Promoters of violence in Karachi

By Sajjad Shaukat

Violence continues unabated in the provincial capital of Karachi, raising the death toll to more than 250 during the last 40 days. Multiple subversive events such as targetted killings, intense exchange of fire between two ethnic groups, emblazing the houses, shops, vehicles and kidnappings, etc. keep on going periodically.Reports indicate that Pukhtuns led by Awami National Party (ANP) and Urdu-speaking people led by the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) are fighting against each others. On July 26 this year, six people including activists of Sindh People’s Youth Organisation (SPYO) and those of the MQM were also killed. Recently, accusations and counter-accusations have continued between the leaders of the MQM and those of the ANP in particular and MQM and Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) in general. Before the new reconciliation, some MQM leaders held the rulers of the PPP in Sindh and at center responsible for fuelling ethnic riots in Karachi. But on August 3, Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani dispelled the impression that government wanted to create differences among various segments

  A recent report of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan said that 1,138 people have been killed in Karachi in the first half of 2011, with 490 victims of political, ethnic and sectarian violence.In the last few years, aside from gang warfare and criminals’ activities, violent riots and targetted killings have seen a steady increase with some high profile deaths. Each murder sees a retaliatory attack or similar killing. Without naming US, India and Israel, on May 1, 2009, Prime Minister Gilani revealed that he sees “foreign hands” behind Karachi violence.More than one million illegal small and heavy weapons contribute to the violence in Karachi. In this regard, on July 18, 2011, Interior Minister Rehman Malik openly stated that the miscreants were using Israel-made weapons for fomenting unrest in Karachi. He added, “Over 200 persons have been arrested…Israeli-made weapons including AK-45 rifles have been recovered from them.” He also disclosed the involvement of foreign hands behind Karachi violence.Police investigations have indicated that it was also observed that the culprits who disturbed law and order situation in Karachi were not permanent residents of the city. On July 31, Senior Superintendent of Police Chaudhry Aslam Khan told the media that the Crime Investigation Department of Sindh Police arrested four terrorists of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan from Sohrab Goth area of the city..

The police seized weapons, suicide jackets, explosives and hand grenades from their custody. In the past too, a number of militants along with huge cache of arms and ammunition, made of US, India and Israel, have been caught.However, we cannot see the incidents of violence in Karachi in isolation. In this respect, external elements like American CIA, Indian secret agency RAW and Israeli Mossad which have been supporting separatism in Balochistan including subversive acts in the province and other parts of Pakistan, have rapidly established their collective network in Pakistan. They are in collusion to destabilise Pakistan for their common strategic interests—to ‘denuclearise’ the country after weakening it.These foreign agencies have recruited Pakistani nationals who are vulnerable and can work on their payroll, giving them high financial incentives to work for them. They have recruited smugglers, employees of the security companies, experts of the psychological warfare, scholars and journalists in order to fulfill anti-Pakistan designs of America, India and Israel. Political and defence analysts agree that terrorists who commit acts of sabotage in Karachi, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and FATA are receiving training in terrorist camps, situated in India. In Karachi, owing to political instability, poverty and unemployment, the jobless youth fall into the hands of criminals who are supported by the external elements for conducting targeted killings and other violent acts. These internal culprits, foreign insurgents who are backed by the RAW, have joined the rank and file of the Taliban militants and those of the TTP. 

They have also got the membership of MQM, ANP and PPP. Besides attaking the offices of the rival political parties, these are real culprits who target the Pukhtuns, Urdu-speaking people and even the persons, belonging to the interior Sindh. CIA, RAW and Mossad manipulate the ethnic division of Karachi through these paid-agents, while especially leaders of ANP and MQM accuse each other for murdering the people of their-related ethnic communities. Drastic implications of the situation cannot be grasped by the general masses and even the political leaders at large, who abruptly change their opinion without reason. Hence, they become easy prey to the internal exploiters, unintentionally benefiting the external conspirators who want to weaken Pakistan by creating a rift particularly between the political groups, divided on ethnic and linguistic lines.It is of particular attention that Karachi is Pakistan’s financial hub and the largest commercial market, collecting 70 per cent of the country’s tax revenue. It is home to the State Bank and is the largest seaport. So another aim of the already mentioned foreign hands is to cripple the economy of the city as Karachi is continually brought to a halt with shut-down strikes—-many shopkeepers remain reluctant to open their shops due to intermittent violence. Besides, foreign agents misguide the disgruntled elements that national institutions are not made to develop other areas of Pakistan and policies formulated at Islamabad are not congenial to other provinces except Punjab.As a matter of fact, CIA, RAW and Mossad have succeeded in creating and exploiting the ethnic and linguistic division in Karachi.

Now the situation has so deteriorated that leaders of ANP and MQM Chief Altaf Hussain have requested to Pak Army and rangers for intervention in order to save the lives of people.Today Pakistan stands at the crossroads of its destiny, facing internal and external threats to the national security of the country. Besides facing multi-faceted economic crises such as high prices, load shedding, unemployment etc., Pakistan and its security forces are coping with suicide attacks, bomb blasts, sectarian violence and target-killings including sporadic battles with the militants in the tribal areas. While violence in Karachi has become the focus of attention, therefore, on August 3, all the lawmakers in the National Assembly have made passionate appeals for finding out a solution to the deteriorated situation in Karachi.Nevertheless, the pressure is mounting on the government to take some kind of action. In this context, first of all a search operation should be conducted in phases with an aim to cut off the supply chain of illegal weapons in the city and root out culprits from the most affected areas as sources also suggest that a programme of de-weaponization is essential to curb violence in Karachi. Second, the government should be fully determined to take stern action against the miscreants and outlaws who want to dirupt the peace of the city. It has also been ensured by Rehman Malik, but must be implemented immediately. Third, our political parties need to behave with far greater responsibility. In this respect, our national, provincial and regional leaders must stop manipulating various problems and disparities at the cost of the country, which have hindered the path of national unity. Fourth, Pakistan’s media, particularly TV channels can play a key role. First of all the owners of these channels should detect some anchors who are working on the payroll of foreign enemies. Then they must terminate their services. Notably, our media should give a matching response to malicious propaganda of the US-led some western countries including India and Israel which are leaving no stone unturned in distorting the image of Pakistan, its army and ISI. As unlike the printed media, electronic media attract more viewers, so our TV commentators must point out the collective collusion of CIA, RAW and Mossad in relation to their support to subversive acts inside our country and especially in Karachi.No doubt, precarious situation of Karachi demands sacrifices of individual selfish interests——belonging to any ethnic group or province. Various stakeholders of Karachi require a strong sense of unity and by creating the same among the general public, politicians and religious leaders; they must cope with the foreign enemies who are the real promoters of violence in Karachi.

sajjad_logic@yahoo.com

China's first aircraft carrier sails into new era

China's first aircraft carrier docked at a port in Dalian, Liaoning Province on Friday. Photo: CFP

China's first aircraft carrier left a shipyard in northeastern Dalian Wednesday for its first trial journey.
Tugboats steered the vessel out of the shipyard at about 6 am Wednesday, a source close to the trial run told the Global Times. A number of service ships accompanied the carrier on her maiden voyage.
The carrier took to sea without a naval code as it has not yet entered service, the source said. Some people in Dalian set off firecrackers to mark the event.
The Liaoning Provincial Maritime Safety Administration published a notice restricting navigation off the Dalian coast and in an area 13.25 nautical miles (24.54 kilometers) wide and 22 nautical miles long in the northern Yellow Sea and Liaodong Bay.
The restriction took effect Wednesday and last through Sunday, but there is no information available on how long the trial itself will last.
Military sources told the Xinhua News Agency that the trial is in line with the carrier's refitting schedule and will not last long. Refitting work will continue after the vessel returns to port.
Li Jie, an expert with the Naval Research Institute at the People's Liberation Army Navy, told the Global Times that the maiden trial is likely to involve tests of its power, weapons and control systems.
When contacted by the Global Times, the Ministry of Defense refused to elaborate on the first day of the trial, but said it would release more information in the following days.
The maiden voyage had long been expected. Preparations for the trial were visible from many points around Dalian and had been regularly photographed and documented online by military enthusiasts.
China officially acknowledged the refurbishing project of the aircraft carrier only last month, saying the vessel will be used as a platform for "research, experiments and training" and would take a long time to become fully operational.
Peng Guangqian, a military strategist, told the Global Times that the test trial is significant for China's military development, but people should not attach too much significance to it.
"It is a big thing for China's military, but aircraft carriers are nothing new in the world, and the current one, built mainly for training, will not have a major strategic impact on the global stage," Peng said.
"China's 'starter carrier' is of very limited military utility, and will primarily serve to confer prestige on a rising great power, help the military master basic procedures, and to project a bit of power," Reuters quoted Andrew Erickson, an associate professor in the US Naval War College's Strategic Research Department, as saying.
"The carrier's maiden voyage appears to be a show cruise conducted close to home to both make the vessel a bit less accessible to prying eyes and also keep it near its home port if any mechanical problems materialize," Erickson said.
However, Rick Fisher, a US expert on the Chinese military, told AFP that Beijing was allowing reports and scant online images of the vessel to "propel anxieties" while saying very little about its aircraft carrier project and naval development.
"This 'psy-war' campaign has everything to do with China's multiple ongoing maritime territory disputes," said Fisher of the US-based International Assessment and Strategy Center.
Gu Guoliang, a researcher with the America Study Center of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times that such claims distorted China's defense development.
"The US has never stopped developing high-tech weapons. Some countries in the Asia-Pacific region are also building or are trying to acquire aircraft carriers. I don't see any reason why China cannot have one," Gu said.
Of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, China is the only one without an operational carrier.
In Asia, Thailand has one carrier, and India is building its own. Australia is also trying to acquire two multi-purpose carriers, Reuters reported.
Analysts estimate it will be four decades before China can begin to compete with even one of Washington's 11 monster-sized Nimitz-class carriers, several of which are constantly traveling round the globe protecting US interests, the Daily Telegraph reported.
Commodore Miguel Jose Rodriguez, a spokesperson of the Philippine military, told the Manila-based Daily Inquirer newspaper that China's first carrier is "part of the confidence-building measures among navies around the world."
"They are acquiring these and there is no cause for alarm," Rodriguez said, adding that territorial disputes are best resolved at the negotiating table.

(Global Times)

Washington’s sinister Balochistan strategy

By Ghulam Asghar Khan


Of late, the US ambassadors in Islamabad, one after the other, have shown some suspicious concerns over the developments in Balochistan.In his last Thursday visit to Quetta, the present incumbent Cameron Munter tried to pressurize the provincial government to facilitate the opening of US consulate office in the province. His predecessor in Islamabad Anne Patterson had also visited on a similar mission to show how important Balochistan was to the United States. These persistent moves to establish a strong foothold in Balochistan are fraught with immense danger, not because Washington has any love lost for the local populace, but a move forward for the creation of a “Greater Balochistan” that has long been a dream of US strategists. This sinister move has so far been resisted and opposed by Pakistani foreign office and intelligence agencies. How long the frail rulers in Islamabad could hold the ground against the US pressure? Well, that’s a “billion dollar” question. Can Islamabad contain Washington’s role inside Balochistan within the circumscription of Pakistan’s constitution and its sovereignty and confining it to guarantees under the International Law?The CIA has long been preparing a sordid plan to recognise Balochistan as an independent state by assigning a separate checklist to Balochistan against the “Country of Citizenship” column of “Immigration Form” for non-US nationals. This was one step forward in several measures taken by the US administration to turn into reality the designs for the so-called free Balochistan. This plan had been highlighted in the article “blood borders” written by a US military officer a couple of years back. Pakistani journalist Saleem Shezad had exposed the suspicious underground activities of the CIA all over the country for which he had to pay a very heavy price. He was kidnapped and murdered by CIA sponsored mercenaries in Pakistan without leaving any trail.

 Washington has all along been in favour of creating a “Greater Balochistan” that would integrate the Baloch areas of Pakistan with those of Iran and possibly the southern tip of Afghanistan that would ultimately lead to process of political fracturing in both Iran and Pakistan. Although, rulers in Pakistan are posing no threat to US hegemonic transgressions in the region, Iran is the bete noire that poses a big threat to the US and Israel. Tehran is singled out because it defies Washington. The past decade has been witness to unending and unremitting clash between Iran and the West over Tehran’s nuclear programme. The West has constantly accused Iran of trying to build up its nuclear arsenal, which Tehran has constantly been denying on solid grounds.In the June 2006 issue of the Armed Forces Journal, Lt. Colonel Ralph Peters suggested in no uncertain terms that Pakistan should be broken up, leading to the formation of Greater Balochistan or Free Balochistan that would incorporate the Pakistani and Iranian Baloch provinces into a single political entity. Col. Peters went a step forward and suggested the incorporation of Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province (NWFP), presently Khyber Pakhtunkhawa, should be incorporated into Afghanistan, because of its linguistic and ethnic affinity. This proposed fragmentation that broadly reflects US foreign policy, would reduce Pakistan to approximately 5o% of its present size, and would also loose a large part of its coastline on the Arabian Sea.Lt. Colonel Peters was last posted, before his retirement, to the office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for intelligence, within the US Defence Department and had been one of Pentagon’s foremost authors with numerous essays on strategy for military journals and American foreign policy. There are plausible indications that the Baloch insurgency is being supported and abetted by Britain and the US. In the current geopolitical context, the separatist movement is in the process of being hijacked by foreign powers.In June 2006, Pakistan’s Senate Committee on Defence accused British Intelligence network over abetting the insurgency in Balochistan, and to accomplish the mission they have the candid support of the CIA and Israel’s Mossad. Behind all these nefarious moves the US mission is to topple Tehran’s sovereign government to facilitate Tel Aviv’s supremacy in the Muslim world.

The hoax of Iranian nuclear programme has deliberately been made so controversial although it has nothing to do with nuclear non-proliferation, anymore than the invasion of Iraq over the possession of WMDs and links with al-Qaeda. Isn’t it a fact that Washington used to support Tehran’s nuclear programme when the country was being ruled by the Shah? It’s a strange anomaly that while Tehran is signatory to the Non-proliferation Treaty, there are as many as four countries that are not signatories to the NPT (including Israel), but nobody in the international community pressurise them to halt their nuclear programme and never the IAEA or Washington have investigated their nuclear arsenals. The threats against Iran persist despite the fact that America’s own intelligence agencies assessed in a 2007 that Tehran had no active nuclear weapons programme. In an updated 2011 report published in the New Yorker, the NIE has reiterated that judgement.Despite facts to the contrary, Iran has been singled out because it defies Washington. Israel is the only country in the region that actually possesses nuclear weapons. Unlike Iran, it is not a signatory to the NPT. The jaundiced western media constantly trumpets that Tehran’s nuclear weapons pursuit is a threat to the region as it would spark nuclear arms race in the Middle East. But, Tel Aviv’s big nuclear arsenal, for some inexplicable reason, does not spark a nuclear arms race.The UN Charter explicitly forbids member nations, which includes both the US and Israel, from not only the use of force, but threatening the use of force in international relations. There are only circumstances under which a resort to the use of force is considered legitimate under international law. The first is the use of armed force in self-defence against an armed attack.

The second is if there is explicit authorisation for the use of force under an unequivocal mandate from the UN Security Council (UNSC). So, every time the US or the Israeli government threatens Iran with a military attack against its nuclear programme, it would be the violation of the UN Charter.Opening a US Consulate office in Quetta would amount to providing safe haven to the CIA and its mercenary groups to extend their sabotage activities to Iran from the Pakistani soil. It is a serious threat not be taken lightly by Islamabad. It might just be posturing by the US with Israel being at the back of this serious deception. Both nations have repeatedly shown a willingness to reject diplomacy and use military force to pursue their respective policies. Keeping aside the question of illegality and morality, there are plenty of reasons for the US and Israel not to launch Iraq and Afghanistan like invasions on Iran, but to use Balochistan as a bastion to bring instability in Iran through their secret commandos. And there is no shortage of such mercenaries in the CIA. Right now, US secret commandos are carrying out raids in 70 countries. By the end of the year, the number would probably be close to 120.

gasghar20@gmail.com

(Frontier Post)

Unrest Hits England

A wave of violence and looting that across London spread to three other major cities of the country on Tuesday, as authorities struggled to contain the country's worst unrest since racial riots set the capital ablaze in 1980s.
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The seemingly impossible began when a police arrest went horribly wrong some five days ago. Although clouded in uncertainty and speculation, the police shot dead a coloured man, Mark Duggan, last Thursday in Tottenham, north London, for reasons that could range from his being a drug dealer to resisting arrest or to firing at the police after which they shot back. In the wake of this one man’s death, it really does seem as though London is burning. What began as a ‘peaceful’ protest by some 300 people at the Tottenham police station has, since then, transformed into an avalanche of rage, looting and violence. The police and government officials are calling these rioters nothing more than “anarchic” or “criminal” elements bent upon taking advantage of a disturbed situation. The government of the Conservatives-Liberal Democrats seems to smugly be dismissing these ‘thugs’ who are storming the streets, calling the protests mere acts of criminality. If this is so, then they are criminals — but against a system that has marginalised them and left them bereft of hope for the future.

Ever since Prime Minister David Cameron’s Conservative-Liberal Democratic coalition came to power, it has slashed social and welfare funding. In the past couple of years, unemployment has surged, resulting in an unprecedented increase in disenfranchised youngsters without jobs or hopes of getting one. Couple this with the global recession and you have a recipe for disaster — one that seems to have exploded in the faces of the British ruling class. Unemployment in the UK stands at 2.45 million today; this is not ‘criminality’ or madness but a response to the increasingly despondent economic and social situation of so many young people who have no stake in the future opportunities of their country. Protests that started off in Tottenham have spread like wildfire to Croydon, Ealing, central London and now to Birmingham, Liverpool, Ilford and other cities. While it may be easy to dismiss the rioters as nothing more than ‘yobs’ stealing all they can get in this disturbance, there is definitely more at play than meets the eye.

In what can only be termed as Orwellian by its very nature, London boasts one CCTV camera for every 14 people. With precautions and monitoring systems such as these in place, with the police shooting dead a man and then handling the aftermath poorly, and baton-wielding riot police marching out to counter the swelling discontent, does it not seem as though the UK now carries all the markers of a rising police state? It seems to be this rage against the machine that is giving rise to the anarchy we see taking over the streets of London and other British cities. The frustration and anger that is out in full force today has been seething under the surface for a while and has leapt forth now spontaneously and vigorously. Eerily similar to the events in Tahrir Square, these riots have also used online social forums to organise the mass protests in guerrilla fashion.

One cannot help but use this opportunity to remind the complacent ruling elite in Pakistan that if such mass uprisings can occur in a place as well-guarded and safe as the UK, what is to stop them from happening here where despair, anger and misery are at boiling point? The youth in Pakistan are at tipping point and can ignite the flames of discontent at a moment’s notice. If the British ruling class can have its nonchalance punctured in such an emphatic manner, imagine what could happen here where the arrogance and indifference of this corruption-riddled ruling elite knows no bounds. It is time for our rulers to wake up lest the fires of anarchy lick too close for comfort.

What a Cruel Joke

If ever there was a worldwide competition for political gimmickry, Pakistan would win hands down. The amount of political buffoonery in this country has reached a point where you never know which decision/act/incident qualifies as the biggest filly of all. The decision of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) to restore the local government system of 2001 in Karachi and Hyderabad in order to appease its on-again/off-aggain coalition partner, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), is one such example of how our political parties have no qualms about making a laughingestock of this country. The MQM's blackmaling tactics know no bounds but it is not the MQM's perambulations that concern us today, it is PPP''s ineplicable decision making that is worrisome for it is the PPP that is the leading party in the ruling coalition.
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What kind of a joke is the government’s this somersault in Sindh? The people stand completely flummoxed. Not that the people were any duped when the government rolled up the local government system and reincarnated the discarded commissioner mechanism in its place in the province of Sindh with one stroke. They read it, and not so incorrectly, as a politically motivated move, primarily to clip the wings of an increasingly wayward MQM and cut it down to size. The reversal of that move now is again popularly being seen as sheer politics. None on the street was impressed by the reasons trotted out by the government trumpeters when it made the first move. None will lend an ear to what they dish out now to justify its reversion in such a short span of time. It is the expediency, not any imperatives of good governance or the people’s cause, that underlines both the moves. When the government first struck, the ruling clan thought that the estrangement of the MQM had afforded it the right opportunity to garner the political gains it had been looking for in Karachi and wrench out the port city from MQM’s stranglehold. But when the MQM struck back with its time-tested method of bullying and blackmail and unleashed its strong-arms on the beleaguered city to engulf it with violence and bloodletting, the clan developed cold feet, caved in and moved in quickly to appease the troublesome party. In a midnight action, it decreed exemption of the port city from the restored commissioner system. But as this exemption drew a severe reaction from its ANP constituent as well as the Sindhi nationalists, the clan has eaten crow, rolled back yet again the commissioner system and reinstalled the old local government system in the entire province.With this, the clan may have splattered the egg all over its face. But with its foolish moves and the obscene haste in making those moves without first taking all pros and cons into account, it has unnecessarily thrown the province neatly in a pickle. As if the troubles in the beleaguered port city were not enough of it, it has stirred a hornet’s nest in the rest of the province where the nationalists and its political opponents are now out to make hay of its stupidity for their own ends. Strike calls are already going out in protest against its moves. And in all probability, that would not be the end of it. More troubles could be expected. A troublesome problem has thus been divisively created where existed none, to the province’s utter grief.More grievously, it is a cruel joke that the ruling clan has played on the residents of the port city as well as the people of the country. Both are craving impatiently for peace and tranquility in this life-giving economic hub of the nation. And as the woeful events of these times have brought out poignantly, most of the violence and bloodletting in Karachi is rooted deeply in the city’s politics. At war are various political parties, including the ruling clan’s constituents, as also confessional and religious outfits for capturing the city’s hegemony. And they almost all have the links with the underworld to back up their fight for the battle for Karachi. It is the dismantling of their fighting arms and the snapping of their ties with criminal gangs and mafias that have to come uppermost, not the appeasement of any political party or group.But the clan’s idiotic moves unmistakably suggest that it is the political expediencies, not the city’s peace and its people’s wellbeing, that are its overriding considerations. Those may perhaps benefit it, though only transiently. But the losers, for the present, are yet again the peace-loving innocent residents of Karachi and their compatriots at large, who see no end in sight to the long dark night of bloodshed enveloping the beleaguered city. And if a particular party may now be smiling, laughing into splits surely must be the underworld for the heydays it sees ahead. What a cruel joke with a hapless nation is this!

Who started London riots?

Police battled to restore order Sunday as rioters went on the rempage in north London, torching vehicles and buildings amid widespread looting after the fatal shooting by police of a local man. Eight police officers were injured in the violence and taken to hospital. At least one has a head injury. The mayhem, which broke out in Tottenham just before sunset Saturday, followed a protest over the death of a 29-year old man during an apparent exchange of gunfire with police.
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Firefights survey the burnt-out shell of a carpet showroom on High Road in Tottenham, north London on Sunday

 

Lootings and arsons were reported in Brixton in the south of London on Monday night after widespread unrest in the northern areas of Tottenham and Enfield.

Police say riots in Brixton were started by youth gangs who looted and torched a number of retail stores. The looters attacked police officers and vandalized police cars in other areas of London. About 50 teenagers smashed shops at Oxford Circus in downtown London. The looters smashed everything on their way without making any demands.

Police said 26 of its officers were hurt and three members of the public needed treatment following the violence. A total of 55 arrests were made after Saturday’s riots. Scotland Yard Commander Christine Jones described the situation as “challenging with small pockets of violence, looting and disorder breaking out in a number of boroughs”. Police launched a major probe into the weekend’s violence with the participation of Scotland Yard experts who investigate murders and other serious offences.

Riots in London began after several hundred people gathered by a police station in London on Saturday to protest against the death of a 29-year-old man, Mark Duggan, who was shot by police as he resisted a pre-planned arrest on August 4th . Police suspect Duggan of being linked to criminal groups. Given the explosive situation in London, experts express doubts that British special services and police will be able to guarantee security in a city which is hosting the Summer Olympic Games in 2012.

The Guardian and The Times write that the recent outbreak of violence is a result of police losing credibility with the public and that it calls for law enforcement to revise and upgrade its methods.

Apparently, there is more to it than just police work. London, which is full of migrant workers, is gripped by social problems. Tottenham is one of London’s poorest neighborhoods, with the highest level of unemployment and a fairly high crime rate. Young people in this neighborhood have few options to receive education. 90% of those who took part in Tottenham riots were dark-skinned migrants from former British colonies.

The recent riots testify to the failure of the British government’s social and migration policies in recent years. Prime Minister David Cameron said in February that the so-called “multiculturalism” policy in the UK has suffered a fiasco because millions of migrants, mostly from Islamic countries, had failed to integrate into the British society. Mr.Cameron had this to say as he addressed the Munich Conference on Security:

"We have failed to provide a vision of society to which they feel they want to belong. We have even tolerated these segregated communities behaving in ways that run counter to our values. So when a white person holds objectionable views – racism, for example – we rightly condemn them. But when equally unacceptable views or practices have come from someone who isn't white, we've been too cautious, frankly even fearful, to stand up to them."

David Cameron underscored that Islam and Islamic extremism stood separately. While no one will question that, it’s clear that the British society is facing an inter-ethnic crisis and that the authorities have to take effective measures to resolve it. Otherwise, the recent riots will look insignificant compared to an inter-ethnic and inter-religious crisis that might break out on a national scale.

US suffered highest casualties in Afghanistan

American forces in their nearly decade-long war in Afghanistan suffered casualities in a single day on Saturday when a Chinook transport helicopter was shot down by Taliban killing 30 Americans and 8 Afghans. The helicopter was on a night-raid mission in the Tangi Valley of Wardak Province, to the west of Kabul, as the American Commandos carry out such raids regularly to kill high ranking Taliban. It was most likely brought down by a rocket-propelled grenade after an assault on a Taliban compound in the village of Jaw-e-Mekh Zareen in the Vailley.
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Chinook transport helicopter was shot down by Taliban

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack, and they could hardly have found a more valuable target as 22 of the dead were Navy Seal commandos, including members of Seal Team 6. Other commandos from that team conducted the raid in Abbottabad, that killed Bin Laden in May. The American officials however said that those who were killed Saturday were not involved in the Pakistan mission. The attack came during a surge of violence that has accompanied the beginning of a drawdown of American and NATO troops, and it showed how deeply entrenched the insurgency remains even far from its main strongholds in southern Afghanistan and along the Afghan-Pakistani border in the east. With the latest killings, one expects that there would be more pressure on President Obama to expedite withdrawal from Afghanistan. The sooner the foreign forces are withdrawn the better because they have been admitting that they cannot defeat Taliban and the option left for them is to find an honourable way out. It would be advisable for the Americans to hold open and direct negotiations with the Taliban for lasting peace in the war torn country otherwise we warn that Afghanistan would once again experience the situation that emerged after the withdrawal of Soviet Union.

The downing of a US helicopter in which 38 people, including 30 American Special Operations troops, were killed is an indication that Taliban are gaining strength as the US and NATO troops continue gradual withdrawal from Afghanistan. The development is significant since it will considerably weaken the US and Afghan forces psychologically.

The incident shows that Taliban possess some accurate surface-to-air missiles. So far, nobody knows the type of missiles that was used. However, it could be Stinger missiles, which were supplied to the Mujahideen during the first Afghan Jihad against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The Stingers changed the complexion of the war as they crippled the Red Army and subsequently forced the Soviet to withdraw their forces from Afghanistan. According to the public US administration reports, the CIA managed to buy-back the Stingers from the black market by paying $ 100,000 per piece.

However, there are conflicting reports on the CIA claim. Independent military sources believe that Taliban possess at least 100 shoulder-fired Stingers, and they use them when they are hundred percent sure that they would down the fighter planes. Stingers have the deadliest record against fighting aircraft of any weapon since World War II. However, the limitation of Stinger is that they are effective against low-flying airliners. Most probably, this is the reason behind selective using of Stingers during a decade long war.

According to a second theory, Taliban acquired missiles similar to Stingers. Surface-to-air missiles similar to Stingers are made in Britain and Russia. The Russian made SAM-16, which contains Stinger technology. The Russian stole the technology from Greece in 1980s. Russian missiles can be purchased in international arms markets.

The Russian mafia is reportedly bartering weapons with heroin. Hence, the Russian missiles, including SAM-16 can land anywhere in the region. Britain makes Blowpipe, a British equivalent of the Stingers. However, it is relatively difficult to obtain Blowpipe. A third theory is even more dangerous. It suggests that some regional powers were able to reproduce Stingers through reverse engineering. Taliban could have obtained that type of Stingers. Since this brand of missiles rely on stolen American technology, one can buy it from black-market only. Evidently, the black market knows no rules and restrictions.

The only criteria are to pay in cash. And if this theory is correct, it means that the US and NATO would face tough times in the days to come.

Ostensibly, Taliban are following a well-thought plan. They are focusing on hitting hard the US and NATO forces while they are pulling out their troops from Afghanistan. Simultaneously, Taliban are targeting pro-US influential personalities to spread terror among the ill-trained and demoralized Afghan army and police. The objective is to prove that only Taliban can rule Afghanistan.

Bailout financial injection for Pakistan Railways

Hundreds  of passengers are found at railways stations across the country waiting for several hours for trains to come and yet they return disappointed. The fact that 26 trains did not depart only on Thursday speaks of how grave is the crisis in once a profitable organization till 1976-77. Resultantly, road transport is fast replacing trains for short distance journeys but the people who have to travel far are a real loss. The immediate cause is defective locomotives which invariably go out of order midway the journey and drivers struck the job seeking for new traction motors to be fitted. This row was resolved on the management's commitment that locos will be refurbished in two months. But the time the Pakistan Railway commitment is honoured train journey will continue to suffer.  
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The federal government has finally decided to help the Pakistan Railways (PR) by approving a Rs 11.1 billion bailout package. Of this, Rs 6.1 billion will come from loans from the commercial banks. Additionally, Rs15 billion development funds will also be provided for the railways on a fast track basis. Now that a bailout package has finally been put in place, it is up to the Railways Ministry to put the country’s rail transport system back on track. The federal government was not keen on giving out these funds since Railways Minister Ghulam Ahmad Bilour could not come up with a plan to improve PR, which has accrued a deficit of Rs 52.5 billion. Even in the holy month of Ramzan, railway employees are waiting for their salaries due to lack of funds.

Railways all over the world have both a commercial and a social function — that of linking isolated areas suffering from neglect. It was one of the greatest communication revolutions in mankind’s history, which brought isolated communities into the mainstream. PR, on the other hand, seems on the way to reversing this historic legacy due to mismanagement. Only 200 out of the 500 locomotives of PR are operational. There is no fuel available to run many trains because of non-payment. That issue will be resolved now that the government has decided to increase the line of credit from the Pakistan State Oil (PSO) to Rs 2 billion in order to ensure a smooth and uninterrupted supply of oil. The correct approach is to make a three-tier plan: immediate, medium-term and long-term.

Immediately, the Railways Ministry needs to deal with improving the tracks and rolling stock. These are management and administrative issues, and eminently doable. As far as locomotives are concerned, they should assess which ones are still functional. The non-functional ones can be cannibalised for repairing others. In the medium term, new locomotives should be bought but it should be kept in mind that in the past, Chinese locomotives have created some problems so quality must be ensured. American locomotives are more expensive but have a longer life. We should not try to find shortcuts in this regard. We need to buy as many locomotives as possible to get the railways rolling again. In the long run, we have to become self-reliant through manufacturing capabilities. The Mughalpura Railway Workshops should be revamped to restore repair capability and incrementally move to developing manufacturing locomotives and carriages, etc. This will save a great deal of foreign exchange in the future. The maintenance culture of PR also needs to be improved.

Railways are the cheapest, safest and most convenient form of transport service available to mankind. Road transport is not convenient, especially for long journeys, and also puts greater pressure on our roads, leading to more expenditure on road maintenance. Privatising railways is not an option as the private sector is motivated only by profit and will end up chopping all non-profit making railway lines. We cannot allow that to happen. Freight transport through railways was a money-making venture, but PR has fallen into such a pit of inefficiency that now more freight is carried through roads. We must make a thorough, well thought through plan and implement it efficiently. We can learn from the Indian Railways and see what they have done right and where we went wrong.

Karachi: Fiddling with tinderbox

The fact remains that Karachi is home to a turf war that has been seeing it bleed since the mid-1980s. Mr Altaf Hussain must really have a thorn in his side if he has cried out to the army for help. The PPP's Zulfiqar Mirza has been meeting Afaq Ahmed, the leader of the MQM-Haqiqi, and has called him the "real" leader of the MQM. Now this could very well be seen by Mr Hussain as a prelude to the PPP siding with the MQM (H), a faction that has clashed violently and relentlessly with the MQM. Add to this the fact that the ANP is a party representing the growing Pashtun demographic shift in Karachi and Altaf Hussain may feel as though he is being backed into a corner.
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As the beleaguered port city of Karachi is writhing haplessly in the tightening grip of rising flames, the political class across the spectrum is fiddling with this tinderbox just playfully. Convene an all-parties conference to sort out the problem, chant some politicos. Let a bipartisan parliamentary probe team to investigate the problem, chime some others. But who are they kidding? Who doesn’t know that the political parties themselves are part of the problem, not of the solution? The MQM is hell-bent upon preserving its monopolistic control over the city and is not loath of using any device to perpetuate its political hegemony. It is just averse even to entertain the slightest thought that conditions on the ground have drastically altered over the time and what was feasible only until yesterday is absolutely infeasible today. It is not ready to come to terms with the reality that the city’s political pie cannot stay in anyone’s sole grab anymore but has to be shared by all political contenders in keeping with the prevalent realities as well as the ways stipulated by a democratic order. But the challengers too are for a forced grab. They want to snatch the pie from the MQM, each eyeing it avariciously to gobble it up by himself all alone. They too profess commitment to democracy and democratic principles, norms and practices. But as dishonest in their avowals are they all as is the MQM. Force is their actual instrument to dislodge the MQM from Karachi’s sultanate as is it the MQM’s perpetual tool for keeping Karachi its exclusive preserve. And who doesn’t know that for fighting their war for Karachi, every political party harbours in its stables armed militia, without any exception? And who doesn’t know that all the fighting sides have established links with the city’s underworld to put more punch in their fighting for a victorious battle? The political class may feign, pretend or posture. But dupe it cannot the city residents. They know for sure what is blighting their besieged city. It is they who bear all the brunt of this war. It is they who are largely getting killed, maimed or wounded in this silly mad war of the political class. And they know what deceit underlies the political class’s calls for all-parties conference. They have seen such conferences being held in these very times and they know nothing came of them every time. And they know how spurious could be a parliamentary probe when the self-assuming parliamentarians have shown themselves to be no sages or wise men. And deluded they cannot be such deceptive calls as calling the army to pacify the city. Leave aside the army’s capacity to undertake this onerous task, overstretched as it is presently in safeguarding our eastern border, defending our western frontiers and fighting out militancy from the tribal areas. To act for the city’s pacification, the army would require precise information on the gunmen, hideouts and arsenals of parties’ militias and their aligned criminal mafias. After all, the military cannot launch into a blind action, knocking out the whole areas and localities. But the real source of this information could only be the local police and intelligence, not the ISI or the MI, as a PML (N) guru calling for parliamentary briefing by these agencies seems suggesting. And that information cannot come by in the given conditions, as local police and intelligence are deeply politicised outfits, flush as these are with political appointees who are loyal to their own political masters, not to the state or the citizens. Still, the political class can make amends by giving all the way to peaceful democratic means to share political spoils in the city. But the time is running out fast. The underworld, presently the combatants’ piggyback in their war for Karachi, is already perceptibly gaining upper-hand. If politicos do change, the underworld would throw the city irreversibly in ruinous gang warfare like Beirut of the Lebanese civil war era. Or, Munna Pistole, Khanna Tope and Charru Goli will then be coming to represent Karachi in the provincial and federal legislatures. For, this is how politics’ criminalisation invariably culminates. Then, the present-day’s political supremo and gurus will be left to watching videos in wilderness here or abroad, with their hearts weeping over the demise of their glory times. they stand forewarned.

The umbilical cord of NATO

A calibrated approach be adopted to de-escalate on the war on terror and each drone attack or incursion shall cost the NATO in the severance of their logistic tail for three days, as a quid pro-co to the unilateral strike/violation. Otherwise, enough is enough with this Alliance of inconvenience.
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Brig (retd) Said Nazir Mohmand




‘Amateurs discuss strategy while professionals talk logistics.’ 

The truth of this statement has been highlighted by numerous events in the recorded history and amply demonstrated in the conduct of recent warfare. The myth regarding Russia; that it cannot be conquered by external power, was tenable due the fact, that the logistic chain cannot be maintained at longer distances and for a prolonged period of times. The inference drawn is that distances and maintenance/sustenance periods are the rider clauses of any logistic planning. The US occupation of Afghanistan on the pretext of War on Terror, and the presence of almost 170,000 Extra Regional Forces and an additional around 50,000 foreign logistic and security personnel including infamous Blackwater have so far devoured more than three trillion US dollars. The sustenance level is around 3,500 tons per day for the foreign security elements. They require almost one and a half million litres of fuel, oil and lubricants to steam their war machine on daily bases. The surge in logistics gets a boost in operation like Marjah and every so often planned and dropped Kandahar offensive till the drawdown. The destruction, burning, loot, pillage and diversion of NATO’s supplies in route take a sizable piece of NATO’s cake. The NATO main supply route passes through Pakistan via Karachi—Torkham/ Chaman border towns and then up to Kabul and Kandahar respectively. The main and then the twin routes are passing through the volatile provinces of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, FATA and Balochistan, exposed to subversion and interdiction at the hands of US/NATO resisting forces. The safe passage of these trucks is captive to the check posts, taxes, and extortion of Afghan warlords, tribal chieftains and Taliban, up to their final destination. All these levies are paid in US dollars by the US/NATO Forces or support companies. 

The logistic need is so large and dominant that it requires a sustained, continuous and uninterrupted supply chain to feed the armies which marches on their bellies; and to fuel the burning exhausts of tanks and gun ships puffing smoke in the gusty winds of Afghanistan. The fact of the matter is that 70 % of these supplies are routed though Pakistan and only 25% is through the Northern Distribution Network and the remaining 5% is through air cargo. The supply chain through the Northern Distribution (ND) is not only cost prohibitive by three times but unviable in time and space dimensions. The road communication network in Northern Afghanistan is long, sluggish for heavy cargo and more prone to interdiction, loot and plunders due to longer exposures on route. Russia still feel the headache of traversing this route during their occupation of Afghanistan, then why NATO should not learn from others mistakes. It is a geo-strategic compulsion that the logistic support for the war on terror is subject to the Pakistan’s sea, ground and air space traverse. So, by implication Pakistan holds the key to the NATO operations in Afghanistan. If the chips are down to the level of parting the ways, then NATO should discuss strategy, while Pakistan should profess logistics. The adage will assert itself again and again. General William Fraser, Commander US Transportation Command told the Senate Armed Services Committee at his confirmation hearing that they are working on reducing their dependency on supply routes in Pakistan by placing more dependence on the ND network and air cargo. The US logisticians have an ambitious logistic undertaking to bring down the dependence via Pakistan to 35%, almost half of the present material bulk and load. The US logistic wizards have been working on this logistic flexibility since the fissures became visible in the US–Pak nexus in the war on terror due to Raymond Davis episode and 2nd May unilateral raid by US Navy Seals in Abbottabad. As the end game in the war on terror is visible and the transition process has got a kick start in one form or the other, therefore the extra load is to be jettisoned and the allies be abandoned as liability in the American tradition. It does not require a rocket science to understand the American scheme of things in the region. Their objectives and goals are to be seen in the perspective of double game, cloak and dagger, imply and deny and finally the stick and carrot technique being applied and pursued with all the tools available at their disposal. Though, the empire is receding on the war on terror in Afghanistan but wants a face saving in the form of change role from occupation to a patronage (a protectorate Afghanistan) and from large force presence to a power basin in the form of air bases for future use as a long stick in the region. In the geo-strategic perspective create an elbow space for its regional ally India to manage the affairs of Afghanistan and CARs and contain China by implication. The US will still bid on the Northern Alliance to secure for them a role bigger than their size in the post occupation Afghanistan for towing their lines and keeping the US tail clean and secure from disruption. Such an arrangement will slowly erode the Afghan nationalism, keep Iran at a bay as a lured stakeholder and accrue the dividends of balkanization by keeping the ethnic divide alive and functional. The post exit stratagem will leave the southern and mostly eastern Afghanistan in a state of flux with perpetual negative effects on Pakistan. The mayhem in FATA will continue at the cost of Pakistan’s stability and economic growth.

 To meet the end game with little scathing and maximum advantage the American logisticians have drawn the lines to reduce their dependence on Pakistan and lessen the leverage available to Pakistan under the present logistic arrangements. Their approach is two prongs, one to reduce the size of war machine and second to explore and pipeline new and secure routes. The race is against the time, as evident from the question of Senator John McCain from General Fraser, “how long it would take you to adjust to keep the same level of logistics into Afghanistan”? The inference drawn from the diversion of logistics routes is that the sooner they achieve that, the earlier will they abandon Pakistan. The US will keep Pakistan engaged at low level strategic plinth till their objectives are fulfilled in the next couple of years. The leverage Pakistan enjoys in the severance of NATO’s umbilical cord is just a matter of time, if not taken advantage in the limited time and space dimensions the umbilical cord may become that of a still-baby. The storage capacity of Extra Regional Forces in Afghanistan is limited to weeks not months, therefore the noose around the supply chain be kept tight till they renounce drones attacks, all sorts of incursions and pay for the damages caused to our main road communication infrastructure. A calibrated approach be adopted to de-escalate on the war on terror and each drone attack or incursion shall cost the NATO in the severance of their logistic tail for three days, as a quid pro-co to the unilateral strike/violation. Otherwise, enough is enough with this Alliance of inconvenience.

(Frontier Post)

politically ignited killings of Muhajir community in Karachi.

 Why the government does not call out the army to Karachi to restore law and order and punish the culprits who are playing havoc with the lives of Karachi people? A so-called peace rally was taken out by the members of PPP and MQM which did not have any impact on the city situation. Why nobody in parliament raises the issue of the deplorable situation in Karachi? Altaf Hussain too is silent while people are falling dead on the streets of Karachi. The opposition leader Nawaz Sharif is waging a war of words against the government but does not say a word about Karachi carnage?
The last resort in case of the present imefficient and callous government is the Supreme Court which may come to people's rescue in Karachi. It may kindly take suo motu action to stop the politically ignited killings of Muhajir community in Karachi.

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Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) Leader Altaf Hussain

Ten to twenty people are losing their lives every day. The prime minister who had been involved in an unnecessary war of words with the Supreme Court on the transfer of two bureaucrats who were investigating corruption cases — one involving a son of the prime minister and the other involving the son of the senior minister Chaudhry Pervez Ilahi. However, after great bitterness between the apex court and the prime minister a compromise has been reached and things are quiet, at least for the time being.
When the prime minister was in Karachi he did not pay much attention to Karachi situation. He however expressed his “resolve” to solve the problems of the city. But a day after he left Karachi, 32 people were killed bringing the total deaths in the month of July to 318. What kind of government do we have which is sleeping when one of its major hub of trade and commerce is burning. It is very well known as to who are the people in the Sind Government who are playing the game of death and destruction in Karachi but the chief executive is still talking about his “resolve”.

Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) leader Altaf Hussain on Wednesday called for deployment of army in Karachi to contain the ongoing wave of violence that left dozens of people killed in recent days.

In a telephone address from London, Hussain said military should act indiscriminately against all groups to restore peace in the city. His demand came a day after he set a two-day ultimatum for the President and the Prime Minister to restore peace in Karachi. He said that most of the people, who were murdered in Karachi, were innocent. He asked Sindh Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah to stop patronizing land and drug mafias.

The MQM leader said that Punjabis and Sindhis had warmly received Mohajir (migrants) during partition of sub-continent. He said that MQM was not against any ethnic group but, he added, that Mohajir were always targeted. “Mohajir are not Mohajir any more, they are Pakistanis,” he added. He also asked Indians if they would accept the migrants again. The MQM, he said, condemns ongoing acts of violence in Karachi. It is being said that three parties are responsible for Karachi situation, nobody is speaking truth. He further said that so-called heirs of Sindh were slaves of Hindus.

He added that action should also be taken against the MQM if it is found involved. Speaking about the recent violence in Karachi, Altaf Hussain said he had given a 48-hour deadline to the government to restore peace in the city.

Those who claim ownership of Pakistan today had actually been slaves of Hindu Bania (during pre-partition) and the freedom they were enjoying today is because of the Mohajir’ struggle. “Pakistan came into being because of Mohajir,” he maintained. He said Mohajir had not come to Pakistan empty handed and demanded of the international community to accept their presence. “Mohajir are no longer Mohajir here because it is their fifth generation that is now living in Pakistan,” Altaf Hussain argued.

Drawing attention of Sindhis, the MQM Chief said ‘if you are 200-year old Sindhis then we are 70-year old Sindhis’. He said innocent people were being butchered in Karachi and that criminals and land mafia were enjoying patronization. “Stop the people who are patronizing criminal elements,” Altaf Hussain urged the President, Prime Minister and Chief Minister Sindh.

The MQM Chief said the Army must come to Karachi and see for itself who is involved in the killings. If even a single MQM worker is found involved, action be taken against him, he added. “I want peace in Karachi at all cost. I hate violence. I want Pakistan to make progress and corruption be rooted out,” he said, adding, he was ready to renounce the party leadership if it could bring peace to the city.

Commenting on statement by Muttahida Chief, Senior Minister Zulfiqar Mirza said purchasing the ration for entire year would be even more judicious keeping in view the price hike. Sindh Fisheries Minister Zahid Ali Bhurgari said circumstances would not lead to the purchase of ration. Meanwhile, Information Minister Sharjeel Memon did not comment.

Begum Nargis ND Khan said she always stored ration so everybody else should do the same. Sindh Electric Power Minister, Shazia Marri said Altaf Hussain was a great man; hence, he could say anything. Adviser to Chief Minister Imtiaz Sheikh said the time for negotiations was over, now a full-fledged operation should take place.

KESC and power crisis

Karachi has been facing more pain on account of lack of power generation and distribution experience of Abraaj group of Dubai saddled in place of Saudi Al-Jomiah & Kuwaiti NIG consortium, who had successfully bided for KESC in its privatization by Pakistan Government through a transparrent bidding process completed in end 2005, which transferred 71% ownership to Al- Jomiah while 26% were retained by the Government.
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By Muhammad Daheem

The general public of Karachi and industrialists welcomed privatization of KESC in 2005. They hoped that complaints would be attended in a serious business like manner and old lethargic attitude of KESC would come to an end. Unfortunately this conception proved almost entirely wrong. Later on, the company was handed over to another firm Abraaj Capital, under another deal in 2008. But the situation did not change. Several complaints are made daily and only a few are attended under the security of government. The government is a silent observer and apparently follows non-interference policy. Keeping in view the problems of the consumers and workers RazaRabbani, Senator and senior politician, has demanded from the government to take over the company. According to him it was a wrong decision to hand over an essential utility to foreigners. It is also risky from security’s point of view as all the sensitive installations are under threat.Raza Rabbani has highly criticized the KESC for doing nothing to provide smooth electricity to the consumers. According to him the new KESC management has failed to restore the real image of Karachi. It has failed to provide proper services to the consumers and the government has no option but to retake control of the company. It is simply minting money by regularly raising tariff. The Senator has further criticized the management for its anti-people and anti-worker policies. He has blamed the company for sacking about 4,500 lower cadre employees and promoting contract culture. This foreign company, according to him, is blatantly violating the rules of law of the land.He blamed the company for violating the rules of downsizing, terminating and retrenchment. The Chairman of Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan has also asked NEPRA to revoke the agreement with the new management of KESC.The management team, headed by Tabish Gahuar, comprises about 41 senior managers to tackle the crisis at KESC. Unfortunately, the management personnel are drawing huge salaries while output and performance is not up to the mark. The high-ups earn millions in the KESC, while the skilled labour earn between Rs12,000 and 35,000 to live from hand to mouth. The company’s main problem seems to be the shortage of skilled management personnel.The KESC Chief Executive Officer Tabish Gahuar claimed in a press conference that appointments would be made purely on the basis of merit. Unfortunately this did not happen. A number of appointments have been made without keeping merit in view.Several senior posts have been awarded to relatives of influential persons, including politicians, bureaucrats and army officers. It is amazing that more than 650 officers have been appointed at packages ranging from Rs 150,000 to Rs 50,00,000.The company is involved miserably in nepotism, favouritism and corruption. Muttahida Qaumi Movement MNA Khushbakht Shujat’s son, Shahbaz Beg, appointed as Training Director, is drawing a salary of Rs500,000. Pir Danish Ali, son of senior provincial minister from the PPP Pir Mazharul Haq, employed as Director and Senior Advisor for Government Relations Department, is also drawing a salary of Rs500,000. Syed Nayyer Hussain, a relative of PPP MNA Sherry Rehman, appointed as Technical Group Head, is drawing Rs2.5 million per month.Abdul Gafoor, 78–year-old, a retired bank officer, is also paid Rs2.5 million per month. The KESC appointed Asir Manzoor as the group head of Human Resources, with a package worth Rs2 million per month. Manzoor’s brother-in-law Zafar Nasir Khan is drawing Rs500,000 as a general manager. Asif Hussain, brother of MQM provincial minister Aadil Siddiqi, is receiving a package of Rs700,000 per month as the KESC Production Department’s Revenue Director. Abid Hussain, brother of MQM’s parliamentary leader in the Sindh Assembly, Syed Sardar Ahmed, collects a sum of Rs500,000 from the company. He is serving as a project director in the KESC. Another enthusiastic worker of the MQM, Abrar Hussain, serving as Director of Project-2, receives a sum of Rs500,000 per month.Two former heads of Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), serving as security chiefs, are drawing a lucrative salary of Rs1.5 million each. About 18 retired colonels are on a salary of Rs,500,000 each. Naveed Hussain, a close relative of PML-Q’s MNA Humayun Akhtar, serving as Group Head of Recovery, is on a salary of  Rs2.9 million.Muhammad Tayyab Tareen, a resident of ‘Multan’, took charge of Group Chief Financial Officer, on political basis, at  KESC on 2nd November 2009. Tareen plays pivotal role in the company and controls almost all financial activities within the organization such as financial planning, budgeting, insurance, payroll, taxation and treasury activities and financial reporting.

 The KESC is one of the major factors responsible for power crisis in Karachi. The other factors are corrupt governments and selfish rulers who did not utilize the enormous resources of water, coal, wind plants, uranium and gas in Pakistan to produce electricity. Several advanced countries use all these resources for the welfare of their people. Pakistan should have big projects to produce electricity.Coal, for example, can be used to produce electricity. Pakistan has one of the largest coal reserves in the world. The theft of electricity and nonpayment of dues are the other major factors for the power crisis in Karachi. It may be mentioned here that Karachi is suffering from 12-hour load shedding in residential areas and 8-hour load shedding in industrial areas approximately.The company’s viewpoint is that, in the past, KESC hired staff in excess of its operational requirements. The favourite of the ruling party or influential politicians were accommodated unnecessarily. The KESC has blamed the CBA union for the turmoil and fuss. According to the management the CBA union is hindering repair work and workers feel themselves unsafe in the present circumstances. Nonetheless, recently three-month dispute between KESC management and its workers  has been settled amicably.Several critics are of the opinion that almost all the top managers who took charge one after the other were incompetent. A real professional approach is required to crack the hard nut. It may be amazing that 30% electricity is being used through illegal connections and the KESC has almost failed to resolve the issue and overpower the line losses. The management lacks the skill, competence, training and integrity to come over the crisis. Moreover, an independent audit of the company is necessary for finding facts and faults of the company.Frequent power failure for hours, unannounced load shedding and voltage fluctuation has provoked an uproar from the public, traders and industrialists. Industrialists find it really difficult to compete with the products from other countries in the international market because of load shedding. Naturally it means fewer exports and less foreign exchange for the country.The private monopoly companies always try to raise tariff and expand network on commercial basis. They demand special concessions from the government on the pretext of higher fuel prices and meeting emergency situations. It is another way of exploitation of the common man.The new management has done nothing particular to reduce Transmission and Distribution System losses. It did not spend sufficient money to improve distribution system, increase the capacity of grid and sub-stations. Moreover, it did not fulfil the promise to construct new power plants as mentioned in the agreement. The management has failed to reduce corruption in different fields including corrupt billing. The controversial costly and uneconomical thermal plants, fraught with corruption in its design and execution, were introduced in Pakistan in 1994. Under the NAB investigation against these companies 6 out of 21 IPPs confessed paying bribe to high-ups. The independent power producers (IPPs) are not operating full capacity because of so-called financial problems. This is one of the major factors leading to load shedding. Some opposition leaders claim that the power crisis has been created to make market for the purchase of more rental power plants. Though the plan has already doomed to failure. Even a layman knows that energy produced through this source is very expensive.The politics of ad-hocism and nepotism should be discarded.Corruption, inefficiency and mismanagement should not be tolerated and payment to the personnel should be linked to the performance. The KESC should be restructured for the welfare of the people of Karachi. Several critics are of the opinion that KESC management is responsible for the closure of factories, mass unemployment and loss of Pakistan’s export markets. The government is silent observer at this critical juncture. The privatization of the KESC seems to be against the national interest. It’s high time the KESC fate is decided in the national interest of Pakistan.
 
muhammaddaheem@gmail.com

Quetta bus attacks

A complete shutter down strike was observed in the provincial capital on Sunday, condemning the killing of 11 people of Shia acommunity on Saturday. At least 11 people, including a woman, were killed and three others were injured when vehicle was attacked near a bus stop on spiny Road. The attackers were believed to be the activists of Lashkar-e-Jhangvi a banned religious outfit.
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The catastrophically fatal terrorist strikes of Quetta of these past two days spotlight culpably how flute-playing Neros are the ruling political bosses and their subordinate law-enforcers alike. Under their very noses, the vile thugs are playing holi with the innocent blood of our hapless citizens and they both are sitting pretty, at best proffering empty rhetoric or trotting out implausible excuses where robust actions are required indispensably. The political rulers dish out routinely condemnation massages as if their words of compassion are a magical balm that would soothe the hearts of the grief-stricken and their brave vows of not bowing down to the thugs would scare them to flee and abandon their murder trade. Not ashamed are they even a wee bit after the thugs pooh-pooh their brave talk the very next day by shedding the innocent blood of our compatriots in terrorist assaults, bomb blasts and suicide bombings.And their subordinate security apparatus is as inept as are they. Since no questions are asked and no heads roll, the law-enforcers have taken it that their job is not to prevent the wicked terrorists’ thuggery but only to tell after they have struck if it was a suicide bombing or a bomb blast, and what was the weight of the explosives used and who the perpetrators of the bloodletting could be. And they get away with this device, whereas they should be on the mat for inexcusable dereliction of duty. Indeed, by matching up their lackadaisicalness and ineptness with each other, both have opened up the country to the thugs as an expansive ground for their free run to kill and maim our people with their unobstructed wickedness. Whatever excuses they may invent and come up with, the bland fact is neither is pushed about this bloodshed of our innocent. Their indefensible failure to swoop on the lairs of the thugs and disable them before they crawl out and strike is enough of a manifest that they have planned no strategy whatsoever to face up to their monstrous vileness. In Quetta, the Hazara community has not come under terrorist assault only now. It has been the target of unmistakably sectarian terrorism for pretty long. And the attackers do not descend from the sky. Even if the activists of the outlawed Lashkar-e-Jhangvi are involved, as the thugs often claim, they act from lairs inside the metropolis. Even if they come from outside, they have their complicit in the city who hide and aid them. Then, what have the city police and the CID been doing to unearth their lairs and accomplices when their savage bloodletting has been going on for so long? Obviously, both the law-enforcing outfits are hibernating, unmoved by this incessant carnage of the smallish distressed Hazara community? And they both are sleeping blissfully as no questions are being asked of them by the political bosses.Certainly the time has come for the political leadership to wake up and know that the country is in the throes of a very vile urban terrorism. It is not just Quetta that is burning. Karachi too is in spiraling flames. And amn rallies and amn committees are just no answer to the tough fight required against an urban terrorism being waged by vicious lashkars and jaishes and accursed outfits of professional mercenary killers of their ilk. Yes, dismantling and demobilising of militias by various political, ethnic and confessional outfits and snapping of their ties with the underworld, as is evidently in very much play in the port city, is of essence in taking on the vicious dark forces of terrorism and bloodshed. That levels up the ground for both the political rulers and their subordinate security apparatus to move in powerfully to track down and decimate in their lairs the terrorist killer brigades indulging in their orgies of death and destruction in the name of religion. But to fight out urban terrorism, a robust, orchestrated and sustained strategy and action plan are essentially needed. Appallingly, the incumbent ruling political leadership has it not. It even doesn’t have even some haphazard policy to this end. At least now, it must work out a counterterrorism strategy and put it in action. Otherwise, Karachi will remain a killing field. And Quetta too will see no peace. And other parts of the country would remain under the dark shadows of terrorism for times to come.

Pakistan faces unjust World Order

By Sajjad Shaukat

Although all the small countries have been facing the unjust world order, reflected by the US-led privileged status quo of the affluent countries in the unipolar system, yet Pakistan has become its special target because it is the only Islamic country which possesses nuclear weapons. The prevalent global system tends to give a greater political and economic leverage to the most developed nations who could safeguard their interests at the cost of the weak countries. Whenever, any controversy arises, the UN Security Council enforces the doctrine of collective security against the small states, while the five big powers protect their interests by using veto. This shows discrimination between the powerful and the weaker. It is notable that in 2001, UN had permitted the United States to attack Afghanistan under the cover of right of self-defence. In 2003, UN became helpless regarding Anglo-American illegitimate invasion of Iraq. In case of the Indian occupied Kashmir, the issue still remains unresolved as UN resolutions regarding the plebiscite were never implemented because Washington supports the illegitimate stand of India due to its anti-China interests. Similarly, US-led NATO countries have attacked Libya by setting aside the international law. Since September 11, Pakistan which joined the US war on terror as the frontline state against terrorism, especially in relation to Afghanistan, Washington has always tried to apply coercive diplomacy by manipulating the multiple crises of this developing country. The contradictory statements of the US high officials which still continue, shows American duplicity with Pakistan. In this respect, sometimes, US has cajoled Islamabad with economic and military aid, sometimes pressurised the latter to take actions against the Taliban militants, sometimes accused Pak Army and its intelligence agency, ISI of close contacts with the Afghan Taliban, while blaming for cross-border terrorism in Afghanistan. On the other hand, in the past few weeks, cross-border attacks by heavily armed militants who entered Pakistan from Afghanistan and targetted the infrastructure of our country’s various regions have continued intermittently.While, in the post-Osama episode, since the militants’ attack on Pakistan’s naval base in wake of perennial wave of terror-events in the country, US-led some western countries including India and Israel have intensified their campaign against the security of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons. In this regard, on June 9, the then American CIA Chief Leon Panetta expressed fears that there is a danger that Pakistani nuclear weapons could fall into wrong hands. On May 24, the head of NATO in Afghanistan, Anders Fogh Rasmussen also expressed similar thoughts. In fact, CIA-led Indian RAW and Israeli Mossad which are already behind suicide attacks, bomb blasts and targeted killings in Pakistan have continuously been exploiting the killing of Osama Bin Laden. These elements are distorting the image of Islamabad in the comity of nations by indicating that other leaders of Al Qaeda have also taken shelter in Pakistan. Meanwhile, America has also increased drone attacks on Pakistan, which could also include Balochistan and other major cities of the country. At the same time, by setting aside the joint session of Pakistan’s Parliament, protesting the violation of the country’s sovereignty, recently, Obama repeatedly made it clear, “He was ready to order more assaults against any safe havens” of terrorists in Pakistan.In fact, before leaving Afghanistan, US wants to shift Afghan war to Pakistan, which it has already started transferring. Under the pretext of Talibanisation of Pakistan and lawlessness in the country, which has collevtively been created by CIA, RAW and Mossad, US-led India and Israel are preparing ground to ‘denuclearise’ Islamabad. Like ex-president Bush, high officials of the Obama Administration have also been stating that any plot to attack the US homeland and Europe would be planned in Pakistan’s tribal regions. In the recent past, while talking about the failed attempt of the Times Square bombing, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had warned that Pakistan would face “severe consequences” if a future terrorist attack on US soil was traced back to Pakistan. In this respect, America has already gained the favour of some western countries, showing Pakistan as a failed state. Notably, renowned political thinkers, Hobbes, Machiavelli and Morgenthau opine that in international politics, deceit, fraud and falsehood become the principles of international morality. In their sense, strategic thinker, Thomas Schelling remarks about the US, “coercion to be an effective tool of foreign policy.” Kissinger also endorses politics of bargaining and pressure through threats, coercion and even violence as key elements of the US diplomacy. In this regard, diplomacy itself becomes the real tool of blackmailing. In these terms, American policy shows deliberate duplicity towards PakistanIt is notable that despite Pakistan’s successful military operations against the Taliban militants and sacrifices of country’s security forces including civilian casualties and collateral damage during war against terrorism, the US has continuously been pressurising Islamabad to take military action against the Haqqani group in North Waziristan. In this context, on June 28, Lieutenant General John Allen, the US commander in Afghanistan, blamed that Pakistan was keeping its options open by allowing Haqqani fighters based in North Waziristan to operate within its borders to kill the Americans in Afghanistan. While Islamabad has already made it clear that army is engaged in other tribal areas, so it cannot attack the militants of North Waziristan. On June 9, Pakistan’s Chief of the Army Staff, Gen Ashfaq Parvez remarked about military operation in North Waziristan, “a well thoughtout campaign is under no pressure to carry out operations at a particular time…future operations, as and when undertaken, will be with political consensus…the people of Pakistan whose support the army has always considered vital for its operations against terrorists.” On June 7, Gen. Kayani again emphasised people’s backing for army.However, in the recent past, Pakistan’s civil and military leadership has flatly refused to act upon American unnecessary demands. Knowing the American double game and its intentions to shift Afghan war to Pakistan, Islamabad sent home 120 US military trainers. In response, on July 10, America withheld $800 million in military assistance to Pakistan. On the other side, on July 13, Gen. Kayani during Corps Commanders’ Conference made it clear that the military could do without US assistance by depending on its own resources, while on the same day, Defence Minister Ahmed Mukhtar threatened to pull back troops from the Afghan border in response to US aid cuts. At present, trust deficit exists between Islamabad and Washington owing to the ambivalent policy of the US towards Pakistan. In this context, on July 25, US Admiral Mike Mullen stated that US-Pakistan military-to-military ties were at a very difficult crossroads, allowing progress on that front was not yet clear, but like some other US high officials, he hoped that the two nations would soon find a way to reconcile those ties. An American official said, “we are committed to work with Pakistan on counter-terrorism.” It is mentionable that in economic context, the world order shows greater disparities as the flow of capital and credit system including I.M.F and World Bank is also dominated by the US-led most developed countries——its result is an increase in the activities of the Multinationals which have shattered the economies of the poor developing states—-particularly Pakistan. Besides, these developed countries blackmail the governments of the small states through financial pressure, while US especially blackmails Pakistan. Every time, I.M.F sanctions loan to Pakistan after American green signal. Past experience proves that economic dependence on foreign countries always brings political dependence in its wake. While, at this critical juncture, our country has been facing precarious financial problem, US-led some western allies are compelling Islamabad to accept American undue demands which are, in fact, part of American shrewd diplomacy as the US, India and Israel are trying to weaken Pakistan for their secret strategic designs. In case of refusal, US can conduct full-fledged aerial strikes on Pakistan. There is also another option for the United States as with the help of some western powers, the US can impose economic sanctions on Pakistan or can declare the latter as defaulter in connection with the payments of debts so as to further destabilise the country.No doubt, Pakistan has been facing the unjust world order in the unipolar world led by the US. Such a critical situation demands a strong sense of unity among our security forces, politicians and general masses in order to cope with foreign enemies.  

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