential of a conveyor belt of extremism and terrorism. The sooner this task is completed, the better. Bank accounts and cash of proscribed militant groups amounting to some Rs 1.5 billion have been seized. The names of 8,159 people have been put in the Fourth Schedule, 188 hardcore militants’ names have been put on the Exit Control List and the movements of 2,052 terrorists have been restricted. Cases against terrorists registered so far total 1,026 while 230 terror suspects have been arrested. Pakistan has banned 64 organisations while the UN has a black list of 74. Why this discrepancy? Literature and publications spewing out hatred, intolerance, extremism, sectarianism and advocating decapitation of those who do not agree with them have been confiscated and 73 shops purveying such stuff sealed. Books and other such material seized number 1,500. While these are impressive statistics, they merely serve to remind us of the mountain of effort that still awaits before a ‘terror-free Pakistan’ can be envisaged. The attacks on the APS and BKU have created a security headache for educational institutions’ administrators and parents. Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) laid down in NAP include raising the height of boundary walls, installing CCTV, ensuring one entry and one exit point manned by security guards, barriers before entrances, etc. Many public sector educational institutions are complaining their headmasters are being harassed and humiliated, particularly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa but also elsewhere, for not following the SOPs to the letter, after which FIRs are being lodged against them. They complain the education authorities have not released funds to allow them to carry out the instructions. The result of this confusion is that many institutions have had to be closed. This is hardly desirable since this is presumably the exact outcome the terrorists want. The abiding and overarching problem remains the lack of a coordinated strategy against terrorism that brings together all civilian and military intelligence, security and other forces to combat the terrorists with centralised intelligence-led operations and the development of the missing counter-terrorism narrative.

Daily Times Editorial Jan 30, 2016

Pak-India talks If ever the aphorism “the more things change, the more they remain the same” were applicable, it certainly fits the bill as far as Pak-India relations are concerned. If the latest statements of the Pakistani foreign office and the Indian foreign ministry are perused, what one finds is an all too familiar ring to these utterings. Pakistan, in the shape of the foreign office spokesman and Sartaj Aziz, the Prime Minister's Adviser on Foreign Affairs, have thrown the ball back into India’s court as far as settling mutually convenient dates for the foreign secretaries talks originally scheduled for January 15 but postponed due to the Pathankot attack. At the time, both sides had been careful to underline that the talks had only been postponed, not cancelled. Yet here we are more than a month down the road since then, and all we are hearing from the Pakistani side as well as the Indian foreign ministry spokesman is that “mutually convenient” dates are not yet in hand. As though it would help matters move along, our foreign office spokesman felt it necessary to respond to references to Pakistan in the joint France-India communiqué after President Hollande’s visit by urging India to refrain from hurling unsubstantiated allegations of supporting terrorism against Pakistan. The usual corollary to this followed, positing Pakistan as the (biggest?) victim of terrorism itself, having lost thousands of lives, property and economic progress to the phenomenon. Despite Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s reiterations of resolve to counter terrorism and the detention of Maulana Masood Azhar of the Jaish-e-Mohammad, accused of masterminding the Pathankot attack, immense uncertainty looms over the (preliminary) meeting of the foreign secretaries in order to pave the way for the Bilateral Comprehensive Dialogue to follow. Both sides seem firmly bogged down in the old and worn ruts, particularly since Islamabad insists the ‘evidence’ regarding the Pathankot attack provided by India is “insufficient” (shades of Mumbai). Because of the present hiatus, it has not even been possible to finalise the visit of an investigation team Pakistan wanted to send to Pathankot. If there is a chink of light in this once again darkening curtain of dancing around the issue, one is the statement of the Pakistan High Commissioner in New Delhi Abdul Basit, who is confident the foreign secretary talks will begin in February and the other the report that the Pakistani and Indian foreign secretaries could meet this week on the sidelines of a conference in San Francisco, where they will take advantage of the opportunity to discuss dates for their formal interaction. The ‘ball’ referred to in the Pakistani foreign office’s statement, it seems, is being tossed around from one side to the other. Lingering secondary irritants such as the recent reported dropping of a bomb by the Indian Air Force in Rajasthan do not of course help matters. The apprehension is that this bilateral dialogue may suffer the same fate as the proposed dialogue after the Mumbai attacks. Governments in Islamabad and New Delhi changed while both sides were still dancing their minuet around the investigations of that terror attack and even the replacement governments have made little if any progress in that direction. Now comes Pathankot just as the two sides had groped their way back to the negotiating table after initial aggressive intent was on display from the Modi government. On present trends at least, the post-Pathankot scenario has a chilling resemblance to post-Mumbai. There are sceptics on both sides, not to mention the spoilers in the middle, who seldom pass up any opportunity to return the protagonists to their knee-jerk traditional hostility, mistrust and suspicion. Over the years, all means have been tried, confidence building measures, trade, economic cooperation, etc, but none have worked in the face of the underlying mistrust rooted in history. The people of the subcontinent await with a mixture of hope and resignation the reversal of this familiar Pak-India impasse. The world too understands and is concerned about the continuing tensions between the two nuclear-armed South Asian neighbours. The eminently logical recourse to the weapon of language rather than the time-worn language of weapons remains to be established as the dominant and irreversible currency of the relationship. Hope for the best, but don’t hold your breath where these two countries are concerned.

Daily Times Editorial Jan 25, 2016

Attack investigations Director General Inter-Services Public Relations Lieutenant-General Asim Saleem Bajwa updated the media on January 23rd on the ongoing investigations into the attack on the Bacha Khan University. He revealed that the attackers had entered Pakistan through Torkham. The four facilitators of the attack arrested so far and the main facilitator (code named Target A) helped the terrorists clear the Torkham check post and then transported them to Mardan, where they stayed at the house of one of the facilitators called Adil. This gentleman, a mason, made a map of the university while he was doing some work there. He then briefed the attackers on the layout of the campus. His son was also one of the facilitators. The other two facilitators, Riaz and Noorullah from Mardan hired the rickshaw they used to take the attackers from Mardan to the Bacha Khan University, Charsadda. While all this has been gathered from the four facilitators in custody, the main facilitator, Target A, is still being sought. Interestingly, Target A's wife and niece purchased the weapons the attackers used from Darra Adam Khel and surreptitiously transported them to Mardan. Target A and his wife and niece are now on the run and being pursued through intelligence-based operations. The Director General also informed that 'Khalifa' Umar Mansoor and his deputy Qari Zakir of the Geedar group of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan made 10 calls to the attackers on the day of the assault. Lieutenant-General Bajwa took pains to clarify that the Afghanistan government was not being blamed. All the investigations show only that the operation was planned and controlled from Afghan soil. As to the identity of the killed attackers, the ISPR Director General said one of them had been identified as Amir Rehman from South Waziristan, while the identities of the other three were still being investigated. Bajwa also revealed that the results of the investigation had been conveyed by Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif to President Ashraf Ghani. Meanwhile Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif presided over a high level meeting of the military top brass in Peshawar to review progress in the investigations and ponder over the management of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border to prevent cross-border terrorism. Getting to grips with the Bacha Khan University attack, its similarities to the December 2014 Army Public School Peshawar massacre, and the emerging threat to all educational institutions all over the country points to the new challenges and transformed dynamic of the counter-terrorism campaign. While some midnight oil may have to be burnt to get our head around this conundrum, it is instructive to look back at events and developments since the Army Public School incident. Even more than the Bacha Khan University atrocity, the Peshawar massacre was much more shocking for being the first of its kind and given the scale of the bloodshed. Some sought comfort in the fact that the death toll in Charsadda was only 21 killed, whereas the Peshawar butchery had slaughtered 150 people, most of them students in both cases of course. What bears reflection though is whether the 'successes' of Operation Zarb-e-Azb in clearing North Waziristan in particular and FATA in general of the terrorist presence and the relatively long lag (six months) before the terrorists struck in Peshawar had not induced some complacency. Claims of having broken the back of the terrorists and General Raheel Sharif's (overoptimistic?) prediction that terrorism would be eliminated by the end of the current year point to a failure to realistically assess the situation. We have consistently warned in this space against being lulled into complacency and letting our guard down because of the relative length of time taken by the terrorists to regroup and mount ripostes. So long as they can call upon their cadre ensconced in safe havens across the border and their underground cells within the country, it was always going to be a protracted war. In fact the authorities, civil and military, need to prepare the public for the protracted nature of the fight against terrorism, appeal for the people to become the eyes and ears of the anti-terrorist drive, and fashion the missing counter-narrative to the fanatics' wild and woolly ideas that still find some resonance in certain circles.

Daily Times Editorial Jan 24, 2016

Children threatened Kabul has denied any role in the Bacha Khan University atrocity that killed 21 people, most of them students and one teacher who resisted the attackers. The president’s office issued a statement that Afghanistan had never supported or provided sanctuaries to any terrorist group. It went on to assert that Afghan soil was not used in the attack, a claim backed up by a press briefing in Islamabad by DGPR DG Lt-General Asim Bajwa, who clarified that the operation was controlled from Afghanistan but the Afghan government was not involved. The Afghan president’s office, while condemning the incident, argued that terrorism was the common enemy of both countries and joint, sincere efforts were required to combat it. Both statements quoted above should lay to rest the wild speculations in parts of our media that were quick to ascribe blame to Kabul. The fact is that Mullah Fazlullah’s Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has found refuge across the border after Operation Zarb-e-Azb, reportedly with the help of the Haqqani network that has influence in those areas. While the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa apex committee met in Peshawar and set up a probe committee under the Peshawar Division Commissioner to examine the security arrangements at Bacha Khan University on the day of the attack and identify elements responsible for any lapses or negligence, amongst 15 suspects picked up after the attack, five facilitators of the attack were presented before the media in the ISPR briefing. The Bacha Khan University incident once again points to the existential nightmare that terrorism has morphed into for Pakistan. While some prognoses that Pakistan is poised on the crossroads between prosperity and failure may be exaggerated, there is no denying the challenge. If proof were needed, the Geedar group of the TTP that claimed the Charsaddda attack has released a video showing its ‘Khalifa’ Umar Mansoor threatening more such attacks against schools. Coincidentally or otherwise, two incidents occurred on January 22 that served to underline the verity of the threat to our children. Two firing incidents near government girls’ schools in Tandlianwala and Faisalabad produced panic amongst students and anxious parents. Fortunately, no one was hurt in the incidents except for 10 students in Tandlianwala who were injured in the panic-driven stampede when the firing broke out. Such is the state of nervousness amongst students and parents in all schools all over the country in the wake of the Charsadda attack, which has reopened the wounds of the December 2014 Army Public School massacre in Peshawar. Mansoor’s video clearly states that the justification for targeting schools is that these institutions produce professionals and people of an anti-terrorist orientation. They are in fact the nurseries of rationality and resistance to the narrative of the terrorists. The threat does raise serious concerns about how to handle this new challenge, given that there are thousands of such institutions all over the country that should now be considered targets of the terrorists. Inevitably, it is not possible for the security authorities to guard each and every one of these institutions. Lessons can be learnt from the Charsadda attack and how it was contained. The security guards of the university, followed by the local police and later the army, prevented a bigger massacre by eliminating all four attackers after a fierce fight. This suggests that the way forward is to strengthen the internal security of educational institutions through recruitment and training and lay down standard operating procedures for any such contingency, including dedicated hot lines to the local police and military. If the educational institutions ask for enhanced funding for security, as a group of Vice Chancellors of public universities meeting in Charsadda has done, the government/s should bend their backs to ensure this demand is satisfied. Nothing less will suffice when the flower of our youth and our hope for the future of the country, its young people, are so directly and explicitly threatened. Appeals should also go out to the affluent amongst us to contribute to a fund for the purpose. Help can be acquired for ensuring the security of our nurseries of learning from the specialised units of the military and elite forces of the police. The threat must be met as a national duty by all sections of the state and society on a war footing before more young lives are snuffed out by these beasts.

Daily Times Editorial Jan 23, 2016

Post-Charsadda Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Raheel Sharif called Afghan President Ashraf Ghani in Davos (where the latter had met Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif), Afghan Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah and General John Campbell, commander of US forces in Afghanistan, the latter two in Kabul, to pass on information gleaned from the investigations into the attack on the Bacha Khan University (BKU) in Charsadda. The COAS shared with them the finding that the attack was controlled from a location in Afghanistan through an Afghan cell phone by a Tehreek-e-Taliban (TTP) operative. The attack has been claimed by Umar Mansoor of the banned TTP Geedar group, also responsible for the December 2014 Army Public School (APS) attack in Peshawar in which 150 students and teachers were massacred. A spokesman of the TTP, Mohammad Khorasani, had however issued a conflicting statement condemning the attack as being against sharia and warning that those misusing TTP’s name would be brought to justice. Whether this is a genuine disclaimer by the TTP or motivated by the backlash the attack on BKU is likely to evoke is not clear at this point. There is no word yet what President Ghani, Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah or General Campbell had to say in response to the COAS’s calls. The only word, and it is not encouraging, came from the Afghan interior ministry’s spokesman Sediq Seddiqi, who dismissed the claim that the attack emanated from a TTP ‘terror base’ inside Afghanistan, denied that there were any TTP sanctuaries within his country and in turn accused Pakistan of sheltering the Afghan Taliban. It is not clear whether the interior ministry’s spokesman was conveying the official position of the Afghan government. Even if he was not, the response is not surprising or unexpected. It merely reflects the mistrust and suspicion between the two neighbours accumulated over the decades the Afghan wars have raged. While Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Pervez Khattak has labelled the attack as inspired by India’s RAW intelligence agency, unnamed security officials have spoken to the media about the identities of two of the four attackers. One is from the Sararogha area of South Waziristan and another from Swat. The other two are under age and there is no record for them. This suggests that they either came from across the border or were underground within the country after their home bases in Swat and South Waziristan were cleared of terrorists in military offensives during the previous government’s tenure. While dozens of suspects are reported to have been picked up as the result of a combing operation in and around Charsadda mounted after the attack, four men have been detained from Shabqadar who hosted the four attackers one night before the assault. This revelation shines the spotlight on the modus operandi of the terrorists. It stands to reason that attackers need this kind of local support infrastructure in order to operate. This should be the focus of our intelligence agencies: find the support network and it may lead you to the actual perpetrators of such attacks, and may even help to pre-empt them. As has been in evidence numerous times after such terrorist atrocities, we are very quick to close the stable door after the horse has bolted. Suddenly government authorities have woken up to the need to bolster the security of educational institutions according to standard operating procedures (SOPs) worked out by the security authorities. A painful question remains: why was this not seen to after the APS attack? Why are educational institutions now being told their security arrangements must meet the SOPs or they would not be allowed to operate? What were these same authorities doing till now? Was this not part of the National Action Plan (NAP), which by now is so discredited that wags have dubbed it the National Inaction Plan? Given the complexity and inherent difficulty of safeguarding soft targets like educational institutions, it will not do to wait for the terrorists to hit before waking up to the imperatives of the situation. At the risk of repetition, we would once again argue for dedicated ownership of NAP under one umbrella with a shared data base if the critical pre-emptive side of NAP is to become a reality, the only path that feasibly can get to the terrorists before they get to us.

Daily Times Editorial Jan 22, 2016

Lessons not learnt The tragic attack on Bacha Khan University (BKU), Charsadda, on January 20 has resurrected memories of the Army Public School (APS), Peshawar, attack in December 2014, not only because another educational institution was hit in similar style, but also because the perpetrators are the same group of terrorists. Conflicting reports spoke of sometimes four, sometimes 8-10 attackers involved. After a military operation lasting several hours, the premises were declared cleared of any malign presence. Twenty one people were killed in the attack, most of them students, and one notable death of an assistant professor who fought back against the attackers with his own firearm. Dozens were injured. The similarities with the APS attack extend to the claim of responsibility by Umar Mansoor, the leader of the Geedar group of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and a former activist of the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi. Although a spokesman of the TTP disclaimed the attack, calling it a violation of Sharia, the confusion may be tactically deliberate or reflect the factionalised nature of the umbrella TTP. The timing too was significant. The BKU was commemorating the death anniversary of Bacha Khan, after whom the university is named, when it was struck. The message is clear. Bacha Khan’s non-violent inclusive politics is anathema to the fanatics, as is education per se. Two facts stand out. The distance of BKU from any big town (it is located outside Charsadda amidst a rural setting) delayed the response by the military and security forces, with special forces units travelling all the way from Peshawar. Had the security guards of BKU not initially resisted the attackers, the toll may have been even more horrendous. But even the deployment of 54 security guards in the university (a sprawling campus) proved insufficient to ward off or eliminate hardened terrorists armed to the teeth with sophisticated weapons and suicide vests. Fortunately, the attackers were eliminated before they could set off their vests. ISPR DG Lt-General Asim Bajwa weighed in at a press conference with revelations that the attackers had been identified, their phone calls traced to Afghanistan and two cell phones seized from them. That serves to highlight what we have been arguing in this space for long. The terrorism problem has been displaced to safe havens across the Afghan border or driven underground, from where the terrorists can strike at will with a surfeit of riches as far as targets are concerned. Afghanistan has asked for reciprocal cooperation in reply to Pakistan’s repeated requests for action against the TTP elements ensconced in the wild and poorly policed border area on the Afghan-Pakistan boundary. While Pakistan is pushing the Afghan Taliban towards the negotiation table with Kabul, a process fraught with difficulties and uncertainty, the safe havens on Afghan soil and ‘sleeper’ cells throughout Pakistan allow our home grown terrorists to strike at a time and place of their choosing. This brings into focus the National Action Plan (NAP), agreed with consensus by all political parties. Much criticism has now come the government’s way for not implementing the NAP properly. These sentiments echoed in parliament too. NAP remains in the twilight zone of not having an organisational structure suited to its challenges. Under the circumstances of seeming drift in its efficacious implementation, it answers to the description that success has many fathers, failure is an orphan. Since the federal interior minister seems a reluctant point man for NAP, the architecture of counter-terrorism, NAP’s main thrust after Operation Zarb-e-Azb, remains to be constructed. The National Counter Terrorism Authority remains hamstrung. In its absence, there is no central coordinating centre and shared data base to go after the terrorists throughout the country in a systematic way. Terrorists, particularly those prepared to die in their endeavours, are almost impossible to stop once they have embarked on their mission. The damage they inflict can at best be minimised (although even this minimum is painful). The only way to stop the terrorists is to pre-empt their plans by intelligence-led police operations that nip the evil in the bud. For that, the present NAP setup is wholly inadequate and therefore the government must inevitably bear the brunt of the criticism on its failures. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif must himself now step forward and reorganise the counter-terrorism campaign if he does not want his government snowed under the weight of expectation and the tragic failures so far of NAP.

Daily Times Editorial Jan 18, 2016

Mediatory role Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and COAS General Raheel Sharif embark on an attempted mediatory mission to Saudi Arabia (today) and Iran (Tuesday) to help defuse tensions between the two countries that have escalated to virtual breaking point in recent days. To recap, Saudi Arabia's execution of Shia cleric and critic of the Saudi regime Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr earlier this month infuriated Iran and Shias throughout the region. The execution was seen as a deliberate and cruel provocation as al-Nimr was considered a critic advocating peaceful struggle within Saudi Arabia for the rights of the Shia minority. It was also interpreted widely as Riyadh's riposte for the incremental rehabilitation of Iran from international pariah status to a full member of the global community. This turnaround has been made possible by the agreement between Iran and the world powers to halt its nuclear programme and restrict future nuclear activities to peaceful purposes under international supervision and monitoring. First and foremost, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is going to issue a clean chit to Tehran's adherence to the terms of the nuclear agreement. This will be followed by international sanctions imposed on Iran because of its alleged development of nuclear weapons being lifted, freeing Iran to return to international economic engagement. Although the sanctions have taken a toll of the 80 million populace of Iran and western multinational companies are gearing up to exploit the pent up demand of the deprived Iranian market, the most dramatic impact is likely to be felt in the international oil market. Tehran is naturally anxious to re-enter the global oil market as soon as possible and ship as much oil as possible, despite the supply glut that has driven the price of oil below 30 dollars a barrel. Surplus oil being pumped is around 1.5 million barrels a day. If Tehran's intent to increase its exports by 500,000 barrels a day within weeks and another 500,000 barrels a day within a year is realised, the fate of international oil prices is clear. Already, the lowest price of oil in decades points to the market's anticipation of the glut increasing due to Tehran's return to the market. The present level of oversupply has exhausted global storage space. Despite this, OPEC's inability to arrive at a consensus cut back of production has left the market a victim of the anarchy accompanying every producer's unwillingness to take the long view and agree production cuts that would help stabilise falling oil prices. For countries like Saudi Arabia and its Gulf Arab allies, a cut back would threaten their ability to maintain the lifestyle of their peoples, based on the riches derived from a single product economy. However, the present course too could arrive at the same destination because of the downward spiral of oil prices. Instability and chaos therefore loom over the horizon for these monarchies whose dependence on largesse for their people to retain their grip on power could unravel. The mission the prime minister and COAS have embarked upon seems difficult (some would say impossible) but necessary. Pakistan has of late (the Yemen intervention request) and particularly in this instance of Saudi Arabia's concerted drive to get Pakistan and its military capabilities aligned against Iran, adopted exemplary neutrality. This is in the broader interests of the protagonists, the region and the world. More particularly, it is in Pakistan's own interest to steer clear of a manifestly sectarian regional quagmire that would have blowback effects at home. Pakistan cannot allow the opening provided by Iranian international rehabilitation and the lifting of sanctions to go abegging. The gas pipeline from Iran stands completed up to the border on the Iranian side. The lifting of sanctions will allow its completion on our side and the flow of critically needed gas to begin. In addition, given Pakistan's long contiguous border with Iran, the potential for trade enhancement, road and rail linkages and mutual investment remains to be explored. Pakistan has rightly kept its nose out of the sectarian stink in the region fuelled by Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi ambitions. Now if it can offer the olive branch to both Riyadh and Tehran and persuade them to pull back from the brink of a very dangerous and potentially inflammatory confrontation, it will earn plaudits near and far and make a signal contribution to peace and stability in the region. We can only wish our leadership the best of luck in a plucky but difficult endeavour.