Pakistan clears remote, scenic valley of militants

Asim Aquil · 04-30-2006, 18:39 PM

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayA...continent&col=

Bring it.

Quote:

KUNDI GARH, Pakistan - The remote Shawal valley in Pakistan’s North Waziristan tribal region has long been known as a haven for Al Qaeda militants and their allies.

Standing on one of the highest summits in the pine-dotted valley, Pakistani military officials say that Shawal no longer offers sanctuary to militants after security forces gained a foothold in the area last year.

“We have set up our posts at almost every kilometre and a half,” Brigadier Imtiaz Wyne, military commander in Shawal, said as two of his soldiers sat in a post keeping a watchful eye on the unmarked border with Afghanistan.

“I have now almost full control over the area,” he told journalists who made a brief weekend visit to the area arranged by the military.

Shawal is a beautiful upland valley, with forests and meadows where tribesmen graze their flocks in summer. The valley, at about 1,300 metres (4,000 feet), is criss-crossed by ravines and ridges soaring up to 3,400 metres (11,000 feet).

While hardly any signs of habitation could be seen on Kundi Garh, one of the highest summits overlooking the valley, officials said many militants, including Arabs, Central Asians and Chechens fleeing army operations in neighbouring South Waziristan had taken refuge in the valley’s forests.

“This was a major sanctuary for the militants,” an intelligence official said.

But Wyne said the army had launched up to 10 operations in Shawal since it secured the area over the past year.

“Shawal is now almost clear of miscreants,” he told Rper cent.

But despite the military’s claims, clashes between security forces and militants go on unabated in rugged Waziristan.

On Saturday, militants ambushed a convoy of paramilitary troops on the outskirts of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan.

There were no casualties and officials said such attacks had become almost routine in North Waziristan.

“We have become used to such clashes. Hardly a day passes when we don’t have such clashes,” an intelligence official said in Miranshah.

Chasing militant leaders

Military officials say they have killed 324 Islamist militants in North Waziristan and lost 56 soldiers since the middle of last year.

Among the militants killed was Muhsin Musa Matwali Atwah, an Egyptian al Qaeda member wanted for involvement in the 1998 bomb attacks on US embassies in East Africa.

The rugged mountains and forest-clad gorges on the Afghan frontier provide a natural hideout for militants and many believe that al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and his key aide Ayman al-Zawahiri could be hiding in the region.

Pakistani officials say they had no information on the whereabouts of the two al Qaeda leaders.

“We always keep a list of the wanted men with us and whenever we find anyone of them here, we go after him,” the intelligence official said, citing the death of Atwah and Abu Marwan Hadid al-Suri, a man believed to a “bag man” for the families of al Qaeda fighters, killed in the Bajaur tribal region this month.

“We are basically chasing leaders of the militants more actively then their foot-soldiers. These leaders are the real instigators and we are after them,” he said.

About 1,000 foreign militants from Arab and Central Asian countries are operating in Pakistan’s tribal belt, he said.

Afghan officials say militants use Pakistan’s lawless tribal belt as a springboard for attacks in Afghanistan.

Pakistan says it is doing all it can to stop the cross-border movement of militants and has urged Afghanistan to do more to seal its side of the border.

Jay · 04-30-2006, 19:06 PM

http://worldaffairsboard.com/showthread.php?t=11697

UnitedPakistan · 04-30-2006, 20:48 PM

The article you have provided us is dated for...
Last Updated: Monday, 24 April 2006, 23:57 GMT 00:57 UK

While asim's article is dated...
30 April 2006

Archer · 05-28-2006, 00:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UnitedPakistan

The article you have provided us is dated for...
Last Updated: Monday, 24 April 2006, 23:57 GMT 00:57 UK

While asim's article is dated...
30 April 2006

In six days, the world changed.

UnitedPakistan · 05-29-2006, 21:36 PM

No, just the area in which we are discussing.

Puressence · 05-29-2006, 21:50 PM

Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet
allows Taliban crazies to run wild less than 200 miles from their capital, and using rioting to make a point whenever there is a perceived slight against religion

Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet
constantly talks up the threat of war in South Asia, keeps yapping about strategic location as though malignant forces are constantly eyeing its land

Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet
still believes in using its secret services to destabilise its neighbours, as though that would have a positive effect on its own country risk.

Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet
Produces false statistics, stuffs major generals into any available position, allows extremists to gradually take over its universities, and achieves an ever poorer quality of discourse among its elites

Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet
Most of all, shockingly, appears to want a sugar daddy to take care of all its other tiresome needs while it goes to war with its neighbours

Hopeless. You might see hot money washing in to take advantage of short term gains, but major investment?

What a tiresome country. It is acting much too big for its boots. Already it has more than half the population of America.

UnitedPakistan · 05-29-2006, 22:18 PM

If that was the case than India has her entire foot sticking outside of the front of the boot.

Puressence · 05-29-2006, 22:28 PM

I'm not being insulting of Pakistan. I'm just pointing out that your policies are inconsistent. Getting rid of the Taliban is not "for America". It's for Pakistan's own development. Name one first or second world country that is tolerant of armed bands running around in its own country beheading people and starting bush wars with its neighbours.

UnitedPakistan · 05-29-2006, 22:57 PM

Quote:

Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet
allows Taliban crazies to run wild less than 200 miles from their capital, and using rioting to make a point whenever there is a perceived slight against religion

Wait a ****ing minute!

What makes you think we allow them to run around and go crazy? Are we just deploying 80,000 men away from their families for nothing? I also wonder where all the casualties are from. Must be smallpox?

Please keep your assumptions to yourself.

Quote:

Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet
constantly talks up the threat of war in South Asia, keeps yapping about strategic location as though malignant forces are constantly eyeing its land

With India on one side and unfriendly Afghanistan to the north we sure do have a strategic location that is being threatened by aggressors such as India and fools from the north try to intimidate us.

Quote:

Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet
still believes in using its secret services to destabilise its neighbours, as though that would have a positive effect on its own country risk.

What about RAW? As if they are not operating in Pakistan.

Wonder who we caught in Gwadar and I wonder who that guy is that we are about to execute? ****ing hypocrites!

Quote:

Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet
Produces false statistics, stuffs major generals into any available position, allows extremists to gradually take over its universities, and achieves an ever poorer quality of discourse among its elites

False statistics? This is a typical rant based on yet more assumptions. And perhaps you are not aware that the civil service was not operating correctly under civilians. I have been to Pakistan and I can vouch that our military is doing a good job in the civil positions. For some reason most of them are leaving their positions. Probaly the heartache of politics...Extremists taking over the universities? Where the hell do you get this crap? India Times? BBC?

Quote:

Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet
Most of all, shockingly, appears to want a sugar daddy to take care of all its other tiresome needs while it goes to war with its neighbours

More assumptions and ********

Well thats all from me... I rather have our guns and actions do the talking instead of talking on a defence forum which is heavily populated by Indians who tell each other fairy tales to keep the dropping morale up.

Archer · 05-29-2006, 23:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UnitedPakistan

No, just the area in which we are discussing.

Figures. What amazing times we live in.

Archer · 05-29-2006, 23:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UnitedPakistan

Well thats all from me... I rather have our guns and actions do the talking instead of talking on a defence forum which is heavily populated by Indians who tell each other fairy tales to keep the dropping morale up.

Guns and action gee....wow talk about talking big..when was the last time the Pak Army won a war? Wait...is that...like...never?

Meanwhile all those guns and action are being used against Balochis and NWFP. Good job.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default...-5-2006_pg7_12

WASHINGTON: Senator Sanaullah Baloch told a conference on “the crisis in Balochistan’ held here on Thursday that the Pakistan government is at war with the Balochi people, while demanding that Pakistan should accord the same freedom to Balochis that it wants for Kashmiris.

He addressed the conference held at the US Institute of Peace through a video connection from Pakistan. He accused the Pakistan government of having pressured the US government into withdrawing the visa granted to him earlier, leading a Pakistani member of the audience to retort during question hour, “One only wishes Pakistan had so much influence in Washington!” The senator from Balochistan caused the audience to gasp in surprise when he declared that Balochistan was wedged as a buffer between two nuclear powers: Pakistan and Iran. The senator’s remarks were often intemperate and his language in his references to Pakistan and its government described by those who heard him as “reckless.” He openly demanded secession from Pakistan, arguing that Balochistan had been annexed by Pakistan at the time of independence since its people had refused to accede to Pakistan. He said Pakistan had repeatedly used force against the Balochi people, starting from 1948.

Baloch also accused the Pakistan government of handing over Gwadar to China. He said the Chinese were happy that the Baloch people were being killed by the Pakistan Army, which had launched full military operations in the province on 17 December 2005. He said China had its eye on Balochistan’s energy resources and its mineral wealth, since Balochistan holds the world’s third largest deposits of copper. He charged that all the gas pumped in his province was going to the Punjab. He also spoke about the Balochi people having been kept deprived of the fruits of their natural resources as the province got no more than a pittance of the revenues it generated. He said the Pakistan government had consulted no Balochi leader when preparing the master plan for Gwadar. He also complained that a network of cantonments was being established in Balochistan to repress the people. He said there are seven airbases in the province, which a serving Pakistan Air Force officer among the audience later described as “absolutely untrue.”

Baloch said all that “Islamabad and Punjab” want is to exploit Balochistan. He stated that there is a ruling “mullah-military alliance” in the province which has no interest in the welfare of the people who live there. He also accused most elder tribal leaders of “collaboration” with the Islamabad. He said hundreds of Balochi youth have disappeared and nobody knows where they are. Torture of those picked up, he added, is widespread. He called the dividing line between Pakistani and Iranian Balochistan “unnatural.”

Archer · 05-29-2006, 23:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UnitedPakistan

Wait a ****ing minute!
False statistics? This is a typical rant based on yet more assumptions. And perhaps you are not aware that the civil service was not operating correctly under civilians. I have been to Pakistan and I can vouch that our military is doing a good job in the civil positions. For some reason most of them are leaving their positions. Probaly the heartache of politics...Extremists taking over the universities? Where the hell do you get this crap? India Times? BBC?

:

So you dont live in Pakistan. Gee wow.

We get all this from Pakistani sources- figures you wont know about it.

And you are certain all the statistics are correct. Let us see the state of Pakistans statistics collecters.

http://www.brecorder.com/index.php?i...term=&supDate=

Quote:

To have better co-ordination and also ensure more acceptability it was also decided that the new set-up, comprising Federal Bureau of Statistics (FBS), Population Census Organisation (PCO) and Agriculture Census Organisation, be merged with the statistical division of the Ministry of Finance to create an autonomous Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS).

Using a 20 years old base figure instead of 10 leads to inconsistency and wrong comparison. At a seminar organised by the Central Bank, of data providers and data users, the officers of FBS painted a dismal picture of the organisation. For 26 years, dozens of statisticians have remained in the same grade. In comparable time a section officer climbs promotional ladder to become an Additional Secretary. There is neither pay nor pride in the job.

FBS has lost more than 50 percent of its statistician who were in Grade 17, due to meagre resources, and is now a headless organisation, with 18 officers using only one computer (PC). It is without a Director-General since the retirement N.A. Larik. Directors who were empowered to release monthly and quarterly data are not allowed to do so. There were 146 persons in the National Accounts Office in 1986.

Now it has only 40 which includes support staff such as peons and sweepers. No pride nor respect has resulted in turning the Statistics Division into a parking lot for the discard in the bureaucracy. Nine secretaries in 10 years tells the whole picture.

Changing the name to PBS will not improve the quality of statistics being collated. Inducting professionally qualified persons and empowering them to overhaul and restructure the statistical system to collect data and undertake surveys at the national level to measure our success or failure is needed. The data base and data collection points must be large enough to truly reflect the national picture - good or bad. Timely release of accurate data virtually obliges both government and private entities to take correct economic decisions to the benefit of the economy at large.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default...8-5-2006_pg3_4

Quote:

What Sethi found intriguing was that although the next elections were 18 months away, things had started heating up. This could only presage significant developments in the coming months. He found the economic indicators disturbing, with inflation running at eight percent and fuel prices having shot up by 50 percent in one year. Easy bank credit that had everybody driving a new car was going to be tightened and interest rates would go up. Both savings and investment had stayed stationary. A balance of payments crisis was in the offing.

In short, what awaits us is a long, hot and very uncomfortable summer. The prime minister, instead of taking material steps to deal with the expected drought, sends messages from abroad that the people of Pakistan should pray for rain, Sethi observed wryly.

And perhaps most importantly, about how Pakistan fudges statistics to fool its own people

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default...8-5-2006_pg3_6

Quote:

Fourth, let no one question your judgment: Thus, his handpicked prime minister can declare to the world at large that Pakistan’s per capita income has doubled during the last four years. For per capita income to double in four years, it would have to grow at 25 percent a year. With population growing at two percent a year, this would suggest that national income had grown at 27 percent a year. But GDP growth has averaged between six and eight percent a year during the past four years.

So how could national income have grown at a rate almost four times higher than GDP? In his spare time, Aziz needs to begin penning a new economics textbook.

Archer · 05-29-2006, 23:20 PM

Heck even GDP growth in Pak is alleged to be fraudulent to do the usual compete with the infidels nonsense.

And the US gives billions every year plus has resscheduled debt galore, and written off debt.

If the US were to stop aid, (forget trade), Pak would be in deep doo-doo.

Archer · 05-29-2006, 23:28 PM

More and more Pakistanis are realising how they are being led down the garden path, all fudged figures aside

http://www.dawn.com/2006/05/22/ebr1.htm

Quote:

Economy — a reality check

By M. Ziauddin

Poverty: During the last drought cycle and when the government was still focusing on reducing the budgetary deficit by tightening the leash on expenditure under pressure from the IMF, almost 35 per cent of the population had fallen below the poverty line.

In the interim period following the injection of massive concessional assistance from outside, there has been a statistical improvement of five per cent or so in the situation. Still the level of poverty continues to hover around 30 per cent and not 25 per cent as has been claimed by the government in recent weeks.

The reason for this discrepancy is the government’s own attempts at fudging the poverty figures. It had used a figure of 32 per cent for the base year (2001) instead of the actual 35 per cent and now therefore it is forced to come up with an unrealistic figure of 25 per cent.

An exaggerated estimate of livestock population has also been used by this government year after year to window dress its overall growth figures, which it is likely to repeat again this year as the agriculture sector is likely to show a growth rate of no more than zero per cent.

Poverty has been variously defined. But those who do not have any landed asset, lack education (knowledge) and no access to the other assets do remain perpetually poor. In Pakistan, at least about 80 per cent of the population falls into this category.

So, no matter what you do to lessen poverty, you simply cannot succeed if you do not do realistic land reforms, promote the culture of lawful housing mortgage system, provide universal primary education to your population and disarm the warlords.

Pakistan spends far less than its South Asian neighbours on education do. Its annual education budget is only 2.3 per cent of the GDP while most low income countries spend on an average about 3.4 per cent.

Trade and current account deficits: And there is also the challenge of expanding trade and current account deficit which the budget makers will be facing this year. The exporters have made the most of the all the market access that we have so far received from the rich countries by way of a pay-off for joining them in the war against terror. And in the process, they have also exhausted all the idle manufacturing capacity. Now, in order to increase exports further, they would need to install new capacities and also find new markets.

But there is no sign of such a thing happening. And the expanding trade gap is being presently attempted to be covered by the using the $5 billion or so annual flows of remittances and the proceeds from privatisation. And what would happen once all the family silver is sold?

Luxury imports: There is certainly a lot of room to bring imports under control. But the appetite of the rich for expensive consumerism seems to have become inexhaustible and since they belong to the ruling elite who make economic policies, there is hardly any possibility of curbing expensive imports, especially of costly cars and fancy cell phones.

Shockingly, a number of plans are on anvil to ‘set up’ manufacturing units of new models of cars like Renault, Chrysler Daimler and Black Cabs etc.

But all of these brands are likely to be imported in assembled form or knocked down condition (CKDs of any model can be assembled in the available facilities that can be rented at economic rates) for at least three years on the plea that it would take as many years to put up a requisite plant.

And for setting up these plants, the well-connected sponsors are being allotted huge plots of land (at least about ten times more in size than the actual requirement) at throwaway prices. This is called foreign investment.

Basically, in Pak if you are connected - you can get away with anything.

Nutshell- Pakistani economic success:

UnitedPakistan · 05-29-2006, 23:56 PM

You waste a lot of your time. I read the first line and I did not bother to read the rest because the 1st line was yelling...I AM SPEAKING OUT OF MY ASS WITH UTTER NONSENSE!

04-30-2006, 19:06 PM	#2 (permalink)
Jay Tamizhanban *Senior Contributor* Join Date: 08-06-03 Location: Edison, NJ Posts: 6,498 Country:	http://worldaffairsboard.com/showthread.php?t=11697 __________________ A grain of wheat eclipsed the sun of Adam !!

05-29-2006, 21:50 PM	#6 (permalink)
Puressence Banished Join Date: 05-29-06 Posts: 42	Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet allows Taliban crazies to run wild less than 200 miles from their capital, and using rioting to make a point whenever there is a perceived slight against religion Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet constantly talks up the threat of war in South Asia, keeps yapping about strategic location as though malignant forces are constantly eyeing its land Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet still believes in using its secret services to destabilise its neighbours, as though that would have a positive effect on its own country risk. Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet Produces false statistics, stuffs major generals into any available position, allows extremists to gradually take over its universities, and achieves an ever poorer quality of discourse among its elites Pakistan wants to attract global investment, yet Most of all, shockingly, appears to want a sugar daddy to take care of all its other tiresome needs while it goes to war with its neighbours Hopeless. You might see hot money washing in to take advantage of short term gains, but major investment? What a tiresome country. It is acting much too big for its boots. Already it has more than half the population of America. Last edited by Puressence : 05-29-2006 at 21:53 PM.

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04-30-2006, 20:48 PM	#3 (permalink)
UnitedPakistan Banished Join Date: 04-30-06 Posts: 293	The article you have provided us is dated for... Last Updated: Monday, 24 April 2006, 23:57 GMT 00:57 UK While asim's article is dated... 30 April 2006

05-29-2006, 21:36 PM	#5 (permalink)
UnitedPakistan Banished Join Date: 04-30-06 Posts: 293	No, just the area in which we are discussing.

05-29-2006, 22:18 PM	#7 (permalink)
UnitedPakistan Banished Join Date: 04-30-06 Posts: 293	If that was the case than India has her entire foot sticking outside of the front of the boot.

05-29-2006, 22:28 PM	#8 (permalink)
Puressence Banished Join Date: 05-29-06 Posts: 42	I'm not being insulting of Pakistan. I'm just pointing out that your policies are inconsistent. Getting rid of the Taliban is not "for America". It's for Pakistan's own development. Name one first or second world country that is tolerant of armed bands running around in its own country beheading people and starting bush wars with its neighbours.

05-29-2006, 23:20 PM	#13 (permalink)
Archer *Senior Contributor* Join Date: 10-13-03 Posts: 2,888	Heck even GDP growth in Pak is alleged to be fraudulent to do the usual compete with the infidels nonsense. And the US gives billions every year plus has resscheduled debt galore, and written off debt. If the US were to stop aid, (forget trade), Pak would be in deep doo-doo.

05-29-2006, 23:56 PM	#15 (permalink)
UnitedPakistan Banished Join Date: 04-30-06 Posts: 293	You waste a lot of your time. I read the first line and I did not bother to read the rest because the 1st line was yelling...I AM SPEAKING OUT OF MY ASS WITH UTTER NONSENSE!

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