Daily Times Editorial May 31, 2013

Drone strike Just one week after US President Barack Obama reiterated Washington’s policy on drone strikes with more restrictive use against unambiguously identified targets and days before the new elected governments take office, a drone stroke has killed the Tehreek-e-Taliban’s (TTP’s) number two, Waliur Rehman. Along with the commander, five others, including two senior commanders of the TTP and two Uzbek militants were also said to have been killed and two others injured. The strike hit a house in Chashma village near Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan. Waliur Rehman had a $ 5 million bounty on his head announced by Washington, which accused him of coordinating attacks against US/NATO forces in Afghanistan. When the news broke on Wednesday, the TTP at first refused to confirm the development. But on Thursday, they not only confirmed the death of their commander, they also announced ‘breaking off’ talks with the government. It should be noted that these ‘talks’ so far only exist in the statements of intent of the incoming governments at the Centre and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf’s (PTI’s) in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. If the TTP means what it says, and there is no reason to doubt their word, the strategy of a negotiated peace with the militants may not take off. Waliur Rehman was the principal TTP commander in charge of South Waziristan, his home Agency. In North Waziristan, a hotbed of local and foreign jihadis, the government’s writ is virtually non-existent. The authorities have to rely on tribal contacts to garner any information about the area. Interestingly, while the US has stayed mum and is yet to acknowledge the drone strike (a practice they have followed religiously in all but the rarest of cases, and that too after a delay), the Pakistan Foreign Office has reiterated its ‘concern’ at the strike. The language of the Foreign Office’s condemnation is being considered by some analysts as milder than in the past. Whether this restraint emanates from considerations of Pakistan being poised on the cusp of new dispensations taking charge within days and the concomitant uncertainty about how to respond, or secret delight at the elimination of one of the most redoubtable of the TTP’s commanders, is not known. Not unsurprisingly, the PTI has been quick off the mark to unreservedly condemn the attack as a violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty. Verbal condemnations or expressions of concern notwithstanding, the strike indicates that Washington is not about to give up on drones any time soon, despite the new, more restrictive guidelines outlined by US President Obama. Those waxing indignant or apoplectic on this latest drone shrike need to be interrogated on their stance on the thousands of jihadis and foreign fighters concentrated on Pakistani soil for decades, from where they launch attacks on Afghanistan and within Pakistan. The security establishment has failed to act effectively against this concentration of malign forces, amongst whom are foreign jihadis who have violated our sovereignty for decades. Those condemning the drone strikes should see their own visage in the mirror of first using jihadis for projection of power and then failing to deal with the internal threat they pose to Pakistan. The case of Waliur Rehman is an illustration of the nexus between the Afghan and Pakistani jihadis, in which he stood accused of carrying out attacks in both Pakistan and Afghanistan. Objectively, therefore, there was a convergence of interests between Washington and Islamabad in his elimination, verbal protests not withstanding. This ambiguity lies at the heart of the Pakistani establishment’s approach to the question of drone shrikes. Former president Musharraf may have gone too far for the comfort of some in offering the US virtual carte blanche for such attacks (amidst allegations of the drone programmme initially enjoying the use of Shamsi airbase in Balochistan), but even after his departure and during the tenure of the outgoing government, the military establishment and all other stakeholders continued with the policy of ambiguity on drone strikes, with reports regularly speaking of the dichotomy between Islamabad’s public posture of condemnation and private acquiescence so long as civilian casualties were kept to a minimum. The question now arises, after the TTP’s rejection of the notion of peace talks following the death of Waliur Rehman, what remains except tatters of the PML-N’s and PTI’s stated policy of peace through negotiations with the terrorists?