US Officials Skeptical
of Pak Crackdown on Taliban
By
John Lancaster
MOHMAND AGENCY, Pakistan: Until recently, this remote tribal region
on the Afghan border was the last of Pakistan's "no-go"
areas, a lawless realm of parched mountains and mud-walled villages
where not even the army dared to tread. Smugglers operated with
impunity here, and so, some say, did the Taliban and al Qaeda.
But this June, Pakistani soldiers moved into Mohmand Agency, one
of seven tribal areas that have been brought under government
control for the first time in Pakistan's history. The situation
is now so tranquil that the army recently organized a helicopter
tour for Western journalists, showcasing a well-digging project
and smiling villagers bearing trays of ice-cold Pepsi-Cola.
"We
don't allow Taliban here," said Mohammed Shah, 45, a wiry-looking
laborer who was among the well-wishers in the village of Faqir
Wala. "If they come, we will throw them out."
The
army organized the tour to counter charges by the US-backed Afghan
government that Pakistan is allowing Taliban fighters to use its
border areas as a base for stepped-up operations against US and
Afghan forces in southern and southeastern Afghanistan. Such attacks,
including recent large-scale assaults on police posts, have forced
aid groups to curtail some relief and reconstruction efforts and
raised doubts about plans to hold national elections next year.
They
also are a cause of growing concern in Washington. Sen. John McCain
(R-Ariz.) said after a visit earlier this month to Kabul, the
Afghan capital, that Pakistan was "not doing as much as it
can" to secure its border with Afghanistan.
Pakistani
officials deny they are aiding the Taliban, saying they are committed
to helping the government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai while
emphasizing the challenge of preventing illegal movement across
the rugged frontier, much of which is not even marked.
Some
analysts and Western diplomats, however, are skeptical of Pakistan's
assurances. They cite Pakistan's historical ties to the Taliban,
its animosity toward members of the former Northern Alliance militia
who now dominate Karzai's government and its growing anxiety over
links between Kabul and India, Pakistan's historical nemesis.
In
particular, Pakistani officials accuse India of using newly reopened
consulates in the Afghan cities of Kandahar and Jalalabad to stir
up tension between Pakistan and Afghanistan, especially along
the border. "I would not say the policy has gone to overt
or covert support for the Taliban, but there could be a process
of benign neglect," said retired army officer Ikram Majeed
Sehgal, who retains close links to Pakistan's security establishment
as the head of the country's largest private security firm.
"Given
the fact that the Northern Alliance has taken over, [Pakistani
security forces] would not crack down [on the Taliban] with the
same enthusiasm they would have a year earlier," he added.
"Now their worst fears have come true. The Indians have planted
themselves in Kandahar and in Jalalabad."
A
Western diplomat suggested that Pakistani intelligence agents
still maintain "lines of communication" with fugitive
Taliban leaders, who share Pakistan's hostility toward India and
the Northern Alliance. If nothing else, the diplomat added, Pakistani
officials perceive such contacts as "an insurance policy"
in the event that Karzai's government fails and the Taliban returns
to power in some form.
Pakistan's
ties to the Taliban date from the early 1990s, when it embraced
the movement as a stabilizing force in Afghanistan and -- along
with Saudi Arabia -- supplied much of the weaponry and logistical
support that underpinned its rise to power. The movement drew
its manpower from Afghan and Pakistani students at Islamic seminaries,
or madrassas, in the Pashtun tribal belt running through the border
regions of North-West Frontier Province and Baluchistan.
Many
of the madrassas were run by Jamiat-e-Ulema-i-Islami, one of Pakistan's
main hard-line religious parties. The JUI is now part of the six-party
religious alliance that leads the opposition in Pakistan's parliament
and also holds power in the provincial government of North-West
Frontier Province, which includes Mohmand Agency.
Following
the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, on the United States,
Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's president, threw his support
behind the US-led war to topple the Taliban government and crush
al Qaeda with help from the Northern Alliance, which occupied
Kabul several months later. Since then, Pakistani security services
acting in concert with the FBI and CIA have arrested nearly 500
al Qaeda fugitives in Pakistan.
But
Pakistani officials say they make a distinction between al Qaeda
members, most of whom are Arabs, and Taliban fighters, who they
say are generally undeserving of the "terrorist" label.
Pakistani authorities have arrested few, if any, senior Taliban
figures, many of whom are thought to have taken refuge in Pakistan.
"Officials
knew that using strong-arm tactics against the Taliban would be
a mistake," Fazlur Rahman, the head of the JUI, said in a
telephone interview. "One can have a difference of opinion
with some of their leaders, but the Taliban were pro-Pakistan
and would always remain so. My feeling is the army as an institution
recognizes that fact."
Afghan
officials say they are paying the price for Pakistan's ambivalent
attitude toward the Taliban. In Kandahar, Afghan intelligence
officials have been allowing Western journalists to interview
captured Taliban fighters who describe themselves as recent recruits
from madrassas in Pakistan's border areas.
One
of them, identified as an 18-year-old Afghan from the central
province of Uruzgan, told Reuters that he had been studying at
a madrassa in Chaman, near the border with Afghanistan, several
months ago when a pro-Taliban cleric invited him to "join
the jihad." The captured fighter, Rahimatullah, said he traveled
to the Pakistani city of Quetta, where he joined 10 more recruits
before taking a taxi to the Maruf district of Kandahar province.
A
few nights later he was captured during an unsuccessful raid on
the home of a government official. Rahimatullah said he had been
paid 3,200 Pakistani rupees, about $55, to join the militia.
A
Western military source credited Pakistan with making a sincere
effort to stop infiltration, however, noting that the army has
established about 300 new outposts in the border areas in the
last three months.
Pakistani
army officers said they have so far deployed 25,000 men in the
tribal areas of North-West Frontier Province. In Mohmand Agency,
as in other tribal areas, many are involved in public works projects,
such as building schools and roads. Others have been deployed
along the border, occupying positions at one-mile intervals on
the agency's 42-mile frontier with Afghanistan, according to Brig.
Iqbal Harral, the brigade commander in the area.
Gen.
Ali Aurakzai, the corps commander in the province, said his field
commanders hold regular meetings with their US counterparts
across the border and sometimes coordinate operations against
pro-Taliban forces with the aid of satellite phones.
"We
provided the anvil, and they provided the hammer," he said
of one such operation that took place recently.
The
writer is Correspondent for the Washington Post in Pakistan
