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The Battle for Orakzai & Khyber Agencies

Thirteen militant suspects killed in Orakzai

PARACHINAR: Officials say Pakistani troops have killed 13 suspected insurgents in the Orakzai tribal region near Afghanistan.

Local official Jahanzeb Khan says eight militants died after a battle over a checkpoint in the Bezod area of Orakzai.

Airstrikes killed five more in the Kasha area later Tuesday. Five alleged militants also were arrested in the Feroz Khel area.

Two intelligence officials confirmed the account on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to media.—AP
 
Aid must follow military gains in tribal areas: UN

* UN’s special envoy for assistance to Pakistan stresses need to address root causes of terrorism

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan and its Western backers should swiftly pour money into former Taliban bastions to ensure that military successes are not lost and keep the population on the government’s side, a UN envoy said on Tuesday.

The army has said it hit the Taliban hard over the past year with offensives, destroying bases, killing hundreds of fighters and clearing out many others in a bid to stabilise the country.

Jean-Maurice Ripert, the UN secretary general’s special envoy for assistance to Pakistan, said it was now essential to build on military gains by getting displaced people home and improving their economic plight to eradicate conditions that breed terrorism.

That, he said, will be the most critical battle in Pakistan and will require Western countries to urgently deliver larger amounts of humanitarian assistance to those affected by the fighting.

“I don’t think that people should judge only by the number of commanders who have been killed or made prisoners. We also have to control the space, and reducing the space of operations of the Taliban is as important,” he said.

“We know that some of the Taliban’s fighters are fighting more for money than for jihad,” Ripert said.

To break that pattern, Pakistan must create jobs, improve education and put in place effective police forces and a judiciary that will fight corruption in the northwest, one of the poorest areas in the country, he said.

“We have to provide to the people the tools and the means to see that life is better with peace and democracy than with the Taliban. In a way if we are unable to rebuild schools and provide education to kids, including girls we will fail,” said Ripert.

The problem is Pakistan’s government faces a host of economic challenges and can’t afford to pour too many resources into the northwest.

If more money does not start to flow to displaced people quickly and in large volumes, some projects may have to be closed and new ones, particularly related to the return of the displaced, might not be launched. reuters
 
Nice Article fatman17, ofcourse this is what has to be done...

But the government has lots of more important stuff to do, like retaining Jamshed Dasti's services whose phenomenal intellectual prowess cannot be dispensed with in these critical times.
When ministers who are proven frauds in the court and have to resign as a result are still deliberately allowed to be part of the government in advisory role, the message is not so positive regarding how focused the Government is on the core issues at hand.

People like Raja Parwez Ashraf, Babar Awan and Rehman Malik are most incompetent and yet wield tremendous influence in the current setup.
Their statements may suit them well if it were a comic relief side show, sadly they are in the government of Pakistan.

The 18th amendment will not provide electricity, it will not address the inflation and it certainly will not magically restore the economy.
As long as these things remain unresolved i do not see a great improvement.
If the legislation takes up all the energy of the government then it is simply not acceptable performance from such a large parliament which has become a great big white elephant.

The problems which need to be addressed are quite obvious and simply require a sustained and sincere effort to address them based on a clear short to long term vision.
Is it too much to ask from the government to work sincerely and focus on these issues and devise a clear cut road map?
I guess it is literally too much to ask from these people if after 3 years we still have no idea where the energy sector will get its power from?

Army will achieve its military goals by sacrificing a lot, the people will support Army as best as they can and will make a brave stand as well...however the overwhelming barriers in way of development are now not even just prevalent in FATA but all over the country, the Government not only needs to step up its efforts in FATA, it needs to deliver on the energy, agriculture and industrial sectors all over the country.

Army has established field hospitals, made roads etc in some areas in FATA, these are really appreciated by the locals.
However it is not the job of Army, the government has to perform.
Sadly the government still is not performing in the areas which are far more developed and secure, what it shall achieve in FATA is not clear yet.

I just hope all the sacrifices do not end up in vain, not that we should remain mute against terrorist infestation.
However the government has performed below par, i am all for democracy etc. but it does not mean that we ignore the aspects of good governance which are supposed to be the real aim of any system be it democracy, socialism etc.
 
Militants blow up three girls’ schools
PAKISTAN - 30 APRIL 2010

KALAYA: Unidentified militants blew up three primary girls’ schools in Mamozai area of Upper Tehsil, tribal sources said on Thursday.

The schools were destroyed early in the day, bringing to 15 the number of schools destroyed since the military operation was launched in the region on March 23. Besides, two healthcare centres have also been bombed in Orakzai Agency during this period.

Meanwhile, the political administration arrested 26 persons for looting the houses abandoned by internally displace people due to the ongoing military operation in Ferozkhel area of Orakzai Agency on Thursday.

They arrested were also involved in inciting violence among the local rival sects. Some of the arrested men were identified as Babar, Malik Awan Ali, Ashkat Ali, Siddique Ali, Jabir Ali, Karamat Ali, Mutahir Hussain, Mumtaz Ali, Shakeel Khan, Ashraf Khan, Iftikhar Ali, Majid Hussain and Ameer Ali. The political administration has handed over a list of 40 persons involved in act of looting to the elders of the Manikhel tribe and demanded that they be handed over to the government.


Source: The News International
 
‘Pakistan to get $600m in CSF funds quickly’

WASHINGTON: The US plans to quickly transfer $600 million to Pakistan to reimburse the government for military operations over the last year, the Pentagon said on Thursday. “There has been some concern on Pakistan’s part about the rate at which they are reimbursed for the Coalition Support Funds for their efforts in the war on terror on our behalf within their borders,” Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell said at a news conference. “We have made great strides over the past few weeks to try to accelerate reimbursement payments to the Pakistanis... We have, I think, in total about $600 million that is in route or will soon be in route in the next few weeks to Pakistan to reimburse them for their operations over the past year.” The payment delay has been a source of friction and has contributed to Pakistan’s economic woes. The US is in arrears in paying about $2 billion in military aid to Pakistan under the so-called Coalition Support Fund. reuters
 
Troops kill at least eight militants in Orakzai
Friday, 30 Apr, 2010

PESHAWAR: Troops pressing an anti-Taliban offensive into a second month in a tribal district near the Afghan border killed at least eight militants on Friday, officials said.

Clashes broke out during a military search operation in Goain village, about 25 kilometres west of Kalaya, the main town in Orakzai district, local administration official Fazle Qadir told AFP.

Orakzai is the latest district in northwest Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal area where the military has launched an operation to evict Taliban militants.

Although senior military officials confirmed Friday's fighting and death toll, it is impossible to confirm casualty statistics independently in what is a closed military zone inaccessible to aid workers and journalists.

“At least eight militants were killed during a search operation and four of the wounded militants were arrested,” the local official said.

Two soldiers were also injured in the fighting, Qadir added.

Security forces launched the Orakzai offensive on March 24 in a bid to flush out Taliban fighters who escaped a major assault on South Waziristan last year.

DAWN.COM | Pakistan | Troops kill at least eight militants in Orakzai
 
analysis: Tirah massacre: insensitive state response —Farhat Taj

The Pakistan army simply does not have the tradition to punish its rank and file, unless the aggrieved party is also from within the army

Recently, Pakistan Air Force fighter planes bombed Sra Vella area in the Tirah Valley of Khyber Agency, killing over 70 innocent civilians from the Kuki Khel tribe of the area and injuring dozens more. The air force bombed these people on the directives of the Pakistani Army. To add insult to the injury of the Kuki Khels, the political agent of Khyber, Mr Shafeerullah Wazir, said that 45 militants were killed and two hideouts were also destroyed in the Sra Vella bombing.

The army acknowledged the civilian deaths when media reports established, beyond doubt, that the victims were indeed innocent civilians. The chief of army staff tendered an apology to the Kuki Khel tribe and offered financial compensation of Rs 20 million to the affected families.

The day after the apology, I was utterly surprised to see that leading English and Urdu dailies carried announcements by the Kuki Khel tribesmen accepting the apology. Could the Kuki Khels be so profoundly insensitive to their own people, I wondered. The dead bodies are newly buried. The injured are still in hospitals; some are struggling for life. The grief of the affected families is too fresh. In such a situation, an apology, even if it comes from the most powerful man in Pakistan — General Kayani — would be hard to accept by the grief-stricken families. How could they publish this announcement?

With these thoughts in mind, I decided to contact the Kuki Khel tribesmen and women for their views. I discussed this issue with 16 Kuki Khel men and women. They are students, housewives, tribal leaders, farmers, people linked with the transport business and political activists.

Not a single one of them owned up to the announcement. All of them said they did not know of any fellow Kuki Khels who associated themselves with this newspaper snippet. All of them unanimously condemned it and claimed that the political agent of the Khyber Agency had issued the announcement. Nearly half of them said that it was a cheap attempt by the political agent to curry favour with the Pakistani Army and paint himself in the good books of the military establishment for his own selfish motives. The other half opined that the political agent issued the announcement on the directives of the Pakistani Army to protect the reputation of the institution in the face of the media coverage on the Kuki Khel massacre.

All of them said that General Kayani’s apology was a good symbolic gesture, but it was neither enough nor sufficient. General Kayani, they said, has to do much more to convince the Kuki Khels that the massacre was not deliberate and on purpose. They demanded an independent judicial commission to investigate the killings in the Sra Vella to determine the causes. All those in military uniform — if found guilty by the commission — must be court-martialed and dishonourably removed from service. These are the demands of the Kuki Khels.

Rejecting the army’s compensation package given to the affected Kuki Khel families as ‘peanuts and lollipops’, they demand a similar compensation to the one offered to the families of martyred officers of the Pakistani Army. The Kuki Khels, they argue, are no less loyal to the state than those officers of Pakistan.

Some of them also claimed that the state-provided food items, on their way to the affected families in Sra Vella, were confiscated by the militants linked with the Mangal Bagh group based in Bara, Khyber Agency. The authorities have made no attempts to recover the food items.

This was the view of the Kuki Khels. My own view is that the Pakistani Army should heed the Kuki Khel’s demand for a judicial commission. The Kuki Khel tribe has always been loyal to Pakistan and has resisted the incursions of the Taliban and al Qaeda in their area. A simple apology and mere peanuts and lollipops are just not enough. The Kuki Khel loyalty to the state must be responded to with an independent judicial commission and a better compensation package for the affected families.

This, however, seems to be wishful thinking on the part of the Kuki Khels and myself. The Pakistan Army simply does not have the tradition to punish its rank and file, unless the aggrieved party is also from within the army. The people accused of assassination attempts on former dictator Musharraf were given capital punishment within a short span of time. The civilian victims of army killings, especially those from FATA, were never given any justice.

Right now, Major General Nadeem Ijaz is facing an inquiry in Benazir Bhutto’s assassination case. Let us see whether the Pakistan Army will show some respect for the rule of law, either in Bhutto’s assassination or the Tirah massacre.


The writer is a research fellow at the Centre for Interdisciplinary Gender Research, University of Oslo, and a member of Aryana Institute for Regional Research and Advocacy. She can be reached at bergen34@yahoo.com
 
Pakistan Security Brief - April 30, 2010


Wali ur-Rehman is leading the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP); Hakimullah Mehsud reportedly releases a video; Pakistan warming to the idea of a military operation in North Waziristan; security forces clash with militants in Orakzai; Asian Tigers kill former ISI officer; tribal elders still believe South Waziristan is too dangerous;


FATA

Despite reports indicating the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) commander, Hakimullah Mehsud, is alive, intelligence officials now believe Wali ur-Rehman is leading the militant organization. Wali ur-Rehman and Hakimullah fought over the chief TTP position following the death of Baitullah Mehsud in 2009. The Express Tribune claims to have received a video of Hakimullah Mehsud on Friday, although its contents are unknown.[1]

Recent statements from Western diplomats and Pakistani security officials suggest the Pakistani military is accepting the idea of a military operation in North Waziristan. Several different militant groups—some of which carry out attacks in neighboring Afghanistan—are operating out of the agency. Officials have not detailed the specifics or timing of such an operation.[2]

Pakistani security forces clashed with militants in Orakzai during a search operation in Goain village on Friday. Reports indicate at least eight militants were killed in the fighting. Militants also launched rockets at an army camp in Darra Adam Khel on Friday, and one militant died in the skirmish that followed.[3]

Members of the Asian Tigers, the group holding two former ISI officers and a journalist, shot one of the former officers, Khalid Khwaja. Khwaja’s body was discovered on the Miramshah-Mirali road in North Waziristan on Friday. The Asian Tigers claimed responsibility in a note attached to Khwaja’s body.[4]

Although Pakistani officials claim South Waziristan is free of militants, tribal elders are refusing to return to their homes in the agency. The elders believe militants still operate in the area, making a return home too dangerous.[5]
 
These scumbags warned us over South Waziristan as well. There aint enough places to hide anymore TTP, come out and die like men even if y'all didn't live like em.
Take some bullets in yours chests and leave the country alone. The times here. You can threaten but its coming...........
 
Pakistani army kills 22 Taliban near Afghan border

Writer Hussain Afzal, Associated Press Writer – 35 mins ago

PARACHINAR, Pakistan – Army helicopter gunships pounded insurgent hideouts in northwest Pakistan on Sunday, killing at least 22 militants, a government official said.

Samiullah Khan said the hideouts hit were in the Dabori area and its neighboring villages of the Orakzai tribal region near the Afghan border. He added the aerial strikes also destroyed six militant compounds.

Khan said the militants fired mortars at an army checkpoint in Mishti Mela area in Lower Orakzai, wounding two soldiers.

Pakistani forces launched an operation in Orakzai in mid-March to flush out militants who last year fled an army offensive in South Waziristan. The troops are believed to have retaken several areas from the Taliban in the region.

Thousands of people have fled the area. Most of them have moved in with relatives in nearby districts.

Independent confirmation of the casualties and the identities of those killed is virtually impossible because the region is remote and dangerous and media access there is restricted.

The tribal region is the primary base of Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud.

Mehsud was believed killed in a mid-January suspected U.S. missile strike, but intelligence officials now say he is thought to have survived.

The Taliban had always denied the strike killed Mehsud, though failed to offer any evidence such as video footage of him.

Pakistani army kills 22 Taliban near Afghan border - Yahoo! News
 
Pakistani jets target Taliban positions, kill 19

KALAYA, Pakistan (Reuters) – Pakistani warplanes bombed Taliban positions in the northwest on Sunday, killing at least 19 militants, a government official said.

Government forces have stepped up offensives in the Orakzai and Khyber regions on the Afghan border to root out militants waging a campaign to topple the U.S.-backed government of President Asif Ali Zardari.

The military says several hundred Taliban fighters have been killed in the operations but there has been no independent confirmation of that. The Taliban usually dismiss the army's death toll figures.

The latest air strikes in the Okakzai region were carried out in several remote villages after intelligence showed that militants there had been planning attacks, the government official, Asghar Khan, told Reuters.

(Reporting by Hassan Mahmood; Writing by Kamran Haider; Editing by Maria Golovnina)

Pakistani jets target Taliban positions, kill 19 - Yahoo! News

Probably the same airstrike as the previous post but putting here just in case.
 
How much man power do they left? I mean, they must be losing at least 100 a month.
 
These scumbags warned us over South Waziristan as well. There aint enough places to hide anymore TTP, come out and die like men even if y'all didn't live like em.
Take some bullets in yours chests and leave the country alone. The times here. You can threaten but its coming...........

Only problem is we can't chase them across the border where ANA provide them protection.
 
If we go into NW, Army should be provided with enormous air support.Couple of fighters must be loitering around Waziristan and as soon as some high scumbag is spotted call in strike.Mirages can be used for this purpose with A2A Refueling and F16 too (They can fly and land another f16 can then go with full payload and fuel) That alone will save alot of soldiers lives.
 
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