Thought I'd pop in for a second from my hiatus to post this:
Analysts say India fanning unrest in Balochistan
* RAND Corporation expert says Indian officials informed
her of pumping money into Balochistan
NEW YORK: Pakistan has legitimate concerns about Indias involvement in Afghanistan and about possibilities of New Delhi fanning unrest in Balochistan, top experts on South Asia noted in a discussion on Monday.
They said the concerns needed to be addressed for regional security.
I think it is unfair to dismiss the notion that Pakistan's apprehensions about Afghanistan stem in part from its security competition with India," Christine Fair, a leading American expert on South Asia said.
"Having visited the Indian mission in Zahedan, Iran, I can assure you they are not issuing visas as the main activity. Moreover, India has run operations from its mission in Mazar and is likely doing so from the other consulates it has reopened in Jalalabad and Qandahar along the (Pak-Afghan) border.
Pumping:
"Indian officials have told me privately that they are pumping money into Balochistan. Kabul has encouraged India to engage in provocative activities such as using the Border Roads Organisation to build sensitive parts of the Ring Road and use the Indo-Tibetan police force for security."
Fair, who is a senior political analyst with RAND Corporation, also pointed out that India was "also building schools on a sensitive part of the border in Kunar, across from Bajaur. Kabul's motivations for encouraging these activities are as obvious as India's interest in engaging in them".
She said it would be a mistake to completely disregard Pakistan's regional perceptions due to doubts about Indian competence in executing covert operations.
Shaun Gregory, director of the Pakistan Security Research Unit at the University of Bradford, emphasised the importance of addressing root causes of terrorism that threatened regional stability.
In this respect, he said anyone seeking greater stability in the region, or seeking to wean support for extremists and terrorists in the country" has to address Pakistan's legitimate security needs".
"This means working with neighbouring countries to draw the sting of issues such as Kashmir and Balochistan. Pakistan, for its part, must move to a fairer federal dispensation and take the opportunity for bilateral progress with India that the present context offers," he said.
Fears: Touching on a point in the context of Indo-Pak tensions and the Indian involvement in 1971 events, Stephen Cohen, a senior expert associated with Washington's Brookings Institution, said US-India nuclear deal had added to fears among some Pakistanis that the US might tilt in favour of India.
Sumit Ganguly, professor of Political Science at Indiana University, said he "never suggested that the Indians have purely humanitarian objectives in Afghanistan. That said their vigorous attempts to limit Pakistan's reach and influence there stem largely from being systematically bled in Kashmir".
"Their role in Afghanistan is a pincer movement designed to relieve the pressure in Kashmir. Whether it will work remains an open question. Meanwhile, I know that the Indians have mucked around in Sindh in retaliation for Pakistani involvement in the Punjab crisis."
However, Ganguly claimed that as much as the Indians may boast about their putative pumping of funds into Balochistan, the evidence for that was thin. app
Daily Times - Leading News Resource of Pakistan
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Fair's comments also match up with Prasun Sengupta's reported conversations with Indian Army officers of the rank of one star generals and higher:
The past week was by all accounts a momentous one, as no less a person than former Pakistani President and former Chief of the Army Staff, Gen (Ret'd) Pervez Musharraf, assertively disclosed what has been a 'no-go' area for India's mainstream media and the otherwise hyper-ventilating broadcast media thus far: that India's Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA) has, since 2002, waged a highly successful covert war against Pakistan by actively rendering all kinds of financial assistance to Balochistan-based separatists.
But mind you, such covert warfare has not been waged by the Research & Analysis Wing (RAW), but by the tri-services DIA and Afghanistan's Riyast-i-Amniyat-i-Milli, and in addition to his routine assignment as India's Defence Adviser at the Embassy in Kabul, Brigadier Ravi Datt Mehta was officially dolling out huge financial assistance--as ordered by the DIA--to the Baloch separatists as and when required.
For the past one year such activities being undertaken by the DIA wer, in fact, openly discussed by both serving and retired senior military officials at both the Armed Forces Gymkhana and the United Services Institution within the National Capital Region.
TRISHUL: Too Many Secrets....
and ..
A major new ISSA study, The Defense & Foreign Affairs Handbook on Pakistan, has reported that Indian security services, working with Afghan Government intelligence officials, have been providing arms, intelligence, training, and other support to jihadist fighters to destabilize Pakistans North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) and Pakistani tribal areas.
The 260pp study also cited US intelligence sources as confirming the Indian and Afghan Government actions, but said that the US was taking no steps to stop the destabilization of Pakistan, despite the fact that Pakistani cooperation with the international peacekeeping operations is critical to the success of the war to halt the Taliban in Afghanistan, and despite the fact that Pakistan which is currently now a net importer of food is providing massive food aid to Afghanistan.
STRATEGICSTUDIES.ORG
