The deadliest terror strikes are frequently taking place in the country but nobody is taken to task for one reason or the other after such tragedies.
Inspite of visible security lapses in the backdrop of barbaric attacks, politicians, bureaucrats, police and paramilitary officers are never held accountable.
No senior government official replied on record when asked why “strict action” is not taken against those who are sitting at the helm of affairs. However, a few officers said on the condition of anonymity that the exercise to replace bigwigs after terror attacks could demoralise the forces.
More than 400 people including security personnel have been killed and over 1000 injured in suicide bombings across the country this year so far.
Nobody has been replaced from his position despite the fact that three terrorists breached security layers, stormed police academy, and killed 59 cadets and wounded 100 others in the Balochistan province.
All government officers, Ministers, and heads of security and law-enforcement agencies are “actively” working in their comfortable offices as usual, following the Quetta carnage.
This year, the Balochistan’s capital has seen the deadliest terror strikes including the attack on lawyers inside the Civil Hospital that left more than 75 people dead in August.
Ironically
, the security was on “high-alert” in the insurgency-infested province when the terrorists managed to reach the police training center without any physical checking. There were security check-posts in every nook and corner of the Quetta city but nobody intercepted the movement of the criminals.
According to the media reports,
Balochistan Inspector General of Police had demanded the provincial government to release funds for repairing the boundary wall months ago but nobody pay heed to his repeated requests.
Now there are reports that the terrorists entered the training center by scaling the same boundary wall.
The province has been bleeding while the law-enforcement agencies appeared to be the prime target of the terrorists. The police and security agencies are battling the militancy for the last couple of years but the authorities failed to ensure best security arrangements at key government installations like police headquarters in Quetta.
Initial investigations revealed that hundreds of young cadets were caught by surprise when the militants entered the ,otherwise, highly-guarded center and opened firing with assault rifles.
Many cadets were asleep while some were chatting with colleagues on their beds when militants struck the academy and started gunfire which continued for hours.
The government vows to punish the culprits after each terror strike. But, the key government Ministers, officers and officials are never taken to task even if “negligence” is proved on their part.
Everybody in Pakistan knows that those responsible for the security and intelligence failure in Quetta will never be held accountable but no one knows when those who masterminded and perpetrated the dastardly terror attack will be brought to justice. Even after the deadliest terror assault on the police training center, all gentlemen are working on “as is where is” basis.
The powerful people will stay on their posts since there is no pressure on the Federal government to fix responsibility of the security failure and hold accountable those responsible. Obviously, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, Balochistan CM Sanaullah Zehri and chiefs of the police and the paramilitary forces will retain their positions to “continue fighting militancy.”
For an instance, the country witnessed some deadliest terror strikes in the Punjab, Balochistan, and KPK provinces this year but no top government official was replaced or questioned over security lapse.
In early August, terrorists targeted the lawyers community in Quetta. More than 70 people mostly lawyers were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up in the Civil Hospital. Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, an offshoot of the Pakistani Taliban having links with ISIS, had claimed the responsibility for the attack.
The same group was behind the deadliest attack in the country so far this year; the suicide attack in a crowded Lahore park that killed 75 people on Easter Sunday in March. After claiming responsibility for the Gulshan-i-Iqbal park blast, the Jamaat-ul-Ahrar declared the start of a new terror campaign, “Sound of Thunder”.
The group posted an Urdu communiqué on its Facebook page early this year claiming that Christians were the prime target. The post also carried a photo of the bomber, identifying him as Salahuddin Khorasani.
Security experts state they believe the Quetta blast was identical to Lahore attack. The modus operandi was the same. Again, they selected a soft target. They used lethal combination (of explosives) to inflict maximum casualties.
The Monday’s barbaric assault comes barely two weeks after the Punjab Counter Terrorism Department killed no less than 17 members of the so-called Islamic State group in armed encounters which took place in different districts of the province.
Eight militants were killed in an anti-terror ‘combing operation’ in the Southern Punjab early this month. A week ago, at least six terrorists including one captor of Shahbaz Taseer, the son of slain Governor Salman Taseer, were killed in gun-battle with CTD in Punjab’s Sheikhupura district. Similarly, three members of the terror outfit were killed in Gujranwala district.
According to officials, the terrorists were planning to attack some sensitive installations as they were killed in the combing operations. Eight hand grenades, maps, and some pictures of IS leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi were also recovered from them.
Reportedly, they were affiliated with Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, and Daesh, the Middle East-based group which controls large swaths of Syria and Iraq.
As the country mourns the victims of the latest terror strike in Quetta, the government high-ups and top police and paramilitary officers are unlikely to be grilled over visible security lapses.
http://nation.com.pk/national/27-Oct-2016/who-is-responsible-for-security-lapses
