Daily Times Editorial May 12, 2011

Pakistan-US cooperation

US State department spokesman Mark Toner says the US administration is making progress in obtaining information from Pakistan on Osama bin Laden. Perhaps as part of such ‘progress’, there are indications the US may be permitted to interrogate Osama’s three widows who are in Pakistani custody. Pakistan’s foreign office says no formal request for access to Osama’s family has so far been received, but Interior Minister Rehman Malik has told CNN that such access would be granted. It goes without saying that the statement ascribed to one of the widows that Osama spent the last five years holed up in the house in Abbottabad has given rise to firmer suspicions all round that he must have had a support network to be able to survive in self-imposed ‘prison’. Also, the widows could be a rich source for details about where Osama bin Laden was after he escaped the Tora Bora offensive and how the journey and set-up in Abbottabad came into existence, how it was managed, his contacts with the outside world, etc.
Al Qaeda has issued a threat to all Americans that while their President Obama may be safe behind a wall of security, the American people are not, and should expect retaliation for the killing of Osama. Bin Laden’s family has objected to the manner in which his body was disposed of into the sea, considering it an insult to Islam and the rights of the family to receive and bury the head of the family. These sentiments and the threats from al Qaeda are hardly unexpected. The world at large would have to remain vigilant against any such manifestations.
Meanwhile British tabloid The Sun has published a report that an operation to find Mulla Omar, the leader of the Afghan Taliban, is about to be launched in Quetta, since the ‘Quetta Shura’ of the insurgents is still based in that provincial capital. The report cannot be taken seriously because even if the Quetta Shura is still around, it is very unlikely to be in the place that would give it away. Given Musharraf’s dual policy of attacking al Qaeda and protecting the Afghan Taliban after 9/11, a policy that continues to this day long after Musharraf’s departure, it is highly likely that our ubiquitous intelligence agencies already know where Mulla Omar is, and may even be protecting him. The Quetta operation story therefore appears to be a red herring. Things may have got bad between the US and Pakistan of late, but there is no evidence that the policy of using the Afghan Taliban as proxies (albeit difficult ones to control) for gaining so-called strategic depth in Afghanistan has been abandoned. Therefore, despite the harsher US tone that Pakistan must either deal with elements that are killing US and NATO troops in Afghanistan itself, or face the possibility of more raids like the one in Abbottabad against high profile targets, Mulla Omar is not about to be paraded before the cameras. Pakistan’s threat to retaliate against any such future incursions sounds hollow and unconvincing.
Whichever way the current friction between Washington and Islamabad is eventually ironed out, it is time to reflect seriously on the pros and cons of the jihad enterprise the Pakistani state has been peddling for the last four decades. Arguably, in the light of the happenings in Abbottabad, the policy of duality and ambiguity may have run its course and be poised, if it is persisted with, to offer more pain than gain. Pakistan’s interests would be best served by remaining an ally of the US against terrorism, while revisiting and realigning its stance on the Afghan Taliban to accord with the emerging scenario in Afghanistan, the region, and in the troubled relationship with the sole superpower.