Pakisthan: The cause or the effect?

(At the outset of Mr.Nawaz Sharif declaring that Mr.Ismail Kasab is undoubtfully a Pakisthani, yet another attack has been traced back to Pakisthan. Is Pakisthan, a 'rogue nation' or a country which is deeply affected by the terrorism, is perhaps the right question to be comtemplated now.)

A recent interview of one of the senior official and ex-journalist from Pakisthan in one of the news channel reveals some interesting statistics. Just this year, he states, there were about 600 major attacks in Pakistan, killing about 2000 security personnel, and people. Almost all the major cities: Islamabad, Rawalpindi and Lahore were deeply affected by the attacks over the past one year. He says though Pakistan has not been successfull in countering terrorism as it is expected to be, it is in the best interests of Pakistan to do so since it is perhaps the worst hit nation by terrorist attacks. The effect (damage) of terrorist attacks within the territory of Pakistan quadrupled from 2006 to 2007, and continues in the same trend. About 3600 terrorist related fatalities were recorded in just 2007. The interesting statement made by him, to be noted here is that Terrorism is a serious problem for Pakistan, as Naxalism in the most parts of India and LTTE as for Srilanka. But, ofcourse this statement seems inherently flawed, since Terrorism is not just been an 'internal' problem of Pakistan (perhaps Balochistan movement is!), and it affects the outside world in a regular basis and on a large scale; Almost 100 of the major terrorist attacks across the world, since 9/11 have been traced back to Pakistanis or terrorist groups in Pakistani soil, including terror in London.

The reasons supporting the other side of the coin seem stronger. A worldwide survey released by the BBC, recently, found that Pakistan was among two nations out of 23 (the other being Egypt) – where "mixed" or "positive" feelings toward Al Qaeda (22% and 19%, respectively) outweighed negative feelings (19%). After Musharraf resigned, replaced by the ever-controversial Mr.Asif Ali Zardari, leader of the country’s only national party in the country, the Pakistan Peoples Party, winning election with overwhelming support from the three smaller provinces of NWFP, Balochistan and Sind. But Punjab, with 65 percent of the country's population, remains out of his hands, run by rival Nawaz Sharif, who refuses to take the terrorist threat seriously and befriends right-wing Islamic parties. These two reflect the present psyche of the people and ofcourse the politicians. The attacks in Balochistan (which is about 43% of the country's territory) are mostly nationalist, though some of them have terror links. The Pakistani Army Chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani (former chief of ISI), who replaced General Pervez Musharaf, is suspected to have a dominating say in the Democratically formed 'liberal' Govt. led by PPP, which was witnessed in the recent controversy of ISI chief coming to India for assistance in the investigation probe. The Govt. which confirmed the house arrest of Masud Azhar (the chief of Jaish-E) immediately following the attacks, has now denied the same. These raise more brows towards the 'honesty' and 'seriousness' of Pakistani Government towards mitigating terrorism.

But, the aftermath of mumbai attacks has proved to be a litmus test of Zardari's Govt. Gven that UPA govt is sincere in holding the pressure, we would see which one is true, perhaps in the due course of time.