Operation Rah-e-Rast (Swat)

[SparklingCrescent]

Two key Taliban commanders arrested in Karachi

Karachi, Apr 1 (PTI) Two key Taliban commanders of the Mullah Fazlullah group, involved in a number of attacks in the northwestern Swat district, have been arrested here, as security agencies continue their swoop on extremists.

A senior police official said the CID had arrested Taliban commanders, Sardar Shah and Mohammad Sahir from the Sohrab Goth area on the outskirts of Karachi.

"Both are from Swat and Mingora and belong to the Maulana Fazlullah group and are aides of commander Ahsanullah," he said.

The official said that the arrest of the two commanders who are involved in attacking military posts in Swat would help in tracking down the elusive Taliban leader Maulana Fazlullah.

Intelligence agencies and police have in the past seven weeks claimed the arrest of some top Taliban commanders, the most prominent among them being Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the second-in-command of the Afghan Taliban.




2 TTP members involved in Swat attack arrested

KARACHI: Two members of the Tehreek-e-Taliban (TTP), who were involved in an attack on a check post in Swat that killed 25 soldiers in 2009, have been arrested, police said on Thursday. According to officials of Sindh Police Crime Investigation Department’s anti-Extremist Cell (AEC) the arrested men were identified as Sardar Shah alias Sardar Khan and Tahir. A special AEC team arrested the men from Sher Shah area in a raid conducted after a tip-off and two TT pistols were recovered on Sardar Shah’s indication while investigators are still searching for his companions, who are also hiding in the city. AEC chief senior superintendent of police (SSP) Omer Shahid said Shah was also involved in the bombing of a girls college and a suicide attack on a mosque in the Qabal area. He said Shah was the finance secretary of TTP’s Swat chapter and his name was placed on the ‘A’ category of most wanted terrorists. staff report

 

[ajpirzada]

By Karin Brulliard
Friday, April 2, 2010

A soldier helps children cross the street in a Swat Valley town. The army presence in Swat is larger than it was during the summer offensive. (Karin Brulliard/the Washington Post)

MINGORA, PAKISTAN -- Officially, the military operation to purge the Taliban from Pakistan's Swat Valley ended last summer. But even as life in the lush region returns to normal, the army's footprint is everywhere.

The military is rebuilding roads, schools and libraries. It is buying computers for women's vocational institutes and solar-powered streetlights for villages. It is planting a million trees. The work has made soldiers hugely popular, but some wonder why the civilian government is not doing it.

"The mandate of the army was to clear the area and to hold the area for peace. To build should be done by the civilians," said Zia ud-Din, an educator and spokesman for the Swat National Committee, a civil society group. "How long will we depend on them?"

There are competing explanations for why the military remains in the lead. Some U.S. and Pakistani military officials say Pakistan's anemic civilian government is too corrupt and bureaucratic to build on military progress by improving services and quality of life. Others say the military is too accustomed to control and too enthralled with its popularity to cede any power.

Pakistani officials say their objective is to prevent the rebels from regaining a foothold. Pakistan's successes over the past year in battling Islamist fighters in Swat and in the remote tribal area of South Waziristan have won the country high praise from U.S. officials. But at the same time, some American and Pakistani experts say the enduring military presence carries worrying implications, because it ties down forces needed to battle militants elsewhere and raises awkward questions about the country's efforts to emerge from a decade of military rule.

"They are carrying guns at the same time they are carrying shovels. It's sending the wrong signals," said Rifaat Hussain, a defense and security studies professor in Islamabad. "The civilians are completely dependent on the army."

To be sure, government offices in Swat are open, and they have reclaimed their chaotic bustle. Naeem Akhtar, a top civilian administrator, said officials have reduced a large backlog of court cases, surveyed 10,000 destroyed houses and shops, and plan to distribute $1 million in total compensation to families of victims or survivors of terrorist attacks.

"In the entire district, every nook and corner, the government is functioning," Akhtar said.

But security analysts say that keeping insurgents at bay requires the government not just to resume its functions but to improve them -- and that is the worry.

Outside the government complex on a recent day, Ehsan Ullah paced with a folder full of documents. He was injured in a bombing in February 2009, he said, and had spent months submitting paperwork for compensation, only to be shuffled from one office to another.

"Corruption, corruption, corruption, corruption, corruption," fumed the young man, waving a cellphone that he said he planned to sell that day to feed his family.



Usurping authority?

Of 401 schools bombed by militants or left dilapidated, half have been rebuilt. But it was the military, not the government, that rebuilt them while also providing temporary tents for other schools. By some estimates, the army has carried out 90 percent of the building and rebuilding projects -- a list so long that it took 20 minutes for Lt. Col. Akhtar Abbas, an army spokesman in the region, to recite.

The army has also set up mobile clinics in rural areas that have no government hospitals. At the occasional checkpoints in the valley, soldiers stand alongside police officers, and the army is working to enroll and train police recruits. With 50,000 soldiers in Swat, the military presence there is now larger than it was during the offensive.

The military says it will leave Swat when the provincial government asks. Ud-Din, the activist, said the continuing troop presence has created tensions, with provincial workers complaining privately that the army has usurped authority by "putting their noses into everything," in an effort to create dependency.

In South Waziristan, officials say they are prioritizing a rapid buildup of civilian institutions. Tariq Hayat Khan, the law and order secretary for the tribal areas, said the federal government had pledged -- though not yet fully delivered -- millions of dollars for a post-operation plan to prevent residents from "being mercenaries for the miscreants." It includes vocational schools, a buildup of community police and road construction.

But in both Swat and South Waziristan, there also appears to be widely felt apprehension about too quick a military drawdown. In the hectic city of Mingora, civil officials say the army is providing much-needed security and carrying out reconstruction projects that could not otherwise be funded. A senior Pakistani military official, for his part, was disparaging about his civilian partners. "Whenever we give them the job, they're not capable of doing it because of corruption," he said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the matter frankly.

"They completed this in two months," Mohammed Saeed, a principal in the village of Shamozai, said of the military's reconstruction of his school and renovation of its furniture. "I think if it had been done by the government, it would have taken 10 years."

washingtonpost.com

 

[Janbaz]

Breaking news on ARY: Important militant commander dead in Malakand clash, 2 soldiers wounded.

Fazlullah maybe?

 

[ajpirzada]

 

[SMC]

Guys, anyone mind editing the following in wikipedia?

Second Battle of Swat - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

We know the vast majority of the claims are BS and total lies. For instance, TTP in North West were separate from Swat. However this person (yes, person) is saying that if TTP are gone in Swat, howcome they are still fighting in North West? Then the claim about there being harsh resistance and Taliban holding strong in the areas mentioned and Pakistan military being at bay and Taliban holding strong in Swat. If anyone has the time and sources, please edit this page.

Seriously, I can't believe this nonsense and propaganda makes its way on wikipedia and stays there for a long time. Anyone wanna guess the nationality of who does this? I think I have a good idea.

 

[SMC]

The article cited was written like 4 days after the start of Rah-e-rast which of course meant Taliban were still quite strong at that time.

 

[air marshal]

Over 200 suspects arrested in Swat

The forces have launched a search drive in the vicinity of Mingora and captured over 200 suspects. The forces imposed curfew and launched search operation at Tahirabad, Usmanabad and Band in the vicinity of Mingora Tuesday morning. The troops arrested more than 200 suspected persons including two scribes of news channels. Most of the arrested persons were released after an identification parade.

Over 200 suspects arrested in Swat | Pakistan | News | Newspaper | Daily | English | Online

 

[fatman17]

Dancing girls of Swat back in business

MINGORA: Their cousin was kidnapped and killed in a hail of bullets — her body dumped at a roundabout, dripping blood.

That was 15 months ago when the Taliban roamed Swat with impunity.

Today, Shabana and her sister Shabnam are back in business, proffering their favours and their dancing skills to gentlemen with cash to spare on such extravagancies, now that the Islamist extremists have been pushed back by the Pakistan Army.

Business starts towards dusk. As the sun dips in the sky, Shabnam is already with a client.

“We used to receive death threats earlier, but not now,” she says, a year after the army offensive began and nine months since commanders declared the valley free of the Taliban.

The people of Swat suffered encroaching Muslim conservatism for years and in July 2007, radical cleric Fazlullah launched a Taliban insurgency to impose a harsh brand of Islamic law.

Dancing, music, art and films were outlawed by the Taliban and the punishment for violation was death or flogging, particularly for those associated with prostitution.

The mere fact that they are back in their meticulously clean quarters on the first floor of a house tucked away in a back street, attests to the success of the military campaign against the Taliban.

“The Taliban earlier threatened this whole street over their FM radio, telling us to stay at our homes like all the other women,” said Shabana.

After their cousin’s murder, they fled terrified to Peshawar, struggling to eke out an existence among clients they did not know and wondering if they would ever be able to return home.

Thousands of army troops were sent into the valley, following public uproar and international embarrassment over the Taliban control of the country’s top holiday destinations.

“The situation has normalised. There is no danger. Through the army we have security,” said Shabana.

The sisters say there is no threat but they exist on the fringes of a conservative society in a city where security is tense.

Their versions of Pakistan’s traditional clothes, shalwar kameez, are slashed at the ankle and upper arm. They go without headscarves and their readiness to even shake hands with men seems shockingly intimate in a place like Swat.

Respectable women outside cloak themselves in dupattas — shawls rammed onto the eyebrows and folded over the nose, with billowing material disguising even the bulkiest body from neck to calves..

In Pakistan, dancing girls are born into the trade. Shunned by mainstream society, daughters have no option but take up the family business when their mother’s beauty wanes, or in this case when Shabana’s mother died.

“There are 10 to 12 dancing girls in this street. Strangers are not allowed to come here. You can only come through a reference,” says Shabana.

Even her true identity is doubtful. She uses the same name as her murdered cousin. “People just look at our flesh, they don’t care about our names,” she said softly, by way of explanation. afp

 

[air marshal]

PESHAWAR: At least 11 militants were killed in a fresh action by the security forces in Orakzai Agency and Swat. - AFP

 

[Creder]

sir is main achi to koi baat bhi nai

Dancing girls of Swat back in business

MINGORA: Their cousin was kidnapped and killed in a hail of bullets — her body dumped at a roundabout, dripping blood.

That was 15 months ago when the Taliban roamed Swat with impunity.

Today, Shabana and her sister Shabnam are back in business, proffering their favours and their dancing skills to gentlemen with cash to spare on such extravagancies, now that the Islamist extremists have been pushed back by the Pakistan Army.

Business starts towards dusk. As the sun dips in the sky, Shabnam is already with a client.

“We used to receive death threats earlier, but not now,” she says, a year after the army offensive began and nine months since commanders declared the valley free of the Taliban.

The people of Swat suffered encroaching Muslim conservatism for years and in July 2007, radical cleric Fazlullah launched a Taliban insurgency to impose a harsh brand of Islamic law.

Dancing, music, art and films were outlawed by the Taliban and the punishment for violation was death or flogging, particularly for those associated with prostitution.

The mere fact that they are back in their meticulously clean quarters on the first floor of a house tucked away in a back street, attests to the success of the military campaign against the Taliban.

“The Taliban earlier threatened this whole street over their FM radio, telling us to stay at our homes like all the other women,” said Shabana.

After their cousin’s murder, they fled terrified to Peshawar, struggling to eke out an existence among clients they did not know and wondering if they would ever be able to return home.

Thousands of army troops were sent into the valley, following public uproar and international embarrassment over the Taliban control of the country’s top holiday destinations.

“The situation has normalised. There is no danger. Through the army we have security,” said Shabana.

The sisters say there is no threat but they exist on the fringes of a conservative society in a city where security is tense.

Their versions of Pakistan’s traditional clothes, shalwar kameez, are slashed at the ankle and upper arm. They go without headscarves and their readiness to even shake hands with men seems shockingly intimate in a place like Swat.

Respectable women outside cloak themselves in dupattas — shawls rammed onto the eyebrows and folded over the nose, with billowing material disguising even the bulkiest body from neck to calves..

In Pakistan, dancing girls are born into the trade. Shunned by mainstream society, daughters have no option but take up the family business when their mother’s beauty wanes, or in this case when Shabana’s mother died.

“There are 10 to 12 dancing girls in this street. Strangers are not allowed to come here. You can only come through a reference,” says Shabana.

Even her true identity is doubtful. She uses the same name as her murdered cousin. “People just look at our flesh, they don’t care about our names,” she said softly, by way of explanation. afp

 

[Abu Zolfiqar]

its an old tradition there......its part of the local culture

 

[blain2]

sir is main achi to koi baat bhi nai

I agree, but an alternate should be given to these women. The Taliban simply shut them up. The GoP should ensure they get some vocational/educational opportunities so they can get out of this lifestyle (one that none of these women enjoy).

 

[air marshal]

COAS visits Swat, inaugurates Govt. school at Tehsil Barikot

SAIDU SHARIF, April 21 (APP): Chief of the Army Staff, General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani here Wednesday visited village Shamozai of Tahsil Barikot and inaugurated a government school.

Corps Commander Peshawar Lt Gen Yasin Malik, In-charge Swat Operation Major General Ashfaq Nadeem and other senior military officers were accompanied with him.

The Army Chief also visited the Yadgar-e-Shuhada at Saidu Sharif and laid floral wreath on the Yadgar to pay tributes to the sacrifices of martyrs. He also offered Fateha for departed soul of martyrs.

Later, he also visited the Public Library setup near District Kacheri which has been reconstructed by army and orphanage Centre. He met with orphan children.

The Army Chief was given detailed briefing by the area commanders about latest security situation and relief work.

 

[air marshal]

 

[air marshal]